I had the great pleasure of attending the author Elif Safak’s Room for Rumi event last night which brought her engaging new novel: The Forty Rules of Love: A novel of Rumi to life through a literary exchange. It was a stimulating discussion about mysticism, faith, sufism, writing, hope and love. The Asia House literature festival (9-26th May) is a jam packed event covering stories and literary journeys from many
Nathaniel Halhed’s ‘A Grammar of the Bengal Language’ (Hoogly, 1778). British Library, T 6863. This November sees an exciting series of talks taking place at the British Library centering around the British Library’s South Asia collections and the Two Centuries of Indian Print digitisation project. The talks will bring cutting research to the forefront including discursive debates with academics, curators and researchers from the UK and beyond. Themes include lithographs, manuscripts
The following exciting workshop is taking place at the British Library. Come and be a part of it: Vernacular Scripts of the Indus Valley and Beyond Friday, 20 May 2016 The Eliot Room, British Library Conference Centre London 10:15 Welcome and Opening Remarks – Nur Sobers-Khan (British Library) 10:30 – 11:15 Personal Reflections and Observations on the Indus Valley Scripts Christopher Shackle, SOAS (London) 11:15 – 12:00 An Anthropological Perspective
Courtesy of Alchemy Festival 2016 webpage I cannot praise this event enough, it is fun, colourful, vibrant and cultured! Each year, Alchemy fills Southbank Centre with a vibrant array of performances, workshops and exhibitions – and a delicious food market. The festival celebrates the rich cultural relationship between the UK and the Indian subcontinent, and explores the creative influences generated by our shared history. In 2016, the seventh Alchemy brings
A major new exhibition has opened in the Brunei Gallery of World IKAT textiles presented by The World Crafts Council and The World Crafts Council Asia Pacific. It is curated by Edric Ong and Manjari Nirula. The exhibition celebrates the rich legacy of Ikat, an age old textile technique stretching across the continents of the world. This unique collection brings together an array of some of the priceless pieces of
The Nehru Centre in London’s Mayfair will be putting on an exhibition of Violet M Digby’s paintings of Kashmir in the last two weeks of April this year. It will be the first opportunity to see her paintings since her death in 1960. Violet was the mother of Simon Digby, an English oriental scholar, translator, writer and collector who was awarded the Burton Medal of the Royal Asiatic Society. The
Image courtesy of www.amazon.com Acclaimed photographer Amardeep Singh’s beautifully illustrated travelogue is a true labour of love. The author visited 36 cities in Pakistan to explore the region’s impact and influence on Sikh culture (and vice versa) – the resulting book’s photography and commentary offers a unique insight into West Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Pakistan Administered Kashmir. You can join Amardeep at the Bradford Literature Festival for an enlightening event
Image courtesy of Open Book Publishers Francesca Orsini- SOAS professor of Hindi and South Asian Literature has a recently published book out titled: Telling and Texts music, literature and performance In North India. Examining materials from early modern and contemporary North India and Pakistan, Tellings and Texts brings together seventeen first-rate papers on the relations between written and oral texts, their performance, and the musical traditions these performances have entailed.
To celebrate the launch of the Autumn issue of ArtReview Asia, there will be a screening of IN THE NAME OF GOD (1992), a feature film by Indian filmmaker Anand Patwardhan. Gaining Patwardhan international acclaim as well as controversy, the film traces the progressive rise of Hindu fundamentalism in India in the 1980s and 1990s, and the resulting wave of religious violence that spread throughout the country (read more here). This
All the events organised by the King’s India Institute are free. RSVP is not needed unless mentioned on the event listing. Events in September 2015 Uski Roti ‘His Bread’ (1969, dir. Mani Kaul, Hindi with English subtitles) Indian Modernisms film series at The Tagore Centre for Global Thought Date: 21 September 2015 Venue: Anatomy Lecture Theatre (K6.29), Strand Campus, London Time: 6.30-9pm Our first screening in the Indian Modernisms series.
