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Carole Satyamurti (1939–2019)

Author of Mahabharata: A Modern Retelling

10+ Works 150 Members 2 Reviews

About the Author

Carole Satyamurti teaches at the Tavistock Clinic.
Image credit: Carole Satyamurti

Works by Carole Satyamurti

Mahabharata: A Modern Retelling (2015) 120 copies, 2 reviews
Love and Variations (2000) 7 copies
Countdown (2011) 4 copies
The Hopeful Hat (2023) 3 copies
Changing the subject (1990) 1 copy

Associated Works

Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama (1995) — Contributor, some editions — 1,012 copies, 7 reviews
I Wouldn't Thank You for a Valentine: Poems For Young Feminists (1992) — Contributor — 57 copies, 2 reviews
The Poetry Cure (2005) — Contributor — 21 copies, 1 review
Modern Women Poets (2005) — Contributor — 16 copies

Tagged

Common Knowledge

Other names
Carole Sathyamurthy
Birthdate
1939
Date of death
2019-08
Gender
female
Occupations
poet
sociologist
translator
teacher
Organizations
Arvon Foundation
Poetry Society (UK)
University of East London
Awards and honors
National Poetry Competition (1986)
Arts Council Writers' Award (1988)
Cholmondeley Award (2000)
Short biography
poet, translator and sociologist. For many years she taught at the Tavistock Clinic, where her main academic interest was in the relevance of psychoanalytic ideas to an understanding of the stories people tell about themselves, whether in formal autobiography or in social encounters. She co-edited Acquainted with the Night: psychoanalysis and the poetic imagination (2003). She won the National Poetry Competition in 1986, and a Cholmondeley Award in 2000. Countdown (2011) was her first new collection after Stitching the Dark: New & Selected Poems (2005), which drew on five collections: Broken Moon (1987), Changing the Subject (1990), Striking Distance (1994), Love and Variations (2000), and Stitching the Dark (2005), two of these Poetry Book Society Recommendations. Her translation, Mahabharata: A Modern Retelling (W.W. Norton, 2015), was joint winner of the inaugural Roehampton Poetry Prize.
Nationality
UK
Birthplace
Kent, England, UK
Places of residence
London, England, UK
Singapore
Uganda
Associated Place (for map)
England, UK

Members

Reviews

3 reviews
Of the English versions of this epic that I've read, this is by far my favorite.

Carole Satyamurti is a poet, not a Sanskrit scholar. Her retelling uses blank verse and modern language to wonderful effect. I couldn't put it down. The wars of succession between the Pandavas and the Kauravas is enough of a tale to grasp without all the subplots, instructive stories, and dharma lectures that make up the Mahabharata. Satyamurti whittles the 100,000 lines of the whole thing into 841 fast-moving show more pages that include the best of the epic's many digressions.

Satyamurti's rendering captures the spiritual dimension of events and characters (it is not only a great adventure but a religious text) without the pious language that sometimes makes other versions seem two dimensional.

I raced through this version, turned the last page, and started over again.
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Statistics

Works
10
Also by
4
Members
150
Popularity
#138,699
Rating
4.2
Reviews
2
ISBNs
16

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