The Iris 2023: Report

The first inter-school Literary Festival was hosted by Shikshantar on Monday, 30th October 2023. The fest was befittingly titled The Iris 2023: Looking beyond the mundane literary lens. The word ‘Iris’, originally coined for a rainbow in Greek/Latin and subsequently given to the goddess of rainbows and communications, is also a part of the human eye. Since the iris gives our eye its colour, it represents different perspectives of viewing the world. The idea behind the event is to celebrate literary talents, inspire out-of-the-box thinking in the participants and encourage them to explore their creative potential.
The event comprised nine uniquely conceived events taking place under: Poetry [three events for VII-VIII, IX-X and XI-XII], Debate [two events for IX-X and XI-XII], Creative Writing [two events for IX-X and XI-XII], Short Film
Making [for XI-XII] and Book Cover/Jacket Design [for VII-VIII].
All the events were imagined differently from how debates and creative writing are conventionally conceived. The Debate for Class IX and X was called Tête-à-tête in which participants were to debate over seemingly absurd or frivolous topics, like “Pink is better than blue!” or “Cats are better than dogs!” The Debate for XI-XII was Council of the Centuries in which each participant was to channel the essence of historical/ modern figures allotted to them, bringing their distinct voices to the argument. Similarly, for the poetry competitions, the prompts given were unique. For Mystery Muse (VII-VIII), participants were presented with a mystery box containing an assortment of diverse objects and a distinctive scent based on which they had to compose a poem. For Back to the Future (IX-X), the participants stepped into the shoes of a fictional character through the discovery of a special time capsule filled with images, trinkets and objects, offering glimpses into the character's dreams, hopes, and personality. In Poetry Disco (XI-XII), participants combined the styles of some of history’s most renowned poets and add a modern influence to their poems by combining the styles of these poets with some songwriters of the modern era. Besides these, there was a short film competition, Moving Frames, for Class XI and XII and two creative writing competitions, Pinata of Prompts (IX-X) and Dialogue Dilemma (XI-XII). The Iris 2023 was conceived by Prisha Raj and Tanya Malhotra of Class XII. They were wholeheartedly supported by Sara Pant, Priyaan Singh Vardaan and Ekagr Rao from Class XI. Together the five of them comprised the Core Team. There were Moderators from Class XI and XII for each of the nine events, along with a dedicated Design Team, Safety and Security team, Photography team and team to manage the website. The Iris 2023 saw participation from over 70 students from various schools of Gurugram.
Given below is the list of awards from each event. The overall winner’s trophy was bagged by The Shri Ram School, Moulsari Avenue, Gurugram.