William Dalrymple criticises article claiming Indians don't read for pleasure

Historian and author William Dalrymple has criticised an article published by The Guardian, calling it “ignorant and irritating” for suggesting that Indians do not read for pleasure despite hosting a large number of literature festivals.

The criticism followed a report on the newspaper’s website that questioned why India hosts more than 100 literature festivals while allegedly having low levels of recreational reading.

Dalrymple, a co-founder of the Jaipur Literature Festival, rejected the claim and pointed to strong reader engagement at literary events across the country.

In a post on X, Dalrymple said sessions at the Jaipur Literature Festival are “massively crowded” and attended by “passionate, nerdy young readers” from diverse backgrounds. He added that authors often experience the longest signing queues of their careers while in India. Dalrymple noted that more than 44,000 books were sold over five days at the most recent edition of the festival.

The Jaipur Literature Festival concluded its 19th edition last month, bringing together more than 500 speakers from over 40 countries. Participants included Nobel laureates Esther Duflo and Olga Tokarczuk, International Booker Prize winner Banu Mushtaq, and Booker Prize winner Kiran Desai.

Several readers and writers echoed Dalrymple’s criticism, arguing that equating spectacle with superficiality was flawed. Some pointed to global events such as the Frankfurt Book Fair to argue that scale and glamour do not undermine a culture of reading but reflect literature’s wider cultural reach.

Others cited India’s book fairs, street book markets, and secondhand book culture as evidence of a strong and growing readership, saying the article overlooked the country’s literary diversity and deep engagement with books.