Amit Chaudhuri

“Apples still come from Kashmir”

Pale pink in crates in winter’s market.
Each grew through the year till it absorbed
the valley’s sweetness and undertaste
and reached its final shape and weight.
They are not dead, but come to fruition.
When you bite them, not blood,
but the valley’s clear juice floods your mouth.

-from St Cyril Road and other poems
by Amit Chaudhuri

Amit Chaudhuri is a prose writer and he often praised for the poetic quality of his prose.”I was first and foremost a poet,” he confesses, ‘St Cyril Road and Other Poems’ is an unusual collection of his poetry. It bears the stamp of poems when he intended to be not just a writer, but a poet; poems for him are not meant for publication only, his ability to store away apparently unremarkable moments and images and illuminate them in recollection is simply superb.
Amit Chaudhuri is an internationally recognized Indian English author. He was born in Calcutta in 1962 and grew up in Bombay. He has written numerous novels, short stories, poems and critical essays in English, but is probably best known for his book ‘Freedom Song’.
This book is a collection of three short novels which were first published in Britain as separate volumes: A Strange and Sublime Address, Afternoon Raag, and Freedom Song. Chaudhuri received considerable critical acclaim for these novellas.
Amit Chaudhuri’s other creations includes:
Novels: A Strange and Sublime Address (1991), Afternoon Raag (1993), Freedom Song (1998) t, A New World ( 2000).
Short stories: Real Time: Stories and a reminiscence (2002)
Poetry: St. Cyril Road and Other Poems (2005)
Non fiction: D. H. Lawrence and ‘Difference’: Postcoloniality and the Poetry of the Present (2003), Small Orange Flags (2003) reviewed
His most recent book is Clearing a Space: Reflections on India, Literature, and Culture (2008).
According to Amit,”I had no intention of becoming a prose writer” and yet it is fiction that has made his name.
The London Review of Books said: “… he writes better than just about anyone of his generation.”
Amit read English at University College, London, where he took his BA with First Class Honours, and completed his doctorate on critical theory and the poetry of D.H. Lawrence at Balliol College, Oxford. He is currently work as a Professor in Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia.
Amit is one of the most versatile and talented writers of his generation and his books are published in more than twelve countries.
Musical Creation
Other than being a versatile writer Amit also has a charms in the field of music. Amit Chaudhuri is a trained and critically acclaimed singer in the North Indian classical tradition. He has received high praise for his singing from various newspapers and journals.
Amit Chaudhuri was one of the Observer’s Twenty One Writers for the Millennium and one of India Today’s ‘Faces of the Millennium’. On March 18, 2008, he was included in the panel for the Man Booker International Prize 2009, alongside writer Jane Smiley and essayist Andrey Kurkov.