Kathakar to Recapture the Worldwide Magic of Storytelling

NEW DELHI:
The national capital will be abuzz with captivating narration of ethnic tales from around the globe this week as Kathakar 2019 is all set to roll out India’s only oral storytelling festival for three evenings from October 11.

A bunch of professional and passionate raconteurs from all over the world will weave the magic of storytelling as the ninth edition at annual festival is to be held in the city’s Sunder Nursery, a 16th-century heritage park complex adjacent to the Humayun’s Tomb. With 17 sessions in total post-sunset, the October 11-13 event being organised chiefly by cultural forum Nivesh also features morning segments in a string of Delhi schools.

Kathakar, partnered by Himalayan Hub for Art, Culture and Heritage (HHACH) and Babaji Music, is open to the public. The storytelling sessions focus on India’s rare art forms as well as native tales from the host country, besides Poland, Australia, Sweden, Romania, Mongolia, Lithuania and the United Kingdom.

One highlight will be ‘Kissey Kahani Aur Adakaari’ session with actor Manoj Bajpayee in conversation with musician Mohit Chauhan, the patron of the festival. The duo will inaugurate the festival on Friday (Oct. 11) at 7.30 pm.

Theatre artist Danish Hussain will present a self-directed adaptation of ‘Qissebazi: A Multilingual Storytelling Orbit’. Kerala’s traditional Tholpavakoothu puppeteers will enchant the audience with their famed shadow theatre based on the theme of Tamil epic Kamba Ramayana.

Also for the first time, Kathakar 2019 will see Buddhist chanting by Grammy Awardee Monks of Sherabling in Himachal Pradesh. In another first, aborigine storyteller Uncle Larry Walsh will recount his indigenous tales — his debut experience with an Indian audience. Filmmaker Imtiaz Ali, too, will share his stories about filmmaking.

The festival debuted in 2010 as an initiative of a trio of sibling sisters Prarthana, Rachna and Shaguna Gahilote, who have played a stellar role in reviving storytelling as a standalone art form through dramatic performances and travelling festivals. While Shaguna is a master storyteller, Prarthana and Shaguna have written a book titled Curious Tales from the Himalayas, featuring eleven folk stories from the Himalayan belt between Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh eastward.

Emilia Raiter, a Polish storyteller performing at this edition, is a renowned harpist who sings ballads from her country. UK-based Emily Hennessey will perform Indian folktales of Kali and the Mahabharata. There will also be stories from around the world, in particular, European countries like Romania and Sweden besides Australia.

Further, the festival features two sets of Qissebazi, which will regale the audience with the multi-lingual project that showcases Haryanvi folktales performed by women artists Rashmi Mann and Ruchita Tahiliani.

The morning sessions facilitate the participation of children from Delhi’s municipal, government, private, community and civil society school. The sessions are divided in primary and secondary level where children from the age group of eight years onwards listen to the stories.

The festival was first launched under the aegis of UNESCO as part of Ghummakkad Narain, a travelling literature festival in memory of Thakur Vishva Narain Singh, the first Braille editor in India who was an ardent reader and literature.