Why Peer Curated Festivals Resonate Best With Young Adults

As people streamed into the hall, sitting on mats close to the stage or chairs set up behind them, I saw the event that I had been working towards for months finally come together.

It all started in early June with the idea to create a literature festival for young adults and by young adults. Growing up, I had found a pressing lack of spaces in which I could explore my love of books with like-minded teenagers. Reading was a solitary activity for me, but one that I found greater joy in when I could share it with friends. 

So, I decided to pursue the ambitious idea of creating a literature festival of a wholly unique nature with no prior experience. It was an incredibly daunting task, but I was driven by a desire to create a forum for young people to come together and share their love for reading and a platform to highlight the wonderful catalogue of Indian literature too often ignored within India itself. I wanted to help young readers deepen their love for the regional books and authors that they knew and discover the ones they could grow to love. 

My desire to appeal to all readers and my belief in the variety of wonderful Indian literature motivated me to choose a diverse range of speakers for the event.

I planned everything from author talks to a quiz to a conversation about visual storytelling. It was an incredibly rewarding experience, but a challenging one too. At first, I struggled to reach my audience and felt as if I was constantly fighting fires. Yet, as I saw the growing excitement and awareness regarding the event, I knew I had to make it a reality. 

Young readers, young voices

The day itself reminded me of why I had wanted to create such a festival, and why it had felt so necessary. I saw creativity, knowledge, and passion that was only possible in a space that was designed by young adults for young adults. An almost instant ease and connection between the teenage speakers of the YA panel and the young audience reinforced the importance of that foundational element of the festival.

Even as I was guided through the process by Lubaina Bandukwala of Peek A Book, we remained aware of the importance of platforming the voices of young people. We achieved this goal not only through the panel but also through the interactive nature of every session. With Priya Sreedharan, in the span of forty-five minutes, the young adult audience had learned how to use the art of visual storytelling and how to apply it, appointing a director, costume designer, and screenwriter from within the audience and developing a conceit for the story. During Fiona Fernandez’s quiz, I saw every adult in the room taken aback by how much a bunch of kids knew about the city they had grown up in. 

It was not simply young voices that were crucial to the festival for me, but diverse young voices. I sought out attendees from NGOs like OSCAR Foundation, private schools in the city like BIS and St Marys, and individuals from all sorts of backgrounds. They were all united by a passion for reading. 

I saw the members of our audience develop an interest in Indian literature in real time as Shabnam Minwalla spoke about pulling from regional history to write her dual narrative. This passion for sharing regional literature also drives my podcast, Talking Books, in which I invite guests to share a favourite novel of theirs by an Indian author leading into a conversation about diversity and representation, among many other topics. With the podcast, like with the festival, I want to reach young people who love reading and have a burgeoning interest in Indian literature, one that I can help nurture. 

At Multi Storied, I saw that interest being nurtured. I am happy with the space that we created because I saw the beginning of a conversation that I know will not be easily silenced. I saw young readers excitedly go up to the speakers and ask questions after their talks and buy books written by the writers who had kept them entranced for the last forty-five minutes. I know the conversation we started will not end there because those children will go home and read those books and they’ll see the abundance of brilliant regional literature waiting for them. 

Most importantly, I know the readers and writers felt seen and felt their passion nurtured by every young writer who was shortlisted and won our short story competition. With Jerry Pinto promising he had once been just like them, and encouraging them to try writing, just to try it. With the questions, they asked that they couldn’t have asked anywhere else. Multi Storied was a place for them to ask those questions, and answer them together. 

Navya Banga is the founder of Multi Storied YA by YA Lit Fest. Views expressed by the author are their own

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