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Sunday, July 29, 2012

Jeet Thayil's debut novel in the MAN BOOKER long list

 SHORT BIOGRAPHY

Jeet Thayil born in 1959 is a Keralite and contemporary poet and novelist writing in English.  His father Padma Bhushan T J S George is a known figure in India and abroad as a media person and writer.  Jeet's intellectual formation took place in educational institutions like the Island School as well as institutions in Hong Kong and the Wilson College in Mumbai. The influence, in his life, of the premiere institutions like Sarah Lawrence College (New York) from where he mastered in Fine Arts, the New York Foundation for the Arts which  provided him with grants and awards cannot be disputed.  Equally decisive must be the the role of the the Swiss Arts Council, the British Council and the Rockefeller Foundation in shaping a novelist and poet of the Man Booker calibre.   His partnership with the poet Vijay Nambisan resulted in Gemini-2  (1992). Apocalypso (1997), English (2004) and These Errors Are Correct (2008) later works.

  Vijay Seshadri, a poet himself,  highlights the command of the poetic and historical past, depth of his language, archaeological richness, and reality. Jeet has edited two volumes of short stories, Vox: New Indian Fiction (1996) and Vox 2: Seven Stories (1997).  His writings as a journalist appeared in Asiaweek, the South China Morning Post, and India Abroad. He was associated as the literary editor with the Mumbai magazine Gentleman  for three years from 1995.  Six years ago, Jeet edited the book Divided Time: India and the End of Diaspora for Routledge which has been a noted collection. Thayil has as editor a collection of 56 Indian Poets for Fulcrum press (2005) besides another anthology of contemporary Indian Poets for Bloodaxe (2008) too to his credit.

Jeet Thayil is multifaceted creative person.  He is a performer poet and guitarist who is also the founding member of the Chronic Blues Band, a Bangalore-based fusion band.  It is no wonder that the he is on the Montreal International Poetry Prize Board also (http://montrealprize.com/about-us/advisory-board/).

His novel Narcopolis, a Faber & Faber publication is now long listed for Man Booker.  The department of English and the English Club of Payyanur College, Kannur, Kerala salute JEET THAYIL for this glory and share the happiness.
 

Man Booker longlist - 2012:

Nicola Barker, The Yips (Fourth Estate)
Ned Beauman, The Teleportation Accident (Sceptre)
André Brink, Philida (Harvill Secker)
Tan Twan Eng, The Garden of Evening Mists (Myrmidon Books)
Michael Frayn, Skios (Faber & Faber)
Rachel Joyce, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry (Doubleday)
Deborah Levy, Swimming Home (And Other Stories)
Hilary Mantel, Bring up the Bodies (Fourth Estate)
Alison Moore, The Lighthouse (Salt)
Will Self, Umbrella (Bloomsbury)
Jeet Thayil, Narcopolis (Faber & Faber)
Sam Thompson, Communion Town (Fourth Estate)

 

 BOOKER WINNERS WITH SHORT LIST 2000 - 2011

 

 2011 Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending (England) Carol Birch, Jamrach's Menagerie (England) Patrick deWitt, The Sisters Brothers (Canada) Esi Edugyan, Half Blood Blues (Canada) Stephen Kelman, Pigeon English (England) A.D. Miller, Snowdrops (England)

2010 Howard Jacobson, The Finkler Question (England) Peter Carey, Parrot and Olivier in America (Australia) Emma Donoghue, Room (Ireland) Damon Galgut, In a Strange Room (South Africa) Andrea Levy, The Long Song (England) Tom McCarthy, C (England)

2009 Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall (England) A. S. Byatt, The Children's Book (England) J. M. Coetzee, Summertime (South Africa) Adam Foulds, The Quickening Maze (England) Simon Mawer, The Glass Room (England) Sarah Waters, The Little Stranger (Wales)

2008 Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger (India) Sebastian Barry, The Secret Scripture (Ireland) Amitav Ghosh, Sea of Poppies (India) Linda Grant, The Clothes on Their Backs (Britain) Steve Toltz, A Fraction of the Whole (Australia)

2007 Anne Enright, The Gathering (Ireland) Nicola Barker, Darkmans (England) Mohsin Hamid, The Reluctant Fundamentalist (England/Pakistan) Lloyd Jones, Mister Pip (New Zeland) Ian McEwan, On Chesil Beach (England) Indra Sinha, Animal's People (England/India) More info at the The Guardian

2006 Kiran Desai, The Inheritance of Loss (Indian born) Kate Grenville, The Secret River (Australian born) M. J. Hyland, Carry Me Down (English born) Hisham Matar, In the Country of Men (American born) Edward St Aubyn, Mother's Milk (English) Sarah Waters, The Night Watch (English) More info at the The Guardian

2005 John Banville, The Sea (Ireland) Julian Barnes, Arthur & George (England) Sebastian Barry, A Long Long Way (Ireland) Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go (England) Ali Smith, The Accidental (England) Zadie Smith, On Beauty (England) More info at the The Guardian

2004 Alan Hollinghurst, The Line of Beauty (England) Achmat Dangor, Bitter Fruit (South Africa) Sarah Hall, The Electric Michelangelo (England) David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas (England) Colm Tóibín, The Master (Ireland) Gerard Woodward, I'll go to Bed at Noon (English) More info at the The Guardian

2003 DBC Pierre, Vernon God Little (Australia) Monica Ali, Brick Lane (Bangladesh & England) Margaret Atwood, Oryx and Crake (Canada) Damon Galgut, The Good Doctor (South Africa) Zoe Heller, Notes on a Scandal (England) Clare Morrall, Astonishing Splashes Of Colour (England) More info at the BBC website

2002 Yann Martel, Life of Pi (Canada) Rohinton Mistry, Family Matters (Canada) Carol Shields, Unless (Canada) William Trevor, The Story of Lucy Gault (Ireland) Sarah Waters, Fingersmith (England) Tim Winton, Dirt Music (Australia)

2001 Peter Carey, True History of the Kelly Gang Ian McEwan, Atonement Andrew Miller, Oxygen David Mitchell, Number 9 Dream Rachel Seiffert, The Dark Room Ali Smith, Hotel World

2000 Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin Trezza Azzopardi, The Hiding Place Michael Collins, The Keepers of Truth Kazuo Ishiguro, When We Were Orphans Matthew Kneale, English Passengers Brian O'Doherty, The Deposition of the Father

 

Bibliography

 
FICTION
EDITED
  • The Bloodaxe Book of Contemporary Indian Poets, Bloodaxe, U.K, 2008

    VISIT: http://www.amazon.com/Bloodaxe-Book-Contemporary-Indian-Poets/dp/1852248017

  •  Vox2: Seven Stories, Sterling Newspapers, India, 1997
  •  Give the Sea Change and It Shall Change: 56 Indian Poets, Fulcrum, 2005
  •  Divided Time: India and the End of Diaspora, Routledge, 2006
  • 60 Indian Poets, Penguin India, 2008.
 POETRY COLLECTIONS
  •  Gemini, Penguin-Viking, New Delhi, 1992. (two-poet volume ), 0-670-84524-8
  • Apocalypso , Aark Arts, London, 1997, ISBN 1-899179-01-1
  • English, Penguin, Delhi and Rattapallax Press, New York, 2004. ISBN 1-892494-59-0
  • These Errors Are Correct, Tranquebar Books (EastWest and Westland), Delhi, 2008 

CURIOSITY MAY KILL THE CAT BUT NOT YOU

 http://www.saltpublishing.com/saltmagazine/issues/01/text/Thayil_Jeet.htm

http://jaipurliteraturefestival.org/archives/program-2011/speakers-2012/#z 

 http://www.doolnews.com/malayalee-jeeth-thayyil-novel-in-bookker-prize-list-malayalam-news-554.html


 http://www.e-anglais.com/lectures/Booker_Prize.html





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