Saturday, March 28, 2009




Shaleen Kumar Singh's unusual poetry book, Proprietary Pains published by our publishing house, Poets Printery was launched at Durban on the 25 March 2009. This book is now available for saleBook launches would take place at Allahabad and Badaun
Please contact with Shaleen
drshaleen999@gmail.com
Shaleen's work in his book is a trail blazer for Indian poets, poems that are experimental, feelings that have emerged as words at the spur of a moment.

We at Glorioustimes believe in his immense creativity, this book of short poems would continue to inspire poets who believe that poems can be mere words bereft of structure and laws, if understood to its fullest capacity.

The Hungry Generation Movement that started at Kolkata in the late sixties advocated the same principles which Shaleen's work gives a whiff.
Shaleen Singh from Uttar Pradesh has contributed to a movement that is iconoclastic, reminding me of such people as Sasthi Brata and Erica Jong.

Attached is a photo of the bookRegards

Amitabh Mitra
Comments:
Congrats! The young Indian poet goes to South Africa and conquers hearts in the land of Mandela and Nadine Gordimer! Really remarkable! Keep on adding to your your conquests.Regards,
Dr Sunil Sharma (Eminent Fiction Writer) Bombay
CONGRATS, dear Shaleen. You have been doing very well on both critical and creative fronts.
R K SINGH A veteran Poet and Critic
Dr. Shaleen- let the release be auspicious-
Aju Mukhopadhyay (Pondicherry)
Dear Shaleen,
Heartiest congratulations! May you reap rich rewards from the Proprietary Pains.
Best,
Dr Nibir K Ghosh editor Remarkings
Hello Shaleen,
Congratulations.
Dr Uma Parmeshwaran, renowned Critic Canada
ohh thats great congratulation for achieving this milestone
Ram Pratap Singh Chauhan, a young Scholar
Hello! I read your poetry i am so impressed that i can't tell you indeed you are the youngest author in UP
Saifi Adnan a devout scholar
I DO HOPE THAT THESE PAINS WILL BE REMEMBERED LIKE P.B SHELLEY`S SONGOF SKYLARK BY THE WORLD.THIS IS REALLY NOT A MIDDLE FLIGHT BUT FLIGHTOF ONE CONTINENT TO OTHERBEST OF LUCK
DR. RAM SHARMA
Hi Shaleen,

I got a copy of your book from Amitabh. It is very powerful and the words cut deep into the soul giving the reader a view into your life through your eyes not theirs.

Very deep and thought provoking!
Shameela Abrahm
Proprietary Pains
Dr. Shaleen Kumar Singh
published by Poets Printery, East London, South Africa.


It was my great pleasure to be invited to review Dr. Shaleen Kumar Singh’s anthology of poetry, Proprietary Pains. Written in the thirteen days after his father, Dr Vinai Kumar Singh’s death and in honour of a man the author held in great esteem:
A shadow
Soon departed –
Left the sun, the heat,
clearly demonstrates the author’s view “-- a true poem needs no introduction, nor any foregrounding nor backgrounding rather it speaks itself what it is- “ which of course is the way of the true craftsman, which the poet undoubtably is “-- therefore I leave my poems to you to listen and feel what I say…” Which is exactly what comes to the reader’s mind in thought and clear word pictures:

A lamp
Flickering
In deep Abyss.

The slim anthology of one hundred and four, three line, untitled nor catalogued poems is unusual in itself and also in its setting out of openness in this coffee table sized book with an attractive hand painted cover by Dr. Amitabh Mitra. Yet it is easy on the eyes and refreshingly unselfish and un-bounded in the sharing of such deep and personal feelings so soon after the loss of a parent:

A marsh
Feeling helpless
I!.

The collection spanning some thirty years of memories - and the sudden hollow lost feelings of tragedy and anger are deep and without restriction:

A tornado
In thoughts
In words

And yet we find great sadness in the father’s life:

Smouldered whole life
In last
Turned to ashes.

One can only believe the writing has been cathartic, which will ultimately bring about some form of peaceful acceptance of the inevitability of life and the realization that Dr. Vinai’s life also held pride and happiness in his family’s love:

Deprting You
Bidding adieu I
Mute Pantomime.

I wish Shaleen great success with Proprietary Pains, and also have the belief it will bring comfort to many.

Graham Vivian Lancaster
Alexander House
Review of the Proprietary Pains

Proprietary Pains (PP) is haunting!
The way the old Spanish or the soaring Gothic castles are still haunting for the modern tourists!
Or, the vast Russian steppes in Turgnev, running down to the very rims of the infinity, are for the readers. Or, the majestic Brahamputra of Assam, flowing down across the heart of an ancient land, is for the travellers. Or, the fleeting ruins of a Rajasthani haveli are, as seen in the afternoon sun. Things that refuse to fade from your mind already exposed to info overload. After reading the PP, you get the same feeling. It is like hearing the rustling wind in an empty room of an abandoned colonial-era bungalow set on a hill: It is the sad but redeeming MUSIC of the inner space vacated recently by somebody very dear. As we all remember songs from our childhood and can not erase them from our remembering adult heart, in the same manner, some precious persons/ special moments can never be forgotten. They get enshrined in memory. The PP by Shaleen does that for him and his readers. The young bearded poet mourns his father---an unsung college teacher, in the hinterland of India---in this bouquet of 104 short poems, published from South Africa. The poems come straight from a grieving son and the poet within transforms that personal loss--- a family tragedy but a routine thing for others outside the immediate circle---into haunting music and marvelous verbal cadence. It is about remembering an ordinary father, in a celeb-driven age, where the very act of remembrance is Herculean resistance against trivializing mass culture that reduces everything, including art, to trivia and nothingness; where family and values are all dying fast, and, where the human beings and early robust humanism have been all made redundant by the emerging consumerist society. Amnesia is promoted here. Man is superfluous. Only ads, objects, sensations, ephemeral things are made sacred and desirable, crowded out by others competing for your eyeballs. In this universal age of instant gratification and instant replacement, memories of the dead, of the past, personal histories--- of a person and nation, are all heroic attempts to retrieve a slice of the slipping past and capturing it in verbal structures of pure harmony and beauty and thereby, resisting the general forgetfulness endemic to nations and groups. Shaleen pays glowing tributes to a father in a minimal, sparse poetic style and transmutes the felt pains into flowing, arching Niagra fall of loss and recovery, in the face of extreme pain, hardships and emotional black-outs. In the process, a son feels orphaned by the parental death but a promising poet is born…cleansed by mourning and finding strength in that personal tragedy, emerging as a true person, down but not out by the slings of misfortune…the stuff of serious art anywhere and occasion for deep meditations on Life. It is also an elegy on patriarchy, now in the throes of crisis everywhere. Broadly, it is about the loss of father figure, an angst felt by us, while growing up. It is about finite that is man and an infinity that is art!

---Dr. Sunil Sharma

Review cum Personal Essay on Shaleen Kumar Singh's Proprietary Pains by Shreekumar Varma


"i read the book through once again just now. your words are loaded with grief and an effort to be brave so that they reflect--- however or wherever they are placed--- the heaviness of your heart. your father's profile comes alive almost as surely as your bereavement. if all these poems were written during the 13 days following the loss of your father, it's no wonder the words weep. they justify the book's title. but at the end, i wondered whether you shouldn't have included the memory of a few moments of happiness and laughter in his life as well, so that the personality as well as the poetic balance is complete. but then, of course, fresh grief can't be channelised, and this is a moment all men face, and only poets know how to express. i see your tears on amitabh's cover as well."

Shreekumar Varma

4 comments:

Mamta Shenoy said...

Dear Shaleen
Heartfelt Congratulations! for the grand suceess and astounding remarks from the great intellectuals of the literary world . Go ahead ! Keep it up !
All the very best

Dr. TONUKARI Ufuoma Emmanuel said...

I hope I shall lay my hands too on your book so as to get a better glimpse of the people, the Indians, whom I have always admired.

The Unadorned said...

A great anthology of poems should have great a review to do justice to it and I find the review is so very evocative even without going through the poems.

Thanks.

Nanda
http://ramblingnanda.blogspot.com

Unknown said...

Congrats! You have done us proud! Keep it up!
And thanks for stopping by my blog: www.smitaspoetry.blogspot.com
You may visit the other one:
www.smita-poetry.blogspot.com