Delighted…

…to have Jai Arjun Singh bring to my notice his wonderful piece on two YA novels, one of which is my very own Ela!

Meanwhile

My dad’s new book is out. Recommended for students, architects (so said my friend, a professor of architecture!), journalists, all adults who are still grappling with the moodiness, the muddiness of English grammar. Here’s where we talk about it – and other matters!

And here’s some coverage in the DNA:

 

Space Gulliver in Bangalore

After tramping around in some of the the most interesting parts of the United Kingdom, on Friday, 3rd July, Space Gulliver lands in Bangalore. Do come and meet her!

And read about the event in The Hindu

Space Gulliver is out!

It’s been a while. Since my last poetry book. (My last paper-poetry book that is, my e-poetry book The Scorpion came out in 2013). 5 years to be precise. So much has happened in between (Land of the Well, Dirty Love, my translation of the Selected Poems of Joy Goswami, Ela…) that it hasn’t felt like 5 years. Space Gulliver’s been with me through thick and thin, returning like the true visitant that she is. And now she’s found a permanent home. Her own book to live in. Just out from HarperCollins (bless you for publishing poetry!) – and my first reading in India is scheduled this Friday, in Bangalore.

I wrote this book while on residency at the University of Kent, Canterbury, 2012. So it was fitting that the first ever reading from it should have happened at the University of Kent in Canterbury on 27th May 2015. Poets and professors David Herd and Nancy Gaffield launched the book, Lyn Innes, Jan Montefiore were there, friends, faculty, fellow-poets, post-grad students and regulars at the UKC Reading Series came. It was very very special. Here are some pictures of that unforgettable evening.

 

 

Earlier that same week I had the privilege of reading at Ten for PEN organised by Sally Baker and Owen Sheers, at the Hay Festival. I shared a platform with Gillian Clarke, National Poet of Wales, whom I have met twice before, once in Bombay and once in Aberystwyth. It felt like a reunion and we read poems for each other! I included in my set a poem from Space Gulliver, then still unofficially lurking in the fringes, hiding in knapsacks and being read on buses by fellow poets. Here are some photos featuring Gillian, myself, Owen Sheers, Jonathan Edwards, Ranjit Hoskote (both of whom were part of the Walking Cities project with me, about which more later).

 

New poems

Published in Issue 6 of Better Magazine 

More on Selected Poems

In which I write a small piece on the laureateship here

K. Satchidanandan writes an in-depth article that looks at (along with 2 other books) my translation of Joy Goswami’s Selected Poems.

And Sanjukta Poddar reviews the book in the new issue of Northeast Review.

Walking Cities

With phase one of Walking Cities (with Welsh poets) coming to an end, it seemed tangentially relevant to share these poems here.

The third lovely thing…

Joy Goswami gets honoured as the First Poet Laureate at the Tata Literature Live! Festival in Bombay. A few photos of the awards ceremony, in which I read a translation of a poem specially written for the occasion and the poem ‘Olu’ from my book of translations.

I read my translations

Joyda reads his acceptance speech

Joy Goswami receives the award from Ashok Vajpeyi

 

With Joyda and his wife Kaberidi

Two lovely things happen

One: my translation of Joy Goswami’s Selected Poems (Harper Perennial 2014) gets shortlisted for the inaugural Khushwant Singh Memorial Prize for Poetry.

Two: Sumana Roy writes a wonderful review-essay on Asymptote

Post-AFCC, Singapore

Scholastic had asked me to do a little post for their blog, on Ela. Here it is!