It was with fanfare and a crowded hall that the second Islamabad Literature Festival opened at Margalla Hotel on Friday afternoon under the auspices of Oxford University Press.
Last year, was the festival’s maiden voyage in Islamabad, following the successes of similar events in Karachi since 2010, and in Lahore, where several publishing houses have joined hands in organising such annual events.
“I have been asked to organise such events in other cities,” said Ameena Saiyid, the Managing Director of Oxford in her opening speech. “I tell them that they should go ahead themselves. We have now made a model for how to do it,” she said, underlining that books will always be with us, in spite of modern technologies, e-books and other communication forms.
