Touch

Touch

[Recently, the Undergraduate Curriculum Revision Committee of Delhi University asked the English Department of the University to remove poet Meena Kandasamy from the syllabus. The English Department has refused to accept this. We are publishing a poem by her below.] Have you ever tried meditation? Struggling hard to concentrate, and keeping your mind as blank…

Poetry and Reason: Why Tagore Still Matters

Poetry and Reason: Why Tagore Still Matters

In his book Raga Mala, Ravi Shankar, the great musician, argues that had Rabindranath Tagore “been born in the West he would now be [as] revered as Shakespeare and Goethe.” This is a strong claim, and it calls attention to some greatness in this quintessentially Bengali writer—identified by a fellow Bengali—that might not be readily…

S. Raghunandana Declines Sangeet Natak Akademi Award

S. Raghunandana Declines Sangeet Natak Akademi Award

Eminent theatre director from Karnataka S. Raghunandana on July 17 declined the Sangeet Natak Akademi award for 2018, a day after it was announced, in protest against incidents of “mob lynching in the name of God and religion” and the frequent attempts to stifle dissenting views of public intellectuals and activists. Full Text of S…

Official Language Vs Social Justice
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Official Language Vs Social Justice

(This paper was first presented at a five-day conference on ‘Indian Constitution and Social Justice’ held in Mysore in 1995, under the joint auspices of Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla and Dhwanyalok Center for Indian Studies, Mysore. It generated considerable controversy then, as the author had written and presented it in Hindi, even though…

Remembering Bertolt Brecht

Remembering Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht the playwright appears to have overshadowed his other artistic identities nearly completely, though, in truth, Brecht wore more creative hats than most other artists of his time. He was a theatre-producer, essayist, critic, novelist, short-story writer, drama theorist and film-script writer. And, above all, he was a poet. Indeed, Brecht was a poet…