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Professor Anamika

Women in distress triggered her vivid imagination and
at different fronts she started portraying and positioning
the sad lot of Indian women across centuries Her best
received work was the trilogy woven around the characters
of Pandita Ramabai, the courtesan Dhelabai and her Her fictional work Ainasaaz, built around the
rofessor Anamika, the first descendants, Runu, Mira and Tara who insightfully trace the life and times of Amir Khusro, also has won
woman poet to receive the meaning of Mukti in its different registers. Movingly the
prestigious Sahitya Akademi trilogy portrays how from salvation to liberation, from the wide acclaim. Her other fictional works and
Poetry Award for poetry in ‘ divine call’ phenomenon to the ‘ call centre’ and the ‘ call memoirs are Pratinayak, Awantar Katha, Ek
2021, is an eminent Hindi poet,
fiction-writer, translator, literary critic, Tho Shahar Tha, Ek Tha Shakespeare, Ek
a noted academic and a passionate The Charles Dickens, Dus Dware Ka Peenjara
advocate of women’s equality in all
realms of activity. and Tinka-Tinke Pas. Her collection of essays,
Born on 17 August 1961 in Sahitya ka Lokpaksha has received critical
Muzaffarpur, Bihar, as the daughter of
the well-known poet Shyamnandan attention.
Kishore, Anamika has said that her
father was her “first teacher in poetry
Every night he would put her to bed
singing songs or reading out poems girl’ phenomenon how Mukti travels a accomplishment and a role model for
from celebrated anthologies like long way poets in these times. Her poems have
the ones published by the Penguin, through the three phases of the been translated into English, Russian,
PPH,Gnanpeeth, Chaukhamba and pre- independence, independent and Norwegian, Japanese, Korean,
Motilal Banarsidas which are still lying globalised India Malayalam, Bangla, Oriya and Punjabi.
on his table in that big library of his. She has seven collections of Her fictional work Ainasaaz,
with multiple notes in his beautiful poems such as, Galat Pate Ki Chithi, built around the life and times of
handwriting on each page” Her poems Samay Ke Shahar Mein, Beejakxar, Amir Khusro, also has won wide
are so full of reverberations and her Anushtup, Kavita Mein Aurat, Khurduri acclaim. Her other fictional works
images so layered basically because of Hathelian, Doob-Dhan and Paani and memoirs are Pratinayak, Awantar
this deep reading backed up by her ko Sab Yaad Tha. As a poet, she is Katha, Ek Tho Shahar Tha, Ek Tha
simultaneous exposure to all kinds specially noted for her insights into Shakespeare, Ek The Charles Dickens,
of classical and oral traditions. She the modern women’s psyche and Dus Dware Ka Peenjara and Tinka-Tinke
earned this deadly juxtaposition of also for her delightful, intertextual Pas. Her collection of essays, Sahitya
the deshaj - videshaj registers through chit chat with archetypal figures like ka Lokpaksha has received critical
her informal chit chat first with the the Ten Mahavidyas,,Bhamati, Sita, attention.
little, great subaltern women who Radha, Ratnawali, Ahilya,Amrapali She has authored 16 more prose
came to see her mother and then the and other Buddhist nuns, Meerabai, works in Hindi and in English,
with the ones she befriended in the Bahinabai,Rabiya Faqueer and other containing her pioneering literary
different rooms of that PG Women’s Bhakt and Sufi poets Translplanting criticism, poetics, contemporary
Hostel at the University of Delhi them into contemporary contexts literary history, pedagogy, and gender
“where she stayed in the times when she insightfully opens up an entire politics. Her book Feminist Poetics:
with the seeds of universal sisterhood world of new sensibility and positive Where Kingfishers Catch Fire (2008)
down in their hearts women too had energy. Her appeal among the younger and several subsequent works were
started feeling like world citizens” generations of poets and other writers trailblazers in Women’s Writing in the
is tremendous. She is verily an icon of 21st Century.