Sudeep Sen declared joint-winner of the Rabindranath Tagore literary award

Indian author Sudeep Sen has won the Rabindranath Tagore literary award 2021-22 along with Shobhana Kumar and Sanjoy K Roy.

Sen's book Anthropocene: Climate Change, Contagion, Consolation, was published by Pippa Rann Books, UK, has been selected for the award. The winners were selected from a shortlist of 11 authors.

The book focuses on today’s most urgent and important topics: Climate Change and pandemics – and the possibility of consolation.

The book utilises many genres (creative prose, poetry, photographs, etc). Sen is one of India’s most important writers, who has won international prizes for his work.

British Indian publisher Prabhu Guptara started Pippa Rann Books in 2020 at the age of 70. This is the first award for the UK-based publishing firm.

The award ceremony was held at the Multipurpose Hall, India International Centre in New Delhi attended by Freddy Svane, ambassador of Denmark, deputy ambassador of Taiwan Mumin Chen, Ashok Vajpayee and Dr. George Gauthier II and many more.

Kumar won the Tagor Prize for her work in ‘A Sky Full of Bucket Lists’, a collection of poems in haibun style.

TagorePrize for social achievement was awarded to Roy for his contribution towards sustenance and arts. He is the producer of Jaipur Literature festival and 30 other art festivals across the world.

Sen, a poet, translator, and editor of influential anthologies, said “I am delighted that Anthropocene has been awarded the Rabindranath Tagore Literary Prize. This book, which coalesced during the pandemic, is essentially a plea for positivity and prayer in these fervent times. Using multiple literary genres and tropes, it endeavors to address the wider geopolitics of our time. I hope this award will serve to sensitize a greater number of people to very urgent issues that need acute and immediate attention — such as climate change, and our global need for unity and humanism. ‘Hope, heed, heal — our song, in present tense’.”

The Rabindranath Tagore Literary Prize is a literary honour in India conferred annually to published works of Indian authors (residing in India or abroad) in novels, short stories, poetry, and drama, originally written in any of Indian official languages and dialects, but translated to English.

The winner receives $10,000 along with a Rabindranath Tagore statuette, while the shortlisted authors each receive $500.