Anthropocene: Climate Change, Contagion, Consolation

ANTHROPOCENE: Climate Change, Contagion, Consolation is a literary and artistic response to the most urgent issues that face humanity now — climate change and the pandemic. He tackles the complexities head-on with honesty and sensitivity, without any compromise. Simultaneously engaging multiple genres — creative non-fiction, essay, prose, poetry and photography — The book interrogates our lives against the backdrop of a dangerously fraught and ever-changing landscape, on the emotional, physical, micro and macro levels.

Amid all the negative noise in the world, Anthropocene is a quiet artistic offering — a testament to our fervent times where the ever-increasing ravages of climate change scar humanity, where Fascist politics overrides the silence of introspection, where the cleaving schism between the rich and poor becomes ever-widening, where racism peaks at an all time high, where toxicity among people proliferates, and fake news abounds.

Ultimately, Anthropocene is a plea for positivity and prayer — it urges us to slow down, to introspect, to consume less. It is time once again to learn how to love selflessly and embrace “Hope, heed, heal — our song, in present tense.”

A mighty, ambitious work — and it couldn’t be more timely. There is a bounty of riches here, the mixed genres working harmoniously together as they enhance the overall argument. The voice carefully steps away from didacticism or rhetoric, finding beauty and grace in its journey across the pages.

– Lavinia Singer, poetry editor, Faber & Faber

‘One of international poetry’s guiding stars’ – Paul Cooper in New Welsh Review

‘A word-scientist, a master grammarian’ – Weekend Observer

[On EroText] ‘Lo, Anais Nin + Henry Miller! #India. Sudeep Sen’ – Margaret Atwood on Twitter

‘Poised, elegantly constructed poems which provide calm spaces for the reader to inhabit’ – Carol Ann Duffy, former U. K. Poet Laureate

‘Sudeep Sen is a shining star in India’s poetic firmament. —William Dalrymple

‘Sudeep Sen’s poems are a present which bring — like all true poetry — so much companionship’ – John Berger

‘[A] fine bilingual edition of the poems of the great Kaifi Azmi’ . Amitav Ghosh on Instagram

‘The best-known Indian poetic voice of his generation…. Sen has carved out a distinctive space for himself. It’s time for the rest of us to sit up and take notice.’ – Shashi Tharoor on Outlook

‘I was really happy to lose myself in the learned and intricate mosaic of prose-poems [in EroText]… . Your book really stayed with me — for its evocation of rain, for its love of Japan, for its commitment to the writing life and for its freshness. —Pico Iyer

‘Fractals gathers more than three decades of poetry from one of India’s most technically gifted poets working in English. Sen’s poetic scope and knowledge of form and metre will dazzle poetry lovers while drawing in more casual admirers with his sophistication of language and range of topics. Fractals is an important retrospective collection from a poet even now just reaching the height of his powers’ – World Literature Today (USA)

‘A fine contemporary voice whose work is simultaneously urgent, intelligent, innovative, crafted and lyrical’ – Peter Porter

‘In Fractals, Sudeep Sen has created an impressively unified account of his long-term engagement with poetry as fusion of both passion and precision. Sen’s international poetic reputation is founded on his distinct blend of personal, meditative lyricism with camera-sharp imagery and contemporary allusion. A vividly-focused, confident, comprehensive collection’ – Jane Draycott

‘Sudeep Sen has a sharp eye for the irregularities of the global landscape. What is most remarkable is an unusual directness of expression which gives immediacy to his many experiments with form’ – Elaine Feinstein

‘Sudeep Sen is a truly international poet. …. he is also simply a very fine, highly imagistic poet; one who produces such brilliant, tightly stitched pictures …. this rhythmically choreographed insight has also been constructed by and through images. His thinking-with-pictures makes There is a grammar to his images that allows him to build with them…. Sen is a highly discriminating poet’ – Fiona Sampson, The London Magazine

‘Sudeep Sen is a cosmopolitan poet par excellence, who knows how to interweave in his redefned and brilliant poetry, all the possible nuances of an imaginative global poetic language’ – Magda Carneci

‘Prayer Flag is a unique object of art that reveals two intrinsically linked artistic sides of Sen’s work and talent: words and images. Perfection of musicality, tone and cadence is tuned to produce the finest resonance . . . A gift to treasure from a master artist’ – Tom Alter, Biblio

‘A rich, fluent, cosmopolitan voice’ – Peter Bradshaw in London Evening Standard

‘A poet of technical facility’ – Bruce Kingin The Oxford English Literary History

‘Sen is an eclectic poet whose understated work eschews fashionable trends, while exhibiting considerable technical virtuosity and versatility’ —John Thieme in Cambridge Guide to Literature in English

‘Sen [has] extended the range of Indian verse in English to encompass a variety of alternative views of language, history and culture’ – Chris Cook, ed., Pears Cyclopaedia (Penguin)

‘A gifted poet …. I think everyone who works in Indian literature in English should thank him for all he has done’ – Dom Moraes in Midday

‘In this artfully put together anthology [Aria], Sen translates from many languages. Sen’s own translation of Jibanananda Das’s ‘Banalata Sen’ is luminous enough to carry the entire book’ –  Arshiya Sattar in Outlook ‘Best Books of the Year’

‘I read Rain with considerable admiration and pleasure. It is a word-perfect collection and its subject matter is both the measure of the rain and the spoken line’ – Amit Chaudhuri in The Statesman ‘Best Book of the Year’