“Poems are the Dreams of the Earth”

Readings and talk by Raúl Zurita, one of the most important contemporary poets of Latin America and recipient of numerous awards, including the National Literary Prize of Chile 

Raúl Zurita will be accompanied by translator Anna Deeny Morales who will read in English

Welcome: Ms Omita Goyal, Chief Editor, IIC
Introduction by Dr. Sharmistha Mohanty

 
Raúl Zurita is one of the most extraordinary poets of our times. His is the compassion and hope and faith that come from having confronted despair. Zurita was arrested, when a young man, under the regime of General Pinochet in Chile. All his life his poems have spoken of the extreme injustice and suffering of the Chilean people. The devastation of the Chilean experience made it necessary for him to find new poetic forms, because those forms that already existed were incapable of containing these new brutalities. Although Zurita begins from tragedy, he ends with the beauty and hope of the human condition. He has often said, “The task is not to write books or to paint paintings, it is to make life a work of art and that is the task still at hand.” 

(Collaboration: Almost Island)

Readings

Raúl Zurita and publisher V.K. Karthika release poet and fiction writer, Sharmishtha Mohanty’s Extinctions (Context, an imprint of Westland Books). Mohanty will then read from the work

Readings by Aishwarya Iyer who writes in English. Her first book of poems will be published shortly

Balam Rodrigo, one of the strongest voice in Mexican poetry, accompanied by translator Anna Deeny Morales

Readings 

By S. Anand, founder of Navayana Books and the publisher of Namdeo Dhasal, Poet of the Underworld, reads from this Marathi poet in English along with audio recordings of Dhasal reciting his work

Chilean poet Raúl Zurita, one of the most extraordinary poets of our times, accompanied by his translator, Anna Deeny Morales
 

Organised in collaboration with Almost Island. Readings by leading poets from India, Chile, Cuba and Mexico. All work will be read in the original and in English

Readings
By Reina Maria Rodriguez, leading Cuban poet, with her translator, Kristin Dykstra

Anitha Thampi, acclaimed Malayalam poet. English translations will be read alongside
 

Presented by Dr. Uma Sharma and her disciples

Dance Choreography: Dr. Uma Sharma
Music: Pt. Jwala Prasad (late)

(Collaboration: Uma Sharma School of Dance and Music –  Bharatiya Sangeet Sadan)
 

(138 min; 2021; English/Hindi with English subtitles)
Directed by Hemant Chaturvedi who will introduce the film

Screening will be followed by a discussion

The film follows the lives and creative journeys of 14 cinematographers, who worked primarily in the Mumbai film industry. Between these 14 people, they have filmed over 800 movies and over 15,000 commercials, between the early 1960s and until the previous decade. The film captures their early years and the serendipitous events that chart the emotional journeys of professionals; and the inevitability and mortality of their lives
 

The Arab Spring that Was and Wasn’t 

By K.P. Fabian (ICWA & Macmillan Education, New Delhi: 2022)

Discussants: Amb. T.C. A. Raghavan, former diplomat and Director General, Indian Council for World Affairs; Amb. Talmiz Ahmad, former diplomat, Visiting Distinguished Fellow, Observer Research Foundation and author; and Amb. K.P. Fabian, author of the book

Chair: Prof. Gulshan Dietl
 

Panelists: Amb. Rajiv Bhatia, Distinguished Fellow, Foreign Studies Programme at Gateway House, author of Indo-Myanmar Relations and former Indian Ambassador to Myanmar and Mexico and High Commissioner to Kenya, South Africa and Lesotho; Shri Kallol Bhattacharjee, Senior Assistant Editor, The Hindu, author of The Great Game in Afghanistan: Rajiv Gandhi, Gen. Zia and the Unending War; and Mr. Jaffarullah, Founding Member, Rohingya Human Rights Initiative who is presently a teacher at The National Institute of Open Schooling

Chair: Amb. K.P. Fabian, Distinguished Fellow, Symbiosis University and former diplomat

Myanmar is experiencing a time of trouble following the coup d’état carried out by the military on 1^st February 2021 after the party it supported lost the election to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi whose party won the election. Since then the military has used brutal violence to put down resistance to its regime. So far, the international community, including the UN Security Council has failed to assist Myanmar in restoring democracy

Vocal recital by Astha Goswami, disciple of Pt. Arun Bhaduri and Smt Girija Devi
Accompanied by Atual Shankar, Athar Hussain and Kaushik Mitra

Astha has evolved her own unique style of Padavali Gaayan which incorporates the rich intricacies of Khayal gayaki. Her repertoire includes a rich and rare compositions from the Braj region and songs of different seasons

(Collaboration: Guild for Service)