Book Release: Karthika Nair's Until the Lions in Hyderabad | Monday 28 September

Karthika Naïr's Until the Lions, a re-imagining of the Mahabharata in the voices of its marginal characters, will have its Hyderabad release tomorrow. Details below.

It is a fantastic book and if you're in Hyderabad, and free in the afternoon, do try and make it.

Monday, 28 September, 4.30 pm.
School of Humanities Auditorium, University of Hyderabad.

This reading is a part of The Park's New Festival's events in Hyderabad, in association with the Prakriti Foundation.

I will be in conversation with Karthika.

Delay in April's Sideways Door

This month's prompt at The Sideways Door will be delayed by a couple of days.

There's usually a lot of formatting to be done because it's poetry, and that takes time. There are people on leave and the column will go up, therefore, on Monday.

(That's tomorrow).

Upcoming reading from Escape Artist in Delhi and Bangalore

I should have done this last year, but it's not too late. Readings from Escape Artist are happening in Delhi first and Bangalore next, in the course of the next ten days. 

Heads up!

In Delhi

Friday, 20th Feb, 6.30 pm, The Toddy Shop, Hauz Khas Village. 

That's the day after tomorrow! If I don't have your email or number, consider this an invitation.

In Bangalore

Thursday, 26th Feb, 6.30 pm: Atta Galatta, Koramangala.

Friday, 27th Feb, 6 pm: Alternative Law Forum, Infantry Road.

Come to both, either; bring your friends.

See you soon!

*

In other reminders, two days left for submissions to The Sideways Door.

Launch of Escape Artist: 8th August 2014 at Kitabkhana, Bombay

My book, Escape Artist, gets its official release next Friday, the 8th of August, at Kitabkhana, courtesy the bookstore and the Jehangir Sabavala Foundation, with whose support the book was published by Aleph Book Co.

 

Ranjit Hoskote and Jerry Pinto will be in conversation with me. I am super-excited and also nervous because though I've read from my work a lot in the last year, this will be the first time it's from the book. Officially. 

 

I plan not to think about it at all because otherwise the butterflies will take up permanent residence. Instead, I'm thinking about what to wear.

Event listing here, but basic details below.

 

KITAB KHANA and THE JEHANGIR SABAVALA FOUNDATION

invite you to the launch of the book

ESCAPE ARTIST

by SRIDALA SWAMI

Date: Friday, 8 August 2015

Time: 6 pm

Venue: Kitab Khana, Somaiya Bhavan, Flora Fountain, 45/ 47 MG Road, Bombay 400 001

 

If you're in Bombay, do come if you can.

EA back on the Aleph site

Sorry about pulling the previous post. I changed my mind about having temporary moods out forever online.

In other news, as promised, Aleph has sorted out their web issues and Escape Artist is back up on the site.

To all those whose comments I haven't responded to, I'm a terrible person these days and thanks for the congratulations and for bothering to go through two layers of verification for a wall of silence.

Okay. Enough abjectness. Here's a cute donkey instead:

At Kala Ghoda 5th and 6th Feb

I'll be at Kala Ghoda for the annual Arts and Literature Festival. The full programme is up at the KGAF site. My sessions as follows:

On the 5th, from 5-9.15pm, 18 poets (The Hope Street Poets!) will read at The refurbished David Sassoon Library. There will be three sessions of 75 minutes each, with six poets reading in each session. A 15 minute break after sessions 1 & 2.

In order:

Panel 1 | 5 - 6:15 pm

Adil Jussawalla

Sridala Swami

Gerson da Cunha

Jane Bhandari

Priya Sarukkai Chabria

K Srilata

Panel 2 | 6:30 - 7:45 pm

Arundhathi Subramaniam

Gieve Patel

Ranjit Hoskote

Anupama Raju

Menka Shivdasani

Sampurna Chattarji

Panel 3 | 8 - 9:15 pm

Mustansir Dalvi

Meena Kandasamy

Anju Makhija

Anand Thakore

Dominic Alapat

Mani Rao

On the 6th, Thursday, The Tarq Salon: Translation from 6.15-7.15pm. Participants are Arunava Sinha, K. Srilata, R. Sivapriya. I will moderate.

Hope to see some of you!

In which I tell Anthony Bourdain to make raita

The night before last, I dreamt I was kneading dough for bread. It was in a huge barn, with a wood-fire oven. There was a large table with lots of flour sprinkled all over it. I was kneading dough that was soft, bubbly and much more runny than any dough I've ever kneaded but that was how it was supposed to be in both worlds. Strangely, my hands were completely dry and dough-free.

I shaped the dough into loaves, opened the oven and shoveled them in. That's when I noticed Anthony Bourdain standing at my shoulder. I told him he needed to get on with grating the cucumber for raita and not to forget roasting some jeera he'd later need to powder.

Then we talked about August Kleinzahler.

The next morning, someone landed up on this blog searching for Kleinzahler and found this post.

Sometimes I love my dreams but I still wouldn't want them to come true.

*

The best 45 minutes of any given day are the ones I spend doing yoga.

Tomorrow the Hyd Lit Fest begins. I'm reading with Mani Rao, K. Srilata and Tejdeep Kaur Menon on Saturday from 4-5pm. But there's lots of things I'm looking forward to, not least T.M.Krishna's reading and Rajmohan Gandhi's sessions.

This evening I'm moderating a conversation with some women filmmakers. I'm not on Facebook, but I believe you can find details here.

*

Are we really already in the last week of Jan?

All! Live! : Live from Pittsburgh, Live from Prarie Lights

Just returned from rehearsal with Oliver Lake, the other musicians and poets (for the Pittsburgh Jazz Poetry Concert tomorrow )and am noth buzzed and exhausted at the same time; anybody with a kid hopped up on sugar will know what I mean, only I'm better behaved than an eight year old, I promise.

This is my period of unrelived but welcome stress. I don't think I've run on adrenalin since...well, less happy times.

So tomorrow evening is the Jazz Poetry Concert (check the website linked above for a livestream at 7.45pm EST); then we leave early in the morning and arrive in Iowa City at around 2pm.

At 4pm, I read at Prarie Lights. This is also livestreamed, if you feel inclined to tune in.

Thing is, I am a nervous wreck. Sleep is a distant dream and I left my poems - both for here and for Prarie Lights - back in my room. I am more than usually scatty these days; what can I tell you?

For instance, I wish I could post photos from the rehearsal this evening, but I can't because I left my phone usb cable behind in Iowa and I didn't have my proper camera with me because I thought I'd be too busy.

WE REHEARSED WITH JOY HARJO, YOUGAIZ!

*end girlish excitement*

She was amazing and if you want to know how amazing, catch the livestream tomorrow.

Anyway. Links done, photos not done, this is me saying good night and good luck.

(The Jazz Poetry event will be archived, as will the Prarie Lights reading. I think. So catch it whenever.)

CIty of Asylum Pittsburgh: Jazz Poetry Concert

I will be at this event on the 7th of September, reading with other awesome poets including *gasp* Joy Harjo.

Naturally, the excitement is uncontrollable.

On the off-chance that some of you live in Pittsburgh, or live close enough by and have the time and inclination to come, here's a poster of the event. I believe there will be live streaming; details can be had at the website.

In related news, I will be a resident at the IWP, Iowa from August end to mid-November. I'll try to blog through the time, but I'm really not sure how it will go. Needless to say, I am looking forward to every bit of my time there.

Don't - just don't - get me started on packing stories, though.

Announcement: 5th Srinivas Rayaprol Poetry Prize - Call for Entries

I had meant to post this earlier; my apologies to everyone who's come to the blog in recent days looking for announcements. Here it is in full:

Entries are invited from young poets in India writing in English for the fifth Srinivas Rayaprol Poetry Prize. 

The Prize was instituted by the Srinivas Rayaprol Literary Trust to recognize excellence in poetry written in English and is being administered jointly by the Department of English, University of Hyderabad.  The prize consisting of a cash award of Rs.10,000 and a citation will be presented at a literary event in Hyderabad in the month of October 2013.  The entries will be judged by a distinguished jury of poets and literary personalities.

Entries are invited from Indian citizens between 20-40 years and writing poetry in English.

Entries must include:

1.   Three (3) different, unpublished poems written by the applicant;

2.   Evidence of age; Scanned copy of passport/driver's license/pan card/voter id/aadhar

3.   Complete contact information (including phone numbers and email addresses).

Note: Please do not put your name on the poems to be submitted to the jury members.

Entries must reach:

Dr. Aparna Rayaprol

Convener, Srinivas Rayaprol Poetry Prize

Director, Study in India Program

University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad AP 500046

rayaproltrust@gmail.com

Deadline: August 31, 2013

Vasudha Nagaraj talk on the Justice Verma Committee Report

Though the Justice Verma Committee Report [pdf] (which, last I heard, the Ministry of Home Affairs had taken off their website) came out in January this year - just under a month after the Delhi rape - the thing everyone is watching is the wilfully obstuse Ordinance that the GoI might pass any day now.

Regardless, what the Committee did was remarkable.

So, for this month's talk in the Goethe Zentrum's monthly Lecture Series, they've invited AP High Court advocate, and activist Vasudha Nagaraj to tease out the implications of the Report as well as talk about the govt. Ordinance on Sexual Assault.

Date & Time: Wednesday 13 March. 6.30pm.
Location: Goethe Zentrum, Journalist Colony, Road No. 3, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad.

It's going to be a bit strange, but I'll be reading some of my poems before the talk.

Do come if you can.

Poetry Reading at the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival 2013

Five years after my first and only KGAF, I'll be reading at this one. Unlike the last time, I don't have a book. I'm also not as stressed as I was then. All it needs is for me to keep my fingers crossed and for you guys - those of you who are in Bombay - to turn up!

The 7th evening is given over to three hours of poetry. I can't wait to hear Adil Jussawalla, Eunice de Souza, Melanie Silgardo and everyone read. So much excite!

Here's the full schedule for Thursday, 7th Feb, from 5pm on, at the David Sassoon Library:

Session 1: 5-6 pm

1. Adil Jussawalla

2. Gerson da Cunha

3. Jane Bhandari

4. Eunice de Souza

5. Melanie Silgardo

Session 2: 6.15-7.15 pm

1. Arundhathi Subramaniam

2. Sridala Swami

3. Jerry Pinto

4. Anupama Raju

5. Ranjit Hoskote

Session 3: 7.30-8.30 pm

1. Menka Shivdasani

2. Christine Herzer

3. Mustansir Dalvi

4. Athena Kashyap

5. Dominic Alapat

 

Do come if you can.

Hyderabad: Take Back the Night 5th Jan 2013

On the 5th of Jan 2013, there will be a march from Tank Bund to Punjagutta via Liberty (I'm not really sure that'll work, but okay).

Details here.

*
Also, tomorrow there is a Youth Forum panel of Sexual assault and violence at Lamakaan, off Road No. 1, Banjara Hills. That's 30th Dec 2012, 3pm-6pm at Lamakaan.

Panelists/Commentators: 

A.Suneetha, Senior Fellow, Anveshi, Research Centre on Women’s Studies, Hyderabad
Vasudha Nagaraj, Advocate, High Court, Hyderabad with expertise on the Sexual Assault Bill
Tejaswini Madabhushi, Organizer of the ‘Midnite March’ in Hyderabad
Natha Wahlang, PhD student, Hyderabad Central University

Jointly sponsored by Lamakaan and Anveshi( http://www.anveshi.org/) 

Moderator: Sangeeta Kamat, Professor, University of Massachusetts

Readings in Hyderabad: Siva Reddy and Cheran

Putting up the invites for two readings:

Telugu poet Siva Reddy on 16th Dec at Lamakaan
&
Sri Lankan Tamil poet Cheran on 20th Dec at Sundarayya Vignana Kendram.

Please consider this an open invite. Come for either/both readings and do let people know.

*

Entries invited

It's that time of year again (and these days I know when people land up on my blog searching for Srinivas Rayaprol) so mark your calendars for deadlines, sort through your poetry and remind your publishers:

The 2012 Srinivas Rayaprol Poetry Prize [pdf link] and the 2012 Shakti Bhatt First Book Award invite entries.

Good luck!

Pyrta's Spring Issue

I was invited to guest edit the Spring Issue of Pyrta (I must specify, the poetry and photo essay sections of it), and the issue is now up here.

Go read!

Screening of Partners in Crime

Paromita Vohra's new feature-length documentary, Partners in Crime will be screened at the Prasad's Preview Theatre and at the Department of Communications, University of Hyderabad. Details:

SCREENING 1
Date: 11th February, Saturday
Time: 3.30pm tea, screening 4pm
Venue: Prasad Preview Theatre, Rd No 2, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad

SCREENING 2
Date: 15th February, Wednesday
Time: 3:45 pm
Venue: Department of Communication, University of Hyderabad, Gachibowli, Hyderabad-500046

About the film:

Is piracy organized crime or class struggle? Are alternative artists who want to hold rights over their art and go it alone in the market, visionaries or nutcases? Is the fine line between plagiarism and inspiration a cop-out or a whole other way of looking at the fluid nature of authorship? Who owns a song – the person who made it or the person who paid for it? When more than three fourths of those with an internet connection download all sorts of material for free, are they living out a brand new cultural freedom – or are they criminals?
Metal heads who market their own music, folklorists who turn tribal aphorisms into short stories, music archivists who hoard and share everything they can get their hands on, anti-piracy fanatics who think piracy funds terrorism, a smooth talking DVD street salesman who outlines the efficiency of the illegal market, media moguls, lobbyists, “monetizers, downloaders, uploaders, the biggest hit song of 2010 and the small time nautanki singer whose song it was inspired by – these places and people throng the world’s bazaar in which the film is set. Partners in Crime takes you througha story about art, crime, love and money to check if the times, they may be a-changing after all.

For some reason, can't embed the Youtube clip, so here it is.

TFA winners

Anjum Hasan, Vivek Narayanan and I were the judges for the English entries in this year's (I think I mean last year's) TFA Creative Writing Awards.

The results are up here. Congratulations to Ramneek Singh and Joshua Muyiwa. I'm happy to finally put names to the entries.

There were Special Mentions, but they're not on the blog; if any of you were at the awards ceremony, can you fill me on on who those were?

Hyd Lit Fest 2012 Schedule

And we're back!

There's lots of stuff to blog about, but it will have to wait until after the Hyd Lit Fest, which begins on Monday, 16th and ends on Wednesday, 18th Jan.

All events at the Taramati Baradari. Everything is free and open to all. Do come, register and listen to lots of wonderful people.

There's a schedule up on the HLF site, but some sessions have been moved around or have been cancelled for various reasons. Here's the latest - and hopefully final - schedule.

Please note: I'm in conversation with Adil Jussawalla on the 17th of Jan from 11am to noon.

Hope to see some of you there!

Mon 16 Jan	Venue 1	Venue 2	Venue 3
10 - 11	Inaugural Pavan K Varma, Gulzar
11- 12	Romancing Hyderabad Bilkeez Latif, Aminuddin Khan, Narendra Luther (Moderator)	Salaam Hyderabad Vamsee Juluri, Harimohan Paruvu, Krishna Sastry, Meena Alexander (Moderator)	Celebrating Creativity - Contests for College students Sujatha Gopal, Student Coordinators
12 - 1	In Conversation Kiran Nagarkar with Hemant Divate & Sachin Ketkar	Readings (English) Hoshang Merchant, Robert Bohm, Nabina Das, Mohan Ramanan (Chair)	- do -

  1 – 2 LUNCH

2 - 3	In Conversation Urs Widmer and Christopher Kloeble with Charanjeet Kaur & Amita Desai	Translating Bharat Sachidananda Mohanty, Hemang Desai, N Gopi, UN Singh (Moderator), Jeelani Bano	Celebrating Creativity - Contests for College students
3 - 4	Past Continuous Amish Tripathi, Indu Sundaresan, Jaishree Misra T Vijay Kumar (Moderator)	Readings (Poetry) Mamta Sagar (Chair), Arathi HN, Sridala Swami, Arjun Choudhury,	- do -

4 – 4.30 TEA

4.30 – 5	Muse India Awards – Adil Jussawalla, to give away the Awards. UN Singh, Sachidananda Mohanty, GSP Rao
5 – 6	Guftagu with Gulzar Sukrita Paul Kumar
6.30 – 7.00  - Launch of Pavan Varma’s book ‘When Loss is Gain’ 7.00 – 8.30  - Cultural Event – German Music Band - Triotonos
Tue 17 Jan		Venue 1		Venue 2	Venue 3
10 - 11		In Conversation Saeed Mirza with Indraganti Mohan Krishna & T Vijay Kumar		Readings (Poetry) Angshuman Kar (Chair), Mandakranta Sen, Anindita Sengupta, Santosh Alex	Gulzar’s interaction with Students
11 - 12		In Conversation Adil Jussawalla with Sridala Swami		Readings (Poetry) Hemant Divate (Chair), Sachin Ketkar, Anitha Thampi, UN Singh	- do -
12 - 1		The Agony & Ecstasy of India Mark Tully & Pavan K Varma

1 – 2 LUNCH

2 - 3	Translating Classics, Cultures Constance Borde, Sheila Malovany-Chevallier, Gillian Wright, Madhu Benoit (Moderator)	Readings (Telugu Poetry) Chennaiah V (Doraveti), Raja Hussain, Sailaja Mithra, N Gopi (Chair)	Celebrating Creativity  – Contests for College  Students Sujatha Gopal, Student Coordinators
3 - 4	Development and its Discontents Rahul Pandita, C  Rammanohar Reddy, G Haragopal (Moderator)	Readings (Telugu Fiction) Abburi Chhaya Devi, Khadeer Babu, Saleem, Atreya Sarma U C Mrunalini (Chair)	German Movie                 (120 mts)

4 – 4.30 TEA

4.30 – 5		Book Launch – Sagarika Chakraborty
5 – 6		S Rayaprol Prize Function – Meena Alexander, Aparna Rayaprol, Aditi Rao, Sachidananda Mohanty

6.00 – 6.30 6.30 – 7.30 7.30 – 8.30	Book Launch – Vidya Rao’s books Vidya Rao (Hindustani Vocal) Ananda Shankar (Dance)
Wed 18 Jan	Venue 1	Venue 2	Venue 3
10 - 11	In Conversation Suniti Namjoshi with C Vijayasree		Spl Programs for School Students – Cheryl Rao, Vandna Mathur
11- 12	Art of the Matter Alekhya Punjala, Vidya Rao, Pritham Chakravarthy, M Nagabhushana Sarma (Moderator)	Adopting / Adapting to India Gillian Wright, Mark Tully, Robert Bohm, Meitim Connolly Jean-Manuel Duhaut (Moderator)	- do -
12 - 1	Readings (English) Navkirat Sodhi, Kazim Ali, Prageeta Sharma, Meena Alexander (Chair)	Readings (Fiction-English) K Srilata Rao, Swati Chawla, Sagarika Chakraborty, Sudha Balagopal (Chair)	- do -

1 – 2 LUNCH

2 - 3	“’Death, be not proud’: Tributes to Vaclav Havel, Indira Goswami and Arun Kolatkar” Readings by The Little Theatre. Shankar Melkote and team	Readings (Urdu nazms) Ashraf Rafi, Hasan Farrukh, Mushaf Iqbal Tausifi (Chair), Masood Jafri
3 - 4	Readings (English Poetry) – Charanjeet Kaur (Chair), M K Ajay , Amrita Nair, Semeen Ali, Sushmita Sadhu	Readings (Hindi Poetry) Rishabha Deo Sharma (Ch), Ahilya Misra, Shashi Narayan Swadeen, Kishori Lal Vyas

                     4 – 4.30 TEA

4.30 – 5.30	Urdu-Hindi Mushaira Muztar Majaaz, Sardar Saleem, Jagjeevan Asthana, Tasneem Johar, Elizabeth Kurian Mona, Syed Khalid (Chair), Narendra Rai
5.30 – 6	Valedictory GSP Rao, T Vijay Kumar, Amita Desai