Sukrita says - "Literary success lies in the joy I get while in the very process of writing and then the glee in actually being able to finish a poem. The rest of it is rather superficial and temporary."

Welcome to Red River Sessions, which is a collaboration between Red River, the premier independent house for poetry and Uncut Poetry, the much loved poetry podcast. I am your host Sunil Bhandari, and in this episode we are speaking to the renowned poet Sukrita Paul Kumar.

Sukrita  was born in Nairobi, Kenya and emigrated to India when Kenya obtained its freedom from the British. As director of a UNESCO project on 'The Culture of Peace', she edited Mapping Memories - a volume of Urdu short stories from India and Pakistan. She has published several collections of poetry as well as academic books and critical writing. She's recently edited the The Yearbook of Indian Poetry in English 2020-21 along with Vinita Agarwal.

And with Red River she has published the sparkling and incandescent Country Drive, co-written with Yasmin Ladha.

Get the book on Amazon. 

So Sukrita and I had discussed the general drift of questions for the interview. Instead what transpired was a completely freewheeling conversation - and what a talk it turned out to be!

We talked about Plath, death, influence of talented fathers, the blessing and curse of poetry, the meaning of life, her first book, about maintaining innocence in fractured times, Jiddu Krishnamurthy’s teaching on focus, the criticality of independent publishing houses, the thrill of holding onto a tree, and a hundred other things!

This is a peerless episode from Red Rivers Sessions presented to you by Uncut Poetry. In Red River Sessions, we  talk to published poets, about their poetry, their craft and what haunts them. It is brought to you by Red River, which is the premier independent publisher of poetry books and Uncut Poetry, a much-loved poetry podcast.

Following are the details of the music used in this episode -

Music: 1000 Lichter by Sascha Ende

Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/3161-1000-lichter

License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Music: Adventure by Alexander Nakarada

Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6092-adventure

License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Artist website: https://www.serpentsoundstudios.com/

Music: Sentimental Travel by MusicLFiles

Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6968-sentimental-travel

License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license