The PTC workshops are excited to return to Hindi Poetry. At these sessions we will be translating the work of Vinod Kumar Shukla, one of India’s leading Hindi writers, he is known for his style that often borders on magic-realism.
Our online poetry translation workshops can be accessed from anywhere in the world. Join in to meet poetry lovers, translators and poets from across the globe, then get to know each other as you share insights and language skills, working together to open up a poem in its original language and reassemble it into an English translation.
We have had participants from the UK, Ireland, Nigeria, New Zealand and Sri Lanka. The workshops are the perfect way to keep you feeling creative, engaged and connected to the world at large. A rough and ready guild translation is provided by the guest translator so there is no need to know the language being translated, simply sign up and bring your love of language.
This online workshop will take place over two 90-minute sessions on Zoom over two consecutive Tuesdays. This format will let us spend time with a single poetic voice. The workshops will be lead by the writer and translator Mohini Gupta and the poet and PTC Commissioning Editor Edward Doegar.
‘Pay-What-You-Want’ Pricing
We want to keep our workshop experience as accessible as possible, especially as we are aware that Covid has put many people at a financial disadvantage.
The Poet
Vinod Kumar Shukla (born 1 January 1937) is one of India’s leading Hindi writers, known for his style that often borders on magic-realism. His first collection of poems Lagbhag Jai Hind/Almost Jai Hind was published in 1971. Vah Aadmi Chala Gaya Naya Garam Coat Pehankar Vichar Ki Tarah/The Man Wore a New Woollen Coat and Went Away Like a Thought was his second collection of poems, published in 1981.
His poetry has been featured in international publications such as Granta, Metamorphoses, and Modern Poetry in Translation. He has written six acclaimed novels, one of which won him the prestigious Sahitya Akademi Award in 1999. His first novel Naukar ki Kameez/The Servant’s Shirt (1979) was also adapted as a movie by the respected Indian filmmaker Mani Kaul. He now writes poems and stories for children, and lives with his family in Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India.
The Translator
Mohini Gupta is a writer/translator based in New Delhi. She has been the Charles Wallace India Trust Translator-Writer Fellow in 2017 for writing and translation, hosted by Literature Across Frontiers at Aberystwyth University. An alumna of SOAS University of London, she has been a Research Fellow at Sarai, CSDS; and a Dhvani Fellow at the Sangam House international writers’ residency in Bangalore.
She has written for publications such as Huffington Post, The Caravan Magazine, TheWire.in, Scroll.in and the WorldKidLit Blog. Her English-Hindi translations have been published by Tulika Publishers. She now runs the digital multilingual Indian language poetry collective for young readers, Mother Tongue Twisters, and curates conversations on languages, literature and translation. She is also a trained hindustani vocalist and western classical pianist.
The Facilitator
Liz Berry was born in the Black Country and now lives in Birmingham. Her first book of poems, Black Country (Chatto 2014), described as a ‘sooty, soaring hymn to her native West Midlands’ (Guardian) was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation, received a Somerset Maugham Award and won the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Award and Forward Prize for Best First Collection 2014. Liz’s pamphlet The Republic of Motherhood (Chatto, 2018) was a Poetry Book Society Pamphlet Choice and the title poem won the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem 2018. A new book of her collaboration with photographer Tom Hicks will be published by Hercules Editions in 2021. Liz is a patron of Writing West Midlands and works as a tutor for organizations including the Arvon Foundation and The Poetry School.
Full Details
To try and make the online experience as enjoyable and manageable as possible, places will be restricted – if you book please do make sure you can attend both sessions.
Workshop materials and the log-in details to join the sessions with easy to follow instructions, will be sent out by email when you book your place.
• The PTC will deliver these workshops online via Zoom.
• This online series will follow our usual workshop format, working as a group to translate the poem line by line.
• Working from a guide translation of the original poem, guided by a translator and poet to facilitate the sessions.
• Two sessions lasting 90 minutes over two weeks working on one longer poem
• In advance of the beginning of the series, we will share the original poem and the guide translation that the group will be working from as well as further materials to aid the experience like audio examples of the poetry and a video introduction to the poet by the translator
• On consecutive Tuesday evenings 16 and 23 February, 18:30-20:00 GMT.
• Pay-What-You-Want donation when reserving your ticket.
• Reserve one ticket for both sessions
