Ranjit Hoskote: Difference between revisions

{{Infobox person

| name         = Ranjit Hoskote

| image         = File:Ranjit Hoskoté.JPG

| caption       = Ranjit Hoskoté at ''Leselenz Hausach'' 2012

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| occupation   = Contemporary Indian poet, art critic, cultural theorist and independent curator

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'''Ranjit Hoskote''' (born 29 March 1969) is an [[India]]n poet, [[art critic]], [[cultural theorist]] and independent [[curator]]. He was honoured with [[Sahitya Akademi Award]] for lifetime achievement in 2004.

Hoskote began to publish his work during the early 1990s.<ref>See [[Indian Writing in English|Wikipedia entry on Indian Writing in English]].</ref><ref>See [http://www.anothersubcontinent.com/forums/lofiversion/index.php?t7562.html 'another subcontinent' forum, for a close reading and discussion of Ranjit Hoskote's poetry and poetics]</ref> He is the author of several collections of poetry including ''Zones of Assault'', ''The Cartographer's Apprentice'', ''Central Time'', ''Jonahwhale'', ''The Sleepwalker's Archive'' and ''Vanishing Acts: New & Selected Poems 1985–2005''. Hoskote has been seen as extending the Anglophone Indian poetry tradition established by [[Dom Moraes]], [[Nissim Ezekiel]], [[A.K. Ramanujan]] and others<ref>[http://www.anjumhasan.com/on-poetry Anjum Hasan, 'Watering the Desert: Modern Indian-English Poetry']</ref> through "major new works of poetry".<ref>[http://pippoetry.blogspot.in/2014/07/essay-on-ranjit-hoskote-cultivating.html Douglas Messerli's essay on Ranjit Hoskote's poetry, 'Cultivating Mirages']</ref> His work has been published in numerous Indian and international journals, including ''[[Poetry Review]]'' (London), ''[[Wasafiri]]'', ''[[Poetry Wales]]'', ''Nthposition'', ''[[The Iowa Review]]'', ''Green Integer Review'', ''[[Fulcrum (annual)]]'', ''Rattapallax'', ''Lyric Poetry Review'', ''West Coast Line'', ''[[Kavya Bharati]]'', ''Prairie Schooner'', ''[[Coldnoon: Travel Poetics]]'', ''The Four-Quarters Magazine'' and ''Indian Literature''. His poems have also appeared in German translation in ''[[Die Zeit]]'', ''Akzente'', the ''[[Neue Zuercher Zeitung]]'', ''[[Wespennest]]'' and ''Art & Thought/ Fikrun-wa-Fann''. He has translated the Marathi poet [[Vasant Abaji Dahake]], co-translated the German novelist and essayist [[Ilija Trojanow]], and edited an anthology of contemporary Indian verse.<ref>See [http://www.penguinbooksindia.com/AuthorLounge/AuthorDetail.asp?aid=3358 Penguin Books India: Author Lounge]</ref><ref>See, also, [http://www.museindia.com/showcont.asp?id=287 Rizio Raj's contextualisation of Hoskote's generation of poets]</ref> His poems have appeared in anthologies including ''Language for a New Century'' (New York: W. W. Norton, 2008).<ref>[http://www.wwnorton.co.uk/book.html?id=1184 ''Language for a New Century'', eds. Tina Chang, Nathalie Handal & Ravi Shankar (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2008)]</ref> and ''The Bloodaxe Book of Contemporary Indian Poets'' (Newcastle: Bloodaxe, 2008).<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20100519214655/http://www.bloodaxebooks.com/titlepage.asp?isbn=1852248017 ''The Bloodaxe Book of Contemporary Indian Poets'', ed. Jeet Thayil (Newcastle: Bloodaxe, 2008).]</ref>

Reviewing Hoskote's third volume, ''The Sleepwalker's Archive'', for [[The Hindu]] in 2001, the poet and critic [[Keki Daruwalla]] wrote: "It is the way he hangs on to a metaphor, and the subtlety with which he does it, that draws my admiration (not to mention envy)... Hoskote’s poems bear the 'watermark of fable': behind each cluster of images, a story; behind each story, a parable. I haven’t read a better poetry volume in years."<ref>[http://hinduonnet.com/2001/06/03/stories/1303017k.htm Keki Daruwalla's review of Hoskote's 'The Sleepwalker's Archive']</ref>

In 2004, a year in which Indian poetry in English lost three of its most important figures – Ezekiel, Moraes, and [[Arun Kolatkar]] – Hoskote wrote obituaries for these "masters of the guild".<ref>See [https://web.archive.org/web/20040526221349/http://www.hindu.com/mag/2004/01/18/stories/2004011800350200.htm Ranjit Hoskote: Obituary essay for Nissim Ezekiel]</ref><ref>See [https://web.archive.org/web/20040911150856/http://www.hindu.com/mag/2004/06/13/stories/2004061300080100.htm Ranjit Hoskote: Obituary essay for Dom Moraes]</ref><ref>See [https://web.archive.org/web/20040701104701/http://www.hindu.com/2004/06/03/stories/2004060308040102.htm Ranjit Hoskote: Front-page obituary for Dom Moraes]</ref><ref>See [https://web.archive.org/web/20041010091655/http://www.hindu.com/2004/09/27/stories/2004092702971000.htm Ranjit Hoskote: Editorial Page obituary for Arun Kolatkar]</ref> Hoskote has also written about the place of poetry in contemporary culture.<ref>See [http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mag/2003/07/06/stories/2003070600020200.htm Ranjit Hoskote: "State of enrichment"]</ref><ref>See [http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mag/2003/06/08/stories/2003060800120200.htm Ranjit Hoskote: "Poet's nightmare"]</ref>

Hoskote has been placed by research scholars in a historic lineage of five major art critics active in India over a sixty-year period: "William George Archer, Richard Bartholomew, [[Jagdish Swaminathan]], Geeta Kapur, and Ranjit Hoskote... played an important role in shaping contemporary art discourse in India, and in registering multiple cultural issues, artistic domains, and moments of history."<ref>[http://www.aaa.org.hk/Collection/Details/46370 Vidya Shivadas, "Mapping the field of Indian art criticism: Post-Independence", Asia Art Archive research project]</ref><ref>[http://www.aaa.org.hk/cms/Content/upload/download/research/Mapping_the_field_of_Indian_Art_Criticism_01_Final_Report.pdf Vidya Shivadas, "Mapping the field of Indian art criticism: Post-Independence", Asia Art Archive research project]</ref> Hoskote was principal art critic for [[The Times of India]], Bombay, from 1988 to 1999. In his role as religion and philosophy editor for The Times, he began a popular column on spirituality, sociology of religion, and philosophical commentary, "The Speaking Tree" (he named the column, which was launched in May 1996, after the benchmark 1971 study of Indian society and culture, ''The Speaking Tree'', written by scholar and artist Richard Lannoy).<ref>See [http://www.oup.com/uk/catalogue/?ci=9780195650778 Richard Lannoy, ''The Speaking Tree'']</ref> Hoskote was an art critic and senior editor with ''The Hindu'', from 2000 to 2007, contributing to its periodical of thought and culture, ''Folio.''<ref>See [http://www.hinduonnet.com/folio/index.htm Index of ''The Hindu: Folio''.]</ref>

In a series of essays, papers and articles published from the late 1990s onward, Hoskote has reflected on the theme of the asymmetry between a 'West' that enjoys economic, military and [[epistemological]] supremacy and an 'East' that is the subject of sanction, invasion and misrepresentation. In some of these writings, he dwells on the historic fate of the "House of Islam" as viewed from the West and from India, in an epoch "dominated by the NATO cosmology"<ref>See [http://www.counterpunch.org/hoskote02152003.html The View from a "Globalized" India: Essay by Ranjit Hoskote at www.counterpunch.org]</ref> while in others, he retrieves historic occasions of successful cultural confluence, when disparate belief systems and ethnicities have come together into a fruitful and sophisticated hybridity.<ref>See [https://www.bbc.co.uk/asiannetwork/features/ramadan_2004/ramadan_reflections_wk4-archive.shtml Broadcast by Ranjit Hoskote for BBC]{{Dead link|date=June 2021 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref>[http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mag/2004/12/05/stories/2004120500050100.htm Essay by Ranjit Hoskote on the Ramayana as a travelling text]</ref>

Hoskote, in collaboration with [[Nancy Adajania]], has focused on transcultural artistic practice, its institutional conditions, systems of production and creative outcomes, and the radical transformations that it brings about in the relationship between regional art histories and a fast-paced global art situation that is produced within the international system of biennials, collaborative projects, residencies and symposia.<ref>See [http://www.heartmus.com/Ranjit-Hoskote-Signposting-the-Indian-Highway-3358.aspx Ranjit Hoskote, "Signposting the Indian Highway"]</ref><ref>See [http://www.ici-exhibitions.org/index.php/dispatch/posts/notes_towards_a_lexicon_of_urgencies/ Nancy Adajania & Ranjit Hoskote, "Notes towards a Lexicon of Urgencies" (Independent Curators International, ''Dispatch''.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101006062838/http://www.ici-exhibitions.org/index.php/dispatch/posts/notes_towards_a_lexicon_of_urgencies/ |date=6 October 2010 }}</ref><ref>See [http://njp.kr/root/html_eng/Journul/pdf/NJP%20Reader1Eng%28web%29_27Jan2010.pdf Ranjit Hoskote & Nancy Adajania, in ''NJP Reader # 1: Contributions to an Artistic Anthropology''.]</ref><ref>See [http://www.hatjecantz.de/leseproben/9783775726108_06.pdf The Biennial Reader, edited by Marieke van Hal and Solveig Ovstebo]</ref>

In 2011, Hoskote was invited to act as curator of the first-ever professionally curated national pavilion of India at the [[Venice Biennale]], organised by the Lalit Kala Akademi, India's National Academy of Art. Hoskote titled the pavilion "Everyone Agrees: It's About To Explode", and selected works by the artists Zarina Hashmi, Gigi Scaria, Praneet Soi and the [[Desire Machine Collective]] for it. The pavilion was installed in the central Artiglierie section of the Arsenale. Hoskote wrote that his pavilion was "intended to serve as a laboratory in which we will test out certain key propositions concerning the contemporary Indian art scene. Through it, we could view India as a conceptual entity that is not only territorially based, but is also extensive in a global space of the imagination." In making his selection of artists, the curator aimed to "represent a set of conceptually rigorous and aesthetically rich artistic practices that are staged in parallel to the art market. Furthermore, these have not already been valorized by the gallery system and the auction-house circuit.... The Indian manifestation will also focus on artistic positions that emphasize the cross-cultural nature of contemporary artistic production: some of the most significant art that is being created today draws on a diversity of locations, and different economies of image-making and varied cultural histories."<ref>[http://www.biennialfoundation.org/2011/05/pavilion-of-india-in-venice-everyone-agrees-it%E2%80%99s-about-to-explode/ The Biennial Foundation: note on India pavilion, 54th Venice Biennale.]</ref><ref>[http://www.labiennale.org/en/art/exhibition/first-time/india.html La Biennale di Venezia: note on India pavilion]</ref><ref>[http://www.domusweb.it/en/art/theatres-of-self-definition-mythologies-of-identity/ ''Domus'': Radhika Desai's review-feature on India Pavilion, 54th Venice Biennale, curated by Ranjit Hoskote.]</ref><ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20110418001254/http://www.hindu.com/2011/04/14/stories/2011041456862200.htm ''The Hindu'': Rana Siddiqui Zaman's report on India Pavilion, 54th Venice Biennale]</ref><ref>[http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jun/06/entertainment/la-et-venice-wrapup-20110606 ''Los Angeles Times'': Jori Finkel's report on 54th Venice Biennale.]</ref><ref>[http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?277321 ''Outlook'': Maseeh Rahman's column on 54th Venice Biennale and the India pavilion.]</ref>

Hoskote is a defender of cultural freedoms against the monopolistic claims of the State, religious pressure groups and censors, whether official or self-appointed. He has been involved in organising protest campaigns in defence of victims of cultural intolerance.<ref>See [https://web.archive.org/web/20040507140310/http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/mag/2004/02/15/stories/2004021500280100.htm Ranjit Hoskote: "Enemies of cultural freedom"]</ref><ref>See [http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/StoryPage.aspx?id=93dd63c3-b737-4b72-91d6-642a907f21e8 Ranjit Hoskote, "Painting the art world red"]</ref><ref>See [http://www.indiauncut.com/iublog/article/fascism-in-baroda/ Amit Varma: The India Uncut blog]</ref><ref>See [http://www.nthposition.com/liberallydispensing.php Ranjit Hoskote, 'Liberally dispensing death']</ref><ref>See [https://web.archive.org/web/20081016072820/http://www.hindu.com/2008/10/13/stories/2008101352711001.htm Letter from PEN All-India Centre, protesting attacks on Indian Christians]</ref>

* ''The Sleepwalker’s Archive''. (Single File, Mumbai 2001) [http://www.hinduonnet.com/2001/06/03/stories/1303017k.htm <small>REVIEW</small>]

* ''Vanishing Acts: New and Selected Poems 1985–2005''. ([[Penguin Books]] [[India]], [[New Delhi]] 2006) {{ISBN|0-14-306185-2}} [http://www.biblio-india.com/archives/06/ja06/index.asp?mode=adv&mp=JA06 <small>REVIEW</small>] [http://www.deccanherald.com/archives/oct12006/books929552006930.asp <small>REVIEW</small>]

* ''Open Your Eyes - An Anthology'' (2020), Hawaklal Publishers {{ISBN|978-8194665175}} - Edited by Vinita Agrawal

* ''Pilgrim, exile, sorcerer : the painterly evolution of Jehangir Sabavala (Eminence Designs, Mumbai 1998)

*{{cite book |editor-last=Hoskote |editor-first=Ranjit |title=Reasons for belonging : fourteen contemporary Indian poets |location=New Delhi |publisher=Viking |year=2002}}

*{{cite book |last=Dahake |first=Vasant Abaji |others=Trans. Ranjit Hoskote |title=A terrorist of the spirit |location=New Delhi |publisher=Harper Collins Indus |year=1992}}

* ''A New Book of Indian Poems in English'' (2000) ed. by [[Gopi Kottoor]] and published by [[Poetry Chain]] and [[Writers Workshop]], [[Calcutta]].

* ''A Decade of Poetry'' ( 1997–98 ) eds. Prabhanjan K. Mishra, Menka Shivdasani, [[Jerry Pinto]] and Ranjit Hoskote Special edition (Vols. 6 and 7) of Poiesis : A Journal of Poetry Circle, [[Bombay]].

* 'No Parsi is an Island', co-curated by Ranjit Hoskote & Nancy Adajania (The National Gallery of Modern Art, Bombay: December 2013 – February 2014).

* [http://at-lamp.its.uiowa.edu/virtualwu/index.php/archive/record/ranjit_hoskote_interview/ Ranjit Hoskote Interview] mp3 recording

* [http://www.hindustantimes.com/Redir.aspx?ID=93dd63c3-b737-4b72-91d6-642a907f21e8 Painting the art world red] in [[Hindustan Times]]