Vikram Seth

Author profile

born

June 20, 1952 in Calcutta (now Kolkata), West Bengal, India

gender

male

genre

Literature & Fiction, Biographies & Memoirs, Poetry

About this author

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Vikram Seth is an Indian poet, novelist, travel writer, librettist, children's writer, biographer and memoirist.

During the course of his doctorate studies at Stanford, he did his field work in China and translated Hindi and Chinese poetry into English. He returned to Delhi via Xinjiang and Tibet which led to a travel narrative From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet (1983) which won the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award.

The Golden Gate: A Novel in Verse (1986) was his first novel describing the experiences of a group of friends who live in California. A Suitable Boy (1993), an epic of Indian life set in the 1950s, got him the WH Smith Literary Award and the Commonwealth Writers Prize.

His poetry includes The Humble Administrator's...more

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Books by Vikram Seth

Average rating: 3.94 · 15,262 ratings · 1,326 reviews · 16 distinct works

	A Suitable Boy 4.06 avg rating — 9,478 ratings — published 1993 — 42 editions	My rating:
	An Equal Music 3.67 avg rating — 2,649 ratings — published 1999 — 23 editions	My rating:
	The Golden Gate 4.01 avg rating — 1,250 ratings — published 1986 — 10 editions	My rating:
	Two Lives 3.52 avg rating — 978 ratings — published 2005 — 22 editions	My rating:
	From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet 3.94 avg rating — 390 ratings — published 1983 — 10 editions	My rating:
	Beastly Tales From Here And There 3.84 avg rating — 193 ratings — 9 editions	My rating:
	All You Who Sleep Tonight: Poems 4.10 avg rating — 105 ratings — 5 editions	My rating:
	Three Chinese Poets 3.79 avg rating — 48 ratings — 6 editions	My rating:
	Mappings 3.82 avg rating — 22 ratings — 2 editions	My rating:
	The Humble Administrator's Garden 3.77 avg rating — 22 ratings — published 1985 — 2 editions	My rating:

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Quotes by Vikram Seth

“But I too hate long books: the better, the worse. If they're bad they merely make me pant with the effort of holding them up for a few minutes. But if they're good, I turn into a social moron for days, refusing to go out of my room, scowling and growling at interruptions, ignoring weddings and funerals, and making enemies out of friends. I still bear the scars of Middlemarch.”
― Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy

tags: reading

38 people liked it

“God save us from people who mean well.”
― Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy

tags: god , good-intentions , humanity , religion

27 people liked it

“What is the difference between my life and my love? One gets me low, the other lets me go.”
― Vikram Seth, An Equal Music

tags: life , loss , love

9 people liked it

See all Vikram Seth's quotes »

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