Starter Kit. Idea 394 of 500. Cluster 19
Jaffna and Kandy literary festivals to sit beside Galle's
The mechanism, from the book
Eight World Heritage Sites and 2,300 years of records, and the country's story is told to the world by other people.
The first step
Organise a single afternoon of readings in Jaffna or Kandy with three local writers, in a school hall or a library, and sell tickets at a small price. Invite two local businesses to sponsor it for their name on the programme. Tickets sold and a sponsor's payment tell you whether a full festival will stand up.
- Who pays first
- A local business, such as a hotel or a bookshop, that wants its name beside a cultural event and will sponsor the programme.
- What leaves today
- Literary visitors now gather around one festival in the south; festivals in the north and the hills spread that spending and build new audiences for local writers.
Ask first
- Department of Cultural Affairs. Ask whether support exists for literary events in Jaffna or Kandy.
- the local council (Municipal Council, Urban Council or Pradeshiya Sabha). Ask what permission a ticketed public event needs.
Check before you spend
The hall's written permission, any permission for ticketed events, the writers' agreement on fees, and what each sponsor receives in writing.
Find out these three numbers
- How many tickets sell for one afternoon?
- What will a sponsor pay for its name?
- What do the writers expect as a fee?
A comparison from the book
Sri Lanka House, the districts. Chapter Seventeen
"a national showcase that turned out to be a Colombo showcase would be the pull of the capital city repeating itself"
Spread the stage beyond one town, so the island's writing is not heard from only one place.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.