Kunwar Narain India

Kunwar Narain was born in 1927 and spent his early years in Ayodhya and Faizabad before moving to Lucknow; after many decades there, he moved to Delhi where he now lives with his wife and son. His œuvre spans various genres, including poetry, epic poems, short stories, literary criticism, essays, translations of the poetry of Cavafy, Borges, Mallarmé, Różewicz and Walcott among others, and writings on cinema, history and the arts. Among his many honours are the Sahitya Akademi award; Kabir Samman, the highest all-India poetry award; Warsaw University’s honorary medal; Italy’s Premio Feronia; Shalaka Samman, the Hindi Academy’s highest honour; India’s civilian honour Padma Bhushan; the Jnanpith Award, India’s highest literary honour across all languages and genres; and the Sahitya Akademi Fellowship, the highest honour of India’s national literary academy.

(2010)