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The Hong Kong International Literary Festival (HKILF) announces today that their twentieth edition will go ahead in November as a hybrid festival of live and online events.
This year, Hong Kong’s premier literary event includes two authors who have been longlisted for the 2020 Booker Prize, Colum McCann and C Pam Zhang; Irish Fiction laureate Sebastian Barry; Crazy Rich Asians author Kevin Kwan, Ogilvy vice-chairman Rory Sutherland; Pulitzer Prize winners Jhumpa Lahiri and Jonathan Kaufman; Vera and Shetland crime series author Ann Cleeves; poets Marilyn Chin and Mary Jean Chan, to name but a few. Additionally, there will be a vibrant group of Hong Kong and regional writers and speakers including Chan Koonchung, Dorothy Tse, Kai-Yin Lo, Christine Loh, Elizabeth Sinn, and many more.
The twentieth edition theme, Present Tense/Future Perfect, explores in fiction and non-fiction how the world is responding to issues such as health, inequality and climate change, as well as possible future directions for humanity and the planet. Lynda Gratton and Andrew Scott will discuss their latest book, The New Long Life: A Framework for Flourishing in a Changing World, and discussion panels will examine issues such as the future of US politics and US-China relations, racism in Asia, the world post-COVID-19, and the future of food.
Other highlights include a series of book talks and film screenings at the Asia Society, featuring Kevin Kwan, Benjamin Law, and Bruce Lee’s daughter Shannon Lee discussing her book, Be Water My Friend: The Teachings of Bruce Lee. Novelist Romesh Guneskera who took part in the first festival in 2001 will join again, and Hong Kong-born poet Marilyn Chin and her iconic work, Urban Love Poem, will close the festival, with Chin and other local and international poets reading their own urban love poetry about Hong Kong.
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