Vikram Seth is a popular Indian novelist and poet. He is the author of the famous book A Suitable Boy.
Wiki/Biography
Vikram Seth was born on Friday, June 20, 1952, in Kolkata (now Kolkata) (age 71; as of 2023). His zodiac sign is Gemini. He attended St. Michael’s High School, Patna, St. Xavier’s High School, Patna, Veerhan Boys’ School, Dehradun and Doon School, Dehradun. After graduating from Doon School, he won a scholarship to Tonbridge School in England. At the age of 17, he went to Tonbridge, England, to attend school with his great-uncle, dentist Shanti Behari Seth. At Tonbridge he won a scholarship to Oxford University. He received his BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from Corpus Christi College, Oxford, UK, in 1975. He received his graduate degree from Stanford University in California in 1979. He was studying for a PhD in economics at Stanford University, but dropped it to become a full-time writer.
appearance
Height: 5′3″
Eye color: black
Hair color: black (semi-bald)
family, caste and wife
Vikram Seth’s father Prem Nath Seth is an executive of Bata Shoes and is nicknamed “Mr. Shoe” in Delhi. His mother, Laila Seth, was the first female judge of the Delhi High Court and the first female chief judge of an Indian state high court.
Vikram Seth’s parents
He has a brother named Shantum (Buddhist teacher) and a sister named Aradhana (film producer and set designer).
Vikram Seth and his family
Vikram Seth and his family
In an interview, he admitted that he was bisexual. He was once in a relationship with a woman named Gabrielle. He was also romantically involved with French violinist Philippe Honoré.
Philippe Honoré
He revealed in the interview that he had been in a monogamous relationship for a long time and was very sad when it ended.
Profession
In 1980, he wrote his first collection of poems, “Mapping”.
He wrote eight books of poetry, including “The Humble Administrator’s Garden” (1985), “You Who Sleep Tonight” (1990) and “Three Chinese Poets” (1992). His children’s book, Tales of the Wild Beasts Everywhere (1992), consists of ten stories adapted into poetry. Vikram Seth has written three fictional novels, Golden Gate (1986) being the first.
The other two are “A Suitable Boy” (1993) and “Equal Music” (1999). “A Suitable Boy” brought him into the spotlight. He also wrote a travelogue, “From Tianchi: Travels in Xinjiang and Tibet” (1983), which records his journey to Tibet, China and Nepal. His second nonfiction work, Two Lives (2005), is a memoir about the marriage of his great-uncle Shanti Behari Seth and his German-Jewish great-aunt Henner Gerda Kahlo. . He was commissioned by the English National Opera to write a libretto based on the Greek legend Arion and the Dolphin. The opera premiered in June 1994.
Arion and the dolphin
A Suitable Girl, a sequel to Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy, was announced in 2009 but has yet to be published.
Awards and Honors
- Pravasi Bharatiya Saman, 2005
Vikram Seth wins Pravasi Bharatiya Samman Award
- Awarded an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 2001
- 1999 Crossword Book Award for Music for Equality
- In 1994, he won the WH Smith Literary Award for “A Suitable Boy”
- In 1994, he won the Commonwealth Writers Award for “A Suitable Boy”
- In 1988, he won the Sahya Academic Award for “Golden Gate”
- 1985 “The Humble Administrator’s Garden” won the Commonwealth Poetry Prize (Asia)
- “From Tianchi: Travels in Xinjiang and Tibet” won the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award in 1983
dispute
- In 2006, Vikram became a leader of the movement against Section 377 (unnatural sexual intercourse) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which was re-criminalized by the Supreme Court of India. He also slammed Article 377 at an event organized by a television channel at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.
- In 2015, Vikram came under fire for his acceptance into Jagdish Tytler’s Pravasi Bharatiya Samman in 2005. Jagdish was accused of involvement in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in Delhi. When the news of Jagdish’s involvement in the riots came out, Baha Dutt asked Vikram if he would return the award he had received from Jagdish. To this, Vikram replied –
If Sahitya Akademi still talks nonsense, I will also return my award. “
favorite thing
- Food: Awadhi Biryani, Konkani Biryani, Hyderabadi Biryani, Chapli Kabab, Shamli Kabab
- Poets: Timothy Steele, Donald David
- Novelists: Jane Austen, George Eliot, RK Narayan
- Book: “Eugene Onegin” by Alexander Pushkin
- Musicians: Franz Schubert, Johann Sebastian Bach
property/assets
He has been shifting his base from London to Delhi and vice versa. He also owns a residence in Salisbury, England – Bemerton Rectory, the former home of the poet George Herbert.
Bemerton Rectory
sign
Vikram Seth’s autograph
Facts/Trivia
- At the age of six, Vikram was sent to a boarding school, which resulted in him becoming introverted. This also affected his areas of interest, as he became more interested in reading than participating in group activities such as sports. He recalled,
Unable to look others in the eye. The school was too far to go, it took two days to get there from home, and I could only see my family four months a year. My father was always cold when I was at home, and when he came home he was tired and worried. During my six years here I had a terrible sense of isolation and isolation. Sometimes when the lights go out, I wish I never woke up. Because of my interest in learning and reading, because of my lack of interest in games, and because of my unwillingness to join gangs and groups, I was ridiculed and bullied by my classmates and seniors. “
- When he was a student at Doon School, Dehradun, he edited the school’s journal, Doon School Weekly.
- Seth began writing poetry while studying at Oxford University. He condemned the poems he was writing at that time; because he considered them “extremely unskillful.” However, he continued to write and kept these poems to himself.
- He was an avid reader of poetry. While studying at Stanford University, Vikram stumbled upon the translated works of Chinese poet Wang Wei. Wei’s work influenced Vikram to learn Mandarin so that he could read the poet’s original works. Within a year, he became so fluent in the language that he could even write poetry in it. At the same time, he also began to write poetry in English seriously.
Wang Wei
- Knowing he needed counseling, he contacted professors in the English department at Stanford University and found a mentor in the American poet Timothy Steele, who was then the Jones Lecturer in Poetry at Stanford. . Steele not only supported Vikram in poetry but also inculcated in him the creative impulse. Timothy also used to tutor him informally every two weeks. According to Timothy,
The first impression that Vikram leaves on you is his immense and lively intelligence. It was obvious he was going to do some extraordinary things, but when I first met him, it wasn’t clear where his talents would lead. Three or four Muses pulled at him jealously. “
Timothy Steele
- Vikram took a year off for the Wallace Stegner Creative Writing Fellowship (1977-78).
- American poet and author of “Does Poetry Matter?” The author of “Dana Gioia” is also one of Vikram’s contemporaries. Along with Dana and Steele, Vikram’s gift for poetry gradually emerged with the publication of his first collection of poems, Mapping, in 1980. He rejoined the economics faculty at Stanford University.
- “Mapping” had meter and meter (a sound pattern), which was so unpopular at the time that publishers refused to publish his book. This forced Vikram to become a publisher himself and he started forcing his family and friends to sell his books. Later published by Kolkata Writers Workshop.
- Before the publication of his book in 1980, Vikram had gone to Nanjing University in China to conduct doctoral research on Chinese village demography. In China, Seth spent more time reading Chinese poetry than he did studying it. This eventually led to Vikram translating the works of Wang Wei, Du Fu and Li Bai and publishing the book Three Chinese Poets in 1992.
- In addition to Mandarin, he is fluent in German, French, Urdu, Bengali and Welsh.
- At the end of his stay in China, he successfully charmed a policeman by singing the song “Awon Hoon” from the movie “Awon” (1951), which was popular in China at the time; during an organized sightseeing trip to the northwestern provinces of China . The next day, his performance of the song caused a stir at the police station, and he was granted a rare permit to travel to Lhasa, the capital of Tibet in China’s autonomous land. While in Tibet, he decided to hitchhike back to India via Tibet. He chronicled this journey in his book From Tianhu: Traveling through Xinjiang and Tibet (1983), published by London publishers Chatto and Windus.
“Journey to Tianchi” Xinjiang and Tibet (1983)
- After returning to Stanford, he read Alexander Pushkin’s “Eugene Onegin” translated by Charles Johnston. He became obsessed with the book, an obsession that led him to write his first novel, The Golden Gate (1986), published by Random House.
- In 1987, he gave up his PhD and returned to India, where he began work on the novel A Suitable Boy.
Vikram Seth poses with his book – A Suitable Boy
- His love for music began in childhood, when he learned to play the flute and cello. He also studied singing Khayal for 10 years under the tutelage of late Pandit Amarnath. However, his love for Western classical music came to him when a friend in Oxford took him to hear Bach. It was this passion for music that led him to write Music for Equality (1999).
- After the publication of Golden Gate (1986), Vikram decided to hire a British agent. He shortlisted several agencies and conducted interviews one by one. He ultimately chose Scottish literary agent and author Giles Gordon. Gordon recalled that interview and said –
Vikram sat at one end of a long table and began to grill us. It’s really incredible. He wanted to know our literary tastes, what we thought of poetry, what we thought of drama, which novelists we liked. “
- Vikram also served as an editor at Stanford University Press from 1985 to 1986.
- He also received a job offer from the World Bank. His parents suggested that he work in a bank for five years, collect a pension, and then continue writing poetry and novels. Vikram told him that his creativity would be over and instead asked his parents to support him until his next book was published.
- Vikram not only mastered the art of combining words in rhyme (poetry) but also the art of writing i.e. calligraphy. He has learned Chinese and Arabic calligraphy and can write in many languages. He also collaborated with Absolut Vodka on three paintings featuring their bottles.
Vikram Seth and his paintings
- Vikram was born into a Hindu family. However, when it comes to his religious and political thoughts, Vikram said:
I have said it before and I say it again, any Indian who disparages another Indian because of the food he eats, the God he prays to, or the people he loves, does not deserve to be an Indian. Indian leader. “
- According to reports, he earns around Rs. His best-selling novel A Suitable Boy earned Rs 23 million. His novel Two Lives earned Rs 13 crore.
Categories: Biography
Source: HIS Education