Writers, filmmakers on speaker list for annual literary festival

An impressive lineup of international authors will take part in this year's Shanghai International Literary Festival, which gets under way today.

Over the coming weeks, local people can look forward to a diverse range of debates, presentations and readings by a host of emerging and established writers, sinologists, journalists, filmmakers, photographers and historians, the organizers said.

The event runs until March 21 at M on the Bund, while a sister event, the Capital Literary Festival, will be held at Capital M in Beijing from March 16-23.

Michelle Garnaut, owner of M, told Shanghai Daily that both events will feature a broad selection of guests, though their content will differ according to local tastes.

"We differentiate between Shanghai and Beijing because some topics are of greater interest here than in Beijing."

Among the guests in Shanghai will be writer and historian William Dalrymple, wine critic Jancis Robinson, cinematographer Christopher Doyle, journalist Evan Osnos, and comedian Doc Brown.

In the 1980s, Dalrymple traveled more than 12,000 miles to retrace the journey made by Marco Polo from Jerusalem to Xanadu.

He later chronicled his experiences in his 1989 work "In Xanadu."

The author will recount his travels and talk about his work from 2012: "Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan."