By The GLF Team
Back in 2021, something quietly powerful took root – a breeze that stirred not just leaves, but hearts, minds, and imaginations. That was the year the Green Literature Festival (GLF) was born, bringing together readers, writers, and changemakers around one of the defining causes of our time: protecting our only home, this miraculous Pale Blue Dot.
Now, the momentum is growing – and so are the ambitions. This October, GLF sets sail for Mumbai’s coast, India’s bustling financial capital, to launch the very first Green Business Literature Festival in collaboration with IIT Mumbai. This bold new chapter will spark conversations where they’re needed most – at the intersection of sustainability and enterprise. It’s time for the voice of the environment to speak directly to the boardroom, the start-up studio, and the policy table.
Get ready for stories that challenge, ideas that inspire, and a festival where green thinking meets real-world action.
GLF stands apart with its message of hope over fear, because the climate crisis is no longer a distant warning. It’s here – in our air, water, food, and livelihoods. And while fear alone rarely drives action, fear informed by knowledge and empathy can. That’s the space GLF seeks to occupy: where stories become tools for awareness, community action, and climate resilience. Photo: Public Domain.
With its clarion call ‘Learn More, Do More’, GLF has completed four successful editions in Bengaluru, championing the best of environmental writing in India. GLF’s mission is to spark a vibrant culture of reading, writing, teaching, and publishing green literature – while building a strong, inclusive ecosystem that connects students, educators, entrepreneurs, and professionals through the written word.
From the start, GLF has focused on three key segments of green literature: children’s books, business writing, and adult fiction/non-fiction. This targeted approach has sharpened its impact across audiences. Each year, the GLF Honour Book Awards celebrates excellence in these categories, offering recognition and a modest cash prize to top titles.
India’s literary landscape has been buzzing with festivals in the past few years – across cities, colleges, even Army barracks. But GLF stands apart with its message of hope over fear, because the climate crisis is no longer a distant warning. It’s here, and it’s happening now – it has pervaded our air, water, food, and livelihoods. And while fear alone rarely drives action, fear informed by knowledge and empathy can. That’s the space GLF seeks to occupy: where stories become tools for awareness, community action, and climate resilience.
Authors play a vital role in this movement. Think Paul Hawken’s Drawdown and Regeneration, or the compelling climate fiction of Amitav Ghosh, who continues to inspire our work. GLF actively invites such voices – especially climate fiction authors – to share their narratives and solutions on our platform.
Because stories can change minds. And changed minds can change the world.
GLF consciously focuses on the stories of hope and less on fear-mongering. It discusses the possibilities of a greener future with case stories backed by science, entrepreneurship, conservation and policy, and less on the current state of affairs. Serendipitously, the number of books in the environment genre has exploded in recent years, especially in the children’s segment. GLF is a one-stop discovery platform that connects readers and writers.
GLF has not been just a one-day engagement. Along with climate action cells and eco-clubs in colleges and schools, the team is curating better access to relevant knowledge, and providing insights through conversations, dialogues, skits, documentaries, films, photographs, music and, of course, through books. It also publishes monthly GLF Newsletters (https://bit.ly/glfnewsletters), and uses social media to promote new books, publishes features on current themes and puts out a list of new releases. This ensures a steady engagement with the audience.
It has become a launchpad for new authors as well as a platform for the promotion of recently published books. Conversations around the themes of these books between authors and readers are popular and it is magical to watch scientists, conservationists, filmmakers, and photographers dissect topics related to biodiversity, conservation, and wildlife extinction, and explore a range of interconnectedness among them.
Team Green Literature Festival after the successful fourth edition (December 2024). GLF is a one-stop discovery platform that connects readers and writers. Photo Courtesy: Greenlit.
What began as a small initiative– climate education workshops for just 45 teachers – is now expanding to a much larger cohort. At the heart of this effort is a simple belief: real behavioural change begins at home and in the classroom. That’s why GLF is focusing on empowering teachers and parents as key drivers of climate awareness.
To scale this impact, GLF is tapping into tech-enabled platforms such as Parentof.com, which use AI to provide personalised teacher support and skill-building tools for students. These platforms, with active parent involvement, are already encouraging children to engage with local issues and become more actively connected to their communities.
GLF is also deepening its outreach through school and college eco-clubs, with plans to share pre-owned books, host nature writing workshops, and bring in authors for interactive sessions – all to spark curiosity and environmental consciousness among young readers.
In collaboration with NGOs, GLF will work to set up Green Libraries in government schools, further expanding access to environmental literature and resources.
Looking ahead to GLF Bengaluru 2025 in November, the festival will debut in a refreshed format – with each of its three focus areas (children, business, adult fiction/non-fiction) curated as standalone experiences, creating more depth and engagement for participants.
GLF is also branching into a new literary form: green poetry. It has begun publishing original poems in its monthly newsletters – a small but meaningful step toward cultivating environmental expression in verse.
Four editions are long enough to realise a few mistakes and explore new territories. It was a good time to think about taking GLF beyond Bengaluru and with climate change bound to affect Mumbaikars, how to reimagine the city’s future will be of keen interest. Books, after all, are seeds of thought, and seeds must travel to carry the mother tree far and wide.
GLF is also looking forward to working more closely with the Sanctuary Nature Foundation team this year. We look forward to making 2025 count as a key milestone in enriching the green literature ecosystem in India.
