This Week in Poetry

Exploring A. K. Ramanujan's Poetic Masterpieces

In this episode of 'This Week in Poetry with Professor Nedumaran,' Professor Nedumaran presents a series of poems from A. K. Ramanujan's 'Uncollected Poems and Prose.' The episode features detailed discussions and recitations of the poems 'Waiting,' 'Farewells,' 'Returning,' and 'Daily Drivel.' Each poem explores profound and often philosophical themes from simple, everyday moments. The episode also recommends Ramanujan's companion work, 'Journey's: A Poet's Diary,' and emphasizes Ramanujan's poetry's conversational and thought-provoking style.

00:00 Introduction to This Week in Poetry

00:52 Exploring 'Waiting' by A. K. Ramanujan

02:16 Reading of 'Waiting'

03:21 Discussing Farewells in Poetry

04:48 Reading of 'Farewells'

06:43 The Poem 'Returning' and Its Themes

07:21 Reading of 'Returning'

08:16 Daily Drivel: Mundane to Meaningful

09:31 Reading of 'Daily Drivel'

10:53 Conclusion and Farewell

Hello there, Poetry Lovers,

Welcome to this This Week in Poetry with Professor Nedumaran. We are back with episode nine and in this installment, we're about to embark on a poetic journey with one of the most compelling voices of our time, Imtiaz Dharker. Born in Pakistan, and raised in Scotland, Imtiaz Dharker's life unfolds as a mosaic of diverse cultures and experiences. She divides her time between the bustling streets of London and the vibrant city of Mumbai, India. This intersection of mixed heritage and an itinerant lifestyle lies at the very heart of her poetry. Imtiaz Dharker's verses are a profound exploration of themes that span geographical and cultural displacement, the complexities of conflict, and the nuances of gender politics. Her words have a remarkable ability to challenge preconceived notions about home, freedom, and faith. Join us as we embark on this poetic journey with Imtiaz Dharker, an artist who fearlessly embraces unsettlement, as a form of settlement and offers us an exhilarating glimpse into life at the interstices. This is an episode that promises to touch your soul and expand your horizons. Welcome to This Week in Poetry - Episode Nine, featuring the poems of Imtiaz Dharker.

This week in Poetry - Episode Eight. In the coming weeks, we shall explore the amazing variety of poems in English written by Indian poets from the Pithamahan of Modernism, Nissim Ezekiel to the very young like Sivakami Velliyangiri, with their "thoughts weaned in silence, but spoken as poems". This is a whole new generation of poets exploring creativity with utter disregard for labels and canons, reading aloud, or performing their poems and expressing themselves on a dazzling variety of themes; provocative, transparent, and at times damning. 

In this episode, we shall read some of the poems of K. Satchidanandan, born in 1946 in Kerala, he believes Poetry is performance. Poetry is theater. He writes his poems in Malayalam. And he himself translates them into English. A bilingual, literary critic, playwright, social activist, and recipient of many awards, including the Sahitya Academy Award in 2012, Satchidanandan is heard and read with respect by his readers around the world. 

That's all we have in this edition of This Week in Poetry with Professor Nedumaran. Thank you for listening to some of the great poems of K. Satchidanandan. I hope you have enjoyed his poetry and there is more to come. And I shall meet you again next week with more voices from Indian Poetry in English.

Till then, take care and goodbye for now. This is Professor Nedumaran signing off.

Welcome back to this week in poetry - episode seven. A poem is communicated before it is understood. Hence, a poem shall be read aloud heard, especially its music, its orchestrated sounds. The listeners shall feel those sounds before attempting analysis, particularly content analysis. Poems were read aloud in public, in durbars, in the presence of kings and people.

And therefore this week in poetry is an effort at reviving the tradition of Kavi Samelans and Kavi Arangams where poets presented their work to the aficianados and lovers of poetry. Right. Without much ado, let's move on to the poems.

We shall first take up a poem - Ars Poetica, a poem on what poetry is by a modern American poet, Archibald MacLeish.

Then we move on to yet another American poet, William Carlos Williams. Who gives us a deceptively short poem, this is just to say.

Finally we listen to Charles Bukowski, another modern American poet who was called the poet laureate of American low life, with his confessional lyrics about his life in Los Angeles. We present his the laughing heart and roll the dice.

Let's go. And listen.

Thanks for being patient listeners! Do write to me with your feedback and reading suggestions.

Welcome back to This Week in Poetry. Oh, I am absolutely thrilled to be back with my listeners after a break. We shall begin our new season, visiting some of the great minds who made a huge difference to the ways creativity and poetic imagination would take shape in the 20th century.

In this episode, we have an impressive playlist of poems. We being with a reading of a poem by Billy Collins, an American poet. We also have Thomas Hood from the romantic period, and we close the episode with a poem by Meera.

Hello there! Welcome to Episode 4.

In this episode, we'll explore the poems of A.K. Ramanujan. AKR as he was popularly known was born in 1929 in Mysore. He moved to the us in 1962 and became a very distinguished Professor of linguistics and Dravidian studies at the University of Chicago. He's well known for his poems of love and war, an anthology of classical poems in Tamil translated into the English language. His poems in English are the reflections of an expatriate Indian poet, swinging between his perceptions of the vitality, energy, freedom of the west and his memories of his roots in his classical past in South India.

Hello there! Welcome to This week in Poetry with Prof. Nedumaran. In this episode we will be exploring the poems of Nissim Ezekiel.

In the opening episode of this podcast, Prof. Nedumaran reads a couple of poems written by Kamala Das - My grandmother's house and an introduction. Enjoy!

Exploring Indian Poetry in English: Week 1

Professor Nedumaran dives into the world of Indian poetry in English in this podcast episode. He shares his journey with the English language and how he discovered various new words. He credits this curiosity and passion to his teachers and other sources of English learning like All India Radio. The focus of the episode is on Indian poet Kamala Das, her eccentric style of writing, and her two poems 'An Introduction' and 'My Grandmother's House'. Professor Nedumaran discusses the uniqueness of Kamala's Indian-English idiom, her daring challenges to traditional norms, and her self-expression. The episode concludes with a humble invitation to listeners to ignite their love for poetry and to join again the following week for a new episode.

00:00 Introduction to the Podcast and the Host's Journey

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