Trees of Kochi and Other Poems (Award Winning Collection of Malayalam Poems)

Trees of Kochi and Other Poems (Award Winning Collection of Malayalam Poems)

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Book Specification

Item Code: NAL152
Author: K. G. Sankara Pillai
Publisher: Sahitya Akademi, Delhi
Language: English
Edition: 2016
ISBN: 9788126047482
Pages: 160
Cover: Paperback
Other Details 8.5 inch X 5.5 inch
Weight 320 gm

Book Description

About the Book

Trees of Kochi and Other Poems is a collection of the major poems of K. G. Sankara Pillai from his volume, K. G. Sankara Pillayude Kavithakal 1969-1996 which won Sahitya Akademi Award in in 2002, along with a selection of the poems from his volumes.

In his poems, he alludes to famous writers, great leaders, characters from great work, famous painters and film directors. Buddha and Christ are enduring presences in his poems, helping him identify a moral fulcrum that can prevent the fragmentation of the self. Sometimes, Mother Teresa or Narayana Guru takes that central role.

He has been able to incorporate into the thematic range of his poetry contemporary issues pertaining to environmental degradation, struggles of civil society, political violence, subaltern movements and gender/caste discrimination. His awareness of world poetry, art history and contemporary films seeps into the texture of his poetic voice, enriching it with inter-textual echoes from diverse arts and mediums. His poetic idiom communicates acute insights through the use of irony, satire and sarcasm, unsettling the readers from their habits of complacency.

About the Author

K.G. Sankara Pillai rose into prominence in Malayalam poetry in the seventies when an earlier generation of modernists had already established a fresh experimental idiom bristling with restlessness and revolt. Later, he moved away from its apolitical, formalist ethos to confront the socio-political excesses in his poetry in a voice that was both cosmopolitan and critical. He captures the voice of the radicalised youth whose sense of rejection and rage demanded new metaphors of resistance. He developed into a poet of social conscience and moral commitment whose anguished tone spoke of the need to reinvent the language of imagination in an age of pervasive violence and insensitivity.

Contents

The Word and the World: Poetry as Resistances vii
Bengal 1
Baldness 12
The Dhobi and the Dhoti 16
Who Else is There to Come? 17
The Gecko's Tail 20
Sweets 21
Fire fighting 23
Trees of Kochi 28
Girdle 32
Photos in Various Poses 34
In the City of the Noise-Demon 38
Sandtime 39
Refuge 44
Meaning 46
Rejection 47
Big Swallowing the Small 50
How Far will We Go? 54
Deep Layers of the Word 55
Future Shade 58
The Spectator 60
The Horses Who has to Masquerade as Donkeys 63
Gorkha 70
The Spectacle of Speech 73
Favours Returned 76
Deep Within 77
Between the Nectar and the Poison 79
Not on the Cross Alone 84
The Devil 85
The Camel 86
Pray Thus, If You Must 89
Interview 96
The Oily Easy Chair 97
The Path 102
Continuum 104
A Sky, Twisted and Folded 106
Nostalgia: Feet Seen Through a Pair of Torn Socks 117
Prologue to An Autobiography 120
Polyphony of the Day 122
A Strange Experience of Professor Vividhagamanan 125
More of the Sun in Buddha's Words than in Sunlight 130
Come, See This Street of Blood 132
Memories that Can Unlock Doors 135
That which Comes from Above 138
Mirrors 140
They did not Complements Each Other 143
Therefore I did not Go Insane 145
Notes on Translators 147

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