Biography- Born in 1952 in Calcutta, India, Vikram Seth was educated at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, Stanford University and Nanjing University. He has travelled widely and lived in Britain, California, India and China. His first novel, The Golden Gate: A Novel in Verse (1986), describes the experiences of a group of friends living in California. His acclaimed epic of Indian life, A Suitable Boy (1993), won the WH Smith Literary Award and the Commonwealth Writers Prize (Overall Winner, Best Book). Set in India in the early 1950s, it is the story of a young girl, Lata, and her search for a husband. An Equal Music (1999), is the story of a violinist haunted by the memory of a former lover. Vikram Seth is also the author of a travel book, From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet (1983), an account of a journey through Tibet, China and Nepal that won the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award, and a libretto, Arion and the Dolphin: A Libretto (1994), |
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which was performed at the English National Opera in June 1994, with music by Alec Roth. His poetry includes Mappings (1980), The Humble Administrator's Garden (1985), winner of the Commonwealth Poetry Prize (Asia), and All You Who Sleep Tonight: Poems (1990). His children's book, Beastly Tales from Here and There (1992), consists of ten stories about animals told in verse.
Vikram Seth's latest work is Two Lives (2005), a memoir of the marriage of his great uncle and aunt.
A Suitable Boy
Vikram Seth
ISBN10: 1857990889 ISBN13: 9781857990881
Publisher: Orion Publishing Co Phoenix (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd )
Edition: New edition
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 01 Mar 1994
This novel is a love story - the story of a young girl's search for the man she will marry. Lata's mother is determined to find a suitable boy for her daughter, through love or through existing maternal appraisal. Vikram Seth's novel is at its... More
An Equal Music
Vikram Seth
ISBN10: 0753807734 ISBN13: 9780753807736
Publisher: Orion Publishing Co Phoenix (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd )
Edition: New edition
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 20 Dec 1999
A love story from the author of "A Suitable Boy". A chance sighting on a bus; a letter which should never have been read; a pianist with a secret that touches the heart of her music ...AN EQUALl MUSIC is a book about love, about the love of a... More
Two Lives
Vikram Seth
ISBN10: 0349117985 ISBN13: 9780349117980
Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group Abacus
Edition: New edition
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 06 Jul 2006
* A story of love and survival amidst the great events of the twentieth century. TWO LIVES tells the remarkable story of Seth's great uncle and aunt. His great uncle Shanti left India for medical school in Berlin in the 1930s and lodged with a... More
From Heaven Lake
Vikram Seth
ISBN10: 185799082X ISBN13: 9781857990829
Publisher: Orion Publishing Co Phoenix (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd )
Edition: New edition
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 02 Sep 1993
This is a classic travel book. The perfect travel book' New Statesman Hitch-hiking, walking, slogging through rivers and across leech-ridden hills, Vikram Seth travelled through Sinkiang and Tibet to Nepal: from Heaven Lake to the Himalayas. More
A Suitable Boy (v. 3)
Vikram Seth
ISBN10: 1857993594 ISBN13: 9781857993592
Publisher: Orion Publishing Co Phoenix (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd )
Edition: New edition
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 02 Oct 1995
The story that began with a wedding ends with a wedding, as the complex web of character and plot is pulled together in its final resolution. THE FINAL VOLUME IN THE TRILOGY. LATA FINALLY MAKES HER DECISION & THE WHOLE ENDS AS IT STARTED WITH A... More
The Golden Gate
Vikram Seth
ISBN10: 0571212654 ISBN13: 9780571212651
Publisher: Faber and Faber
Edition: New edition
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 04 Feb 2002
Written in verse, this was Vikram Seth's first novel. Set in the 1980s, in the affluence and sunshine of California's silicon valley, it is the story of twenty-somethings looking for love, pleasure and the meaning of life. More
A Suitable Boy (v. 2)
Vikram Seth
ISBN10: 1857993586 ISBN13: 9781857993585
Publisher: Orion Publishing Co Phoenix (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd )
Edition: New edition
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 02 Oct 1995
A student, a shoemaker, a poet: three suitors fight for Lata. Meanwhile India, newly-independent, is struggling through a time of great turmoil as the agony of partition still throbs in people's minds - driving a wedge through friendships... More
Humble Administrator's Garden
Vikram Seth
ISBN10: 0856355836 ISBN13: 9780856355837
Publisher: Carcanet Press Ltd
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 01 Jan 1985
Bibliography
Mappings Writer's Workshop (Calcutta) (re-issued Viking 1994), 1980
From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet Chatto & Windus, 1983
The Humble Administrator's Garden Carcanet, 1985
The Golden Gate: A Novel in Verse Faber and Faber, 1986
All You Who Sleep Tonight: Poems Faber and Faber, 1990
Beastly Tales from Here and There (illustrated by Ravi Shankar, re-issued Phoenix House 2002) Phoenix House, 1992
Three Chinese Poets: Translations of Poems by Wang Wei, Li Bai and Du Fu Faber and Faber, 1992
A Suitable Boy Phoenix House, 1993
Arion and the Dolphin: A Libretto Phoenix House, 1994
An Equal Music Phoenix House, 1999
Two Lives Time Warner, 2005
Awards
1983 Thomas Cook Travel Book Award From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet
1985 Commonwealth Poetry Prize (Asia) The Humble Administrator's Garden
1993 Irish Times International Fiction Prize (shortlist) A Suitable Boy
1994 Commonwealth Writers Prize (Overall Winner, Best Book) A Suitable Boy
1994 WH Smith Literary Award A Suitable Boy
2001 EMMA (BT Ethnic and Multicultural Media Award) for Best Book/Novel An Equal Music
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