C. Subramania Bharati (1882-1921) has an unrivalled reputation in twentieth-century Tamil literature and has come to be known as the Tamil ‘Mahakavi’, meaning ‘Supreme Poet’. His work as a poet and prose-writer ignited a Renaissance in modern Tamil writing. However, he also wrote and published regularly in English.
The Coming Age brings together Bharati’s important English writings in an authoritative and reliable edition presented by his great-granddaughter. The pieces in this volume reveal a well informed and cosmopolitan writer, engaging with the world around him, passionately sharing his opinions.
Exploring Indian history and culture, offering a shattering contemporary view of the colonial experience, commenting on political events, advocating for women’s rights and caste equality, and sharing his deep knowledge of the Tamil language and literary tradition, these pieces present Bharati in a new light for a new generation.
Catagory: Poetry
Hunchprose
What affirms our humanity, enduring beyond our barbarism? Where is home, in a world beleaguered by climate crisis, pandemic and genocide? Hunchprose is Ranjit Hoskote’s fierce, poignant testament to these urgencies.
The title of this dazzling new collection asserts poetry’s claim to be heard above the buzz of data, to transform language, broken by history, into music. Vibrant with linguistic experiment, Hunchprose weaves unpredictable patterns, celebrates our plural selves. In the erasure of ancient scripts, the melting Arctic ice, a lion tamer’s primal fear, we recognize vulnerability and rupture. A dancer’s courage, a leather worker’s revolutionary promise, a locksmith’s passion for ruins inspire us to redeem ourselves through love, doubt, hope and dream.
Infused with wry humour, informed by the wisdom traditions, Hunchprose urges us to look at our world, and within ourselves, with renewed ardour.
Grains of Stardust
Offering a unique expression of thought reflecting feeling more than meaning, Grains of Stardust is a synesthetic stream of consciousness that does not distinguish between journey and destination, but meanders unchecked upon the river of human emotion.
‘Read my poetry out loud
Breathe it in
and taste the letters pour out.
A delicious sound.
Do you hear the colours take form?
Feel the pages move you
as you float in space
make some space
Open your mind
and get inside
and see all that
shimmering
marmalade liquid.
Grains of stardust‘
Singing in the Dark
“The range and depth of this amazing anthology convey the conflicted and conflicting emotions of our times. It provides the consolations of poetry and the solace of art as balm to troubled souls.” NAMITA GOKHALE, author, and director, Jaipur Literature Festival
“…Although it may seem that devoting poetic energy to an invisible enemy that is pushing the world towards a terrifying future is too closely tied to social duty, the truth is entirely different: it is not death that the poets are celebrating, it is life.” EVALD FLISAR, Slovenian author and playwright
While the benumbed world is struggling to combat the apocalyptic devastation it has wreaked, a choral spectrum of poetry has emerged to rekindle the spirit of hope. Has poetry not always spelt hope in dark times? Over a hundred voices of unparalleled resilience have gathered here to speak… It is a word of love, solace and bonding; the word the world today is sorely in need of hearing. GULAMMOHAMMED SHEIKH, artist and author
Singing in the Dark brings together the finest of poetic responses to the coronavirus pandemic. More than a hundred of the world’s most esteemed poets reflect upon a crisis that has dramatically altered our lives, and laid bare our vulnerabilities. The poems capture all its dimensions: the trauma of solitude, the unexpected transformation in the expression of interpersonal relationships, the even sharper visibility of the class divide, the marvellous revival of nature and the profound realization of the transience of human existence. The moods vary from quiet contemplation and choking anguish to suppressed rage and cautious celebration in an anthology that serves as an aesthetic archive of a strange era in human history.
Loom Of Time
Kalidasa is the greatest poet and playwright in classical Sanskrit literature and one of the greatest in world literature. Kalidasa is said to have lived and composed his work at the close of the first millennium BC though his dates have not been conclusively established. In all, seven of his works have survived: three plays, three long poems and an incomplete epic. Of these, this volume offers, in a brilliant new translation, his two most famous works, the play Sakuntala, a beautiful blend of romance and fairy tale with elements of comedy; and Meghadutam (The Cloud Messenger), the many-layered poem of longing and separation. Also included is Rtusamharam (The Gathering of the Seasons), a much-neglected poem that celebrates the fulfillment of love and deserves to be known better. Taken together, these works provide a window to the remarkable world and work of a poet of whom it was said: Once, when poets were counted, Kalidasa occupied the little finger; the ring finger remains unnamed true to its name; for his second has not been found
The Book Of Limericks
A compilation of witty verses based on current events, The Book of Limericks by Bibek Debroy is a brilliantly illustrated guide for anyone trying to understand what exactly happened last year.
From economic issues to citizen concerns, these hilarious five-liners will take you on a roller coaster ride through the year 2017.
Twenty-One Poems
Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the prime minister of India from 1998 to 2004, was a political worker for over five decades. But he was a poet for much longer. This collection of twenty-one poems, marked by disarming simplicity, passion and sincerity, highlights his concerns and convictions, both public and private. His themes range from social inequality and the evils of war to the perils of self-serving attitudes, and the supreme importance of love for our fellow human beings. Also in the collection are moving and very personal poems written at moments of crisis.
Twenty-One Poems provides a rare and rewarding glimpse into the mind of the leader of over a billion people. The English translations, by the bestselling author Pavan K. Varma, retain the simplicity and immediacy of the Hindi originals, which appear alongside the translations in this bilingual edition.
SAANSON KE SITAR PAR
This is a collection of Gopaldas Neeraj’s final works. Kumar Chandrahas, the music composer on some of these verses, has curated these works on the insistence of Neeraj ji himself. Neeraj ji wanted his last work to be a collection of Chandrahas’s favourite songs. Chandrahas ji has also included a few of his own poems that are close to Neeraj ji’s heart.
Nava-e-Sarosh
Through the ages, Delhi has had an effect on its inhabitants. Steeped in a rich history of cultural mingling and periods of creative exchange, the city provided fertile ground for poetic synthesis. Delhi established a legacy of poets whose words set hearts ablaze for the times to come. Love, with all its wine-infused passions and experiences of yearning, has preoccupied classic poets of the city. It also offers to the reader rhymed English transcreations of the selected ghazals so that the work can be enjoyed for the rhythm that the original Urdu-language embraces. As a patron of Urdu poetry and a resident of Delhi, Sanjiv Saraf’s personal investment in preserving and furthering the arts in the Urdu world led to the creation of this book. His careful curation and trans-creations render these ghazals readable to novices of classic Urdu poetry. The selection of works that made their way to this book caters to a wide readership-those reading to experience Delhi from the past, those who wish to engage with the musicality of rhymed verses and, most significantly, those who wish to explore the themes of love as conceptualized by classic poets. Desire, longing and the complexities of love are therefore open to exploration for you, dear reader and lover, through the words laid out in these ghazals by the ‘voices from beyond’.
Kohra Ghana Hai
Bold, sharp and amazingly relevant, Naveen Chourey’s impassioned poetry-on mob lynching, Kashmir and the plight of out soldiers among others-will force you to think afresh on nationalism, patriotism and the state of our country.
Naveen’s youthful idealism, vision for an egalitarian world and progressive thoughts make Kohra Ghana Hai one of the most courageous works of our times.