Perennial: The Red River Book of 21st Century Hindi Poetry

One may claim that Hindi is a relatively new language that emerged as a lingua franca in north and central India during the national movement of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries — codified by journalists, activists, teachers and lawyers; Hindi is perhaps the only language where prose happened before poetry. One might also argue that Hindi has always been around; tracing its roots to the Rekhta era, the Bhakti movement, and the earlier works of Apbhransh, Prakrit and Sanskrit literature — inheriting their diction, forms, idioms, and myths; like a river that has always been flowing and yet is always brimming with new waters — a perennial river.

‘Perennial’ intends to introduce an English reader to contemporary Hindi poetry, that has tradition seamlessly woven into it. This anthology covers 40 poets born across seven decades, who come from varied linguistic, economic, and geographical landscapes — some live isolated in India’s hinterlands while others have travelled the world. And yet, they have reflected in their unique ways the various drifts that have come to define twenty-first century India — rising globalisation, communal politics, changing family systems and values, Dalit and Adivasi movements, gender struggles, farmer struggles, to name a few. While the dialects of their region weigh heavily on their expression and style, they are united by Hindi — a language they live and share.