Collected Poems 1969-2014

by Arvind Krishna Mehrotra

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Genres: Poetry

Paperback

First published January 1, 2014

About the author

Arvind Krishna Mehrotra was born in Lahore in 1947. He has published six collections of poetry in English and two of translation — a volume of Prakrit love poems, The Absent Traveller, recently reissued in Penguin Classics, and Songs of Kabir (NYRB Classics). His Oxford India Anthology of Twelve Modern Indian Poets (1992) has been very influential. He has edited several books, including History of Indian Literature in English (Columbia University Press, 2003) and Collected Poems in English by Arun Kolatkar (Bloodaxe Books, 2010). His collection of essays Partial Recall: Essays on Literature and Literary History was published by Permanent Black in 2012. A second book of essays, Translating the Indian Past (Permanent Black), appeared in 2019.

Mehrotra was nominated for the post of Professor of Poetry at the University of Oxford in 2009. He came second behind Ruth Padel, who later resigned over allegations of a smear campaign against Trinidadian poet Derek Walcott (who had himself earlier withdrawn from the election process).

Mehrotra has translated more than 200 literary works from ancient Prakrit language, and from Hindi, Bengali and Gujarati.

Reviews

[Alok Mishra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Practically, if I am forced to rate the poems by Mehrotra versus the introduction by Chaudhuri, I will rate the introduction higher because of its authoritative tone – Chaudhuri 'explains' and simplifies the complexities of Mehrotra's verse for a common reader.
Coming to the poetry by Mehrotra, it's not extraordinary like Aurobindo and neither it's ordinary like the modern tell-a-tale poets who know not very much of rhythm and reason. Mehrotra's verse is like that of a person looking for a reason to exist, the reason behind sunlight and reason behind time. The Songs from Kabir may delude the readers to be powerful enough to stir their conscience. The translations of unpublished poems written in languages other than English are also noteworthy. However, it keeps revolving around the known – this pole to that pole – without touching the heights of poetic genius, most of the times.

Mehrotra is a curious case. Readable? VERY MUCH! Praiseworthy? YES. Captivating and instantly striking? Somehow, yes.

[Sayantan Ghosh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I once asked Arvind Krishna Mehrotra why he never wrote a novel, and he told me he can either spend a year writing a 300-page novel or say the same thing he's trying to say in the novel in a poem which he can finish in a day and spend the rest of the year relaxing. My favourite poet to exist.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a pretty solid collection of poems by this autor/ translator. There's a lot of work here, collected from many years of writing, and even then, I feel like I kind of missed the sweet spot-- so the most recent work is wise and restrained and interested in a kind of sage role, but is a little too comfortable to me. The poems from earlier, for the most part, feel kind of like a put-on, that Mehrotra is a good poet but one who is inhabiting a role more than really expressing himself. I wanted him to be, I don't know, more comfortable with himself but not so much so that he didn't seem above the fray, and those poems, if they exist, aren't in this volume.

The translations, which Mehrotra is known for at least as much as his original poems, are pretty great, expecially the pankrit translations. That is some good stuff, and definitely makes more more committed than I was to tracking down his translations and reading more of them.

[Tuhin Bhowal · Rating 5 out of 5]

Had the blessed opportunity to meet Hoshang recently, served him tea. As he signed his collection, he wrote my name on the page. Someday, it will be AKM, someday.

[Soumitro Roy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading Mehrotra is like looking at a picture, a scene, being present at a particular time at a particular place and experiencing what the narrator is experiencing without any explanation.

This collection of poems touches almost every aspect of Indian poetry ( from translation of Prakrit Love Poems to Modern Poets of India)

Mehrotra's simple style and ornamentation free words goes deep inside a reader.

A must read.

[Abhishek Ranjan · Rating 3 out of 5]

The poems are having different tempo... you cannot see the singular flow and this is, to be frank, a good thing. The poems are having many views at the same time. However, most of the times, poems are largely about temporal issues rather than something of permanent value.

[World Literature Today]

"Amit Chaudhuri’s perceptive introduction provides the level of in-depth analysis that Mehrotra’s poetry clearly deserves." - Graziano Krätli, North Haven, Connecticut

This book was reviewed in the March 2015 issue of World Literature Today. Read the full review by visiting our website: http://bit.ly/1E23naF