Literature festival ends on melodic note

Event aims to promote reading culture among youth

RAWALPINDI:

The two-day Rawal Literature Festival that commenced at the Rawalpindi Arts Council (RAC) with the aim to promote the culture of book reading in society concluded on Wednesday.

According to the organisers, the event was being held with the aim to promote reading culture among youth.

On the second day of the festival, organised by the PAC, the first session titled "Literary Organisations and Their Role" was held in which Mazhar Shehzad, Khaleequr Rehman, Sabah Kazmi, Ali Aszar Samar, and Nargis Jahanzeb participated as panelists with famous writer Jahangir Imran as the host.

The participants of the discussion said that the promotion of literary organisations plays an important role in the promotion of literature. Literature is an integral part of any society and spearheads change.

Artists performs the Attan, a traditional Pashtun folk dance, at the ‘Rawal Literary Festival’ organised by Rawalpindi Arts Council. PHOTO: EXPRESS

As civilisations advance, so do languages. Their vocabulary increases and rules become clearer, they observed.

The second session titled 'Fiction Mai Boltay Shehar' was hosted by Dr Qasim Yaqub, in which Irfan Ahmed Arfi, Farheen Chaudhry, Dr Arshad Waheed, Mohammad Asim Butt, Akhtar Raza Salimi and Dr Humira Hamad participated.

The participants expressed their views that fiction is the finest of all genres and is a vibration that can shake the whole being of the reader.

In the session titled "Literature and Humor" Muhammad Suleman played the host while the panel members included Yar Muhammad, Anjam Malik, Saeed Anwar, Aslam Mughal, Hameed Babar, Shagfita Khan, and Imran Rushdie. Discussing humour, the participants said that humour does not limit itself to making people laugh. Humour exposes the imperfections of the individual in such a way that the readers laugh out loud. The first traces of humour in Urdu prose are found in ancient stories. On the contrary, examples of standard humour and elegance are found in the letters of Mirza Ghalib. During the fourth session "Film and Culture", an interesting discussion between Irfan Ahmad Urfi and writer and director Shoaib Haroon took place. Shoaib Haroon said that culture is not a static object but a dynamic element. Culture changes with time. The promotion of culture is subject to the development of film and film is more effective than other mediums or sources in terms of communication power, they remarked.

The act of making and watching a film is the result of the mobilisation of the will as it encompasses all the arts and conveys serious messages to the audience in the guise of entertainment.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 15^th, 2023.