This week, our editors-at-large introduce us to transnational literary communities and newly-translated classic literature. From experimental poetry festivals to reading recommendations in contemplation of the 79th anniversary of India’s independence, read on to find out more!
MARGENTO, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Romania
Indefatigable Florin Dan Prodan—just back from Egypt where he co-organized the performance poetry festival & interdisciplinary colloquium Interwoven Voices, and on his way to co-organizing a writing residency and poetry-and-music festival in Annapurna National Park (in Nepal’s Himalayas) and Pokhara City—threw a poetry festival in his home, northern Romania. Via Poetica, which ran from August 10th through the 14th, kicked off in the cultural hub and university city of Iasi and featured established names such as Radu Andriescu and Prodan himself alongside remarkable alternative voices such as past Asymptote contributor Simona Nastac, experimental novelist Paul Mihalache, and the lyrically contemplative Luminița Amarie. While the roster of performance poets slightly varied as the festival moved from Iasi to Prodan’s hometown of Suceava to the UNESCO-heritage medieval Voroneț monastery, a mainstay was the experimental avantgarde electronic music of Ranter’s Bay that has already resounded across Europe and beyond.
Special mention should be made of two genuinely experimental poets that were featured on every single night of the festival, whose inclusion contributed significantly to the festival’s international profile. Rhys Trimble, a Zambian-born Welsh poet, recently joined Prodan and the Zidul de Hartie (Paper Wall) collective’s initiatives, participating in both Interwoven Voices in Cairo, and now, Via Poetica in Romania. Trimble does bilingual work in Welsh and English and is strongly active as an improvisational performance and installation artist, musician, visual poet, and interdisciplinary-poetics academic. Another Welsh poet, David Greenslade, has split his time between Wales and Romania for a few years now, after traveling the world as an English teacher. He writes in both English and Welsh while experimenting (and performing) with “used and usable material objects” such as diagrams, tools, vegetables, and signs, and creatively engaging with visual and aural pareidolia (pattern-seeking misperceptions).
The decisive involvement of poets like Trimble and Greenslade in events such as Via Poetica is a testimony to the growing transnationalization of both individual poets and communities of practice and reception. Along with Via Poetica, with its upcoming festival in Nepal, that trend in contemporary transnational and nomadic poetics can be seen in recent landmarks such as the 7th edition of #GraphPoem @ DHSI (#DHSI25) in Montreal back in June, and Asymptote contributor Felix Nicolau’s literary-academic work spanning Romanian (French) legendary diasporas, Spain, and beyond.
Sayani Sarkar, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Kolkata
In honour of India’s 79th Independence Day on 15th August, I’d like to use this space to spotlight recent literary news that illuminates the complex and evolving nature of this country’s identity. This week’s dispatch is a deliberate examination of how literature captures both the challenges and aspirations shaping India as a nation. While 15th August marks a modern milestone in the history of a land with ancient roots spanning millennia, it is also a day to consider the significance of India’s multilingual and diverse cultural heritage in today’s world.
Scholar and critic G. N. Devy, for example, explores national identity through Sanskrit in his new book, Language of the Immortals: A Concise History of Sanskrit, published by Aleph Book Company this month. Sanskrit, the language of important Hindu texts such as the Vedas, the Upanishads, and the Bhagavad Gita, has always had a flavour of mysticism about it. In fact, some of the oldest texts, like the Rig Veda, are notoriously difficult to date. Having studied Sanskrit in high school myself, I can say from experience that, unlike English and other Indian languages like Hindi and Bengali, Sanskrit’s syntactical structure is extremely elegant and learning it whether orally or via texts requires a mathematical rigor. Devy’s monograph-length book is not detailed study of Sanskrit’s structure, but more its lasting spoken and symbolic influence on Indian thinking.
Another memory surfaces from my high school days, our Hindi teacher reading out loud short lines by Shikrant Verma about this land’s rich history—the sixteen Mahājanapadas, ancient aristocratic states which existed from about the sixth to fourth centuries BCE, with jewel-toned names like Avanti, Gandhara, Kosala, and Panchala. In October of this year, And Other Stories will publish Verma’s Magadh, titled for another of the Mahājanapadas . Some of the poems from this collection can be found on Asymptote here. Reading them in English feels unusual: Studded with names from fallen empires like Ashoka, Bimbisara, and Chandragupta, they are linked primarily to my Hindi-reading sensibilities, as there are far more Western classical poems available in English translation than there are from non-Western languages. The translator, Rahul Soni, keeps the short but strong Hindi delivery intact in the translation. The poems remind me of Cavafy’s treatment of the Greek classics in their tone and delivery. I can’t wait to read all 56 poems once they are published this autumn.
Finally, a book that delights in the conundrum of being a modern Indian, Why the Poor Don’t Kill Us: The Psychology of Indians by Manu Joseph, was also published this month by Aleph Book Company. The first nonfiction by Joseph, the book is a humorous diagnosis of the economic disparity, class differences, and psychological stagnation in a contemporary India where the privileged have shameless bounties and the deprived are reluctant, almost to a point where silence is the norm. Each of the three books here will give readers another layer in the growing body of work coming out of India that celebrate not just the normative but the niche.
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