Dr K. Srilata
Visiting Professor (English)
Department of English
Email: [email protected]
Educational Qualifications
- Ph.D in English, Central University, Hyderabad, (1998).
- Fulbright Pre-doctoral fellow at the University of California, Santa Cruz, (1995-1996).
- M.Phil in English Literature, Central University, Hyderabad (1992)
- Masters in English Literature, Central University, Hyderabad (1990)
- Bachelors in English Literature, Stella Maris College, University of Madras (1988)
K Srilata is a poet, fiction writer, translator and academic. Her books include the critically acclaimed This Kind of Child: The `Disability’ Story (Westland) and six collections of poetry, the most recent of which Three Women in a Single-Room House was published by Sahitya Akademi. Srilata has also edited the anthologies The Rapids of a Great River: The Penguin Book of Tamil Poetry, Short Fiction from South India (OUP), All the Worlds Between: A Collaborative Poetry Project Between India and Ireland (Yoda) and Lifescapes: Interviews with Contemporary Women Writers from Tamilnadu (Women Unlimited). Her novel Table for Four (Penguin, India) was long listed in 2009 for the Man Asian literary prize. Her published translations include the works of the Tamil writers Vatsala and Salma. Srilata’s poems have been widely anthologized and feature in collections such as The Bloodaxe Book of Contemporary Indian Poets, The Penguin Book of Indian Poets, The Harper Collins Book of English Poetry and A Poem a Day. Srilata’s book of poems Footnotes to the Mahabharata is forthcoming from Westland. Srilata was awarded the Fulbright fellowship, the Charles Wallace fellowship and a foundation project by the India Foundation for the Arts. She has been writer in residence at the University of Stirling, Scotland, at the Yeonhui Art Space, Seoul and at Sangam House, India. As part of a Feminist Poets’ Summit project, Srilata was commissioned by the Goethe-Institut Chennai in cooperation with the Chennai Photo Biennale to write poetry. Her poems have been translated into Tamil, Hindi and Korean.
Formerly a Professor of Literature at IIT Madras, Srilata has taught courses and workshops in Creative Writing at various institutes and universities including the Chennai Mathematical Institute and Ahmedabad University.
Work Experience
- Professor of English, Dept. of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Madras from 2013 to 2022.
- Associate Professor of English, Dept. of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Madras from 2009 to 2013.
- Assistant Professor of English, Dept. of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Madras from 2003 to 2009.
Publications
- The Mahabharata Off the Record (forthcoming from Westland – Context Imprint in 2025 and supported by a grant from the India Foundation for the Arts)
- Come, Chisel Away at Me: Selections from Subramania Bharathi’s Poems (forthcoming from Westland in 2026)
- Three Women in a Single-Room House (New Delhi: Sahitya Akademi, 2023)
- This Kind of Child: The Disability Story. (New Delhi: Westland, 2022).
- I, Salma (Translations of the Tamil poet Salma). (New Delhi: Red River, 2023)
- The Scent of Happiness (a translation of a Tamil novel by Vatsala). New Delhi: Ratna Books, 2021.
- Lifescapes: Interviews with Contemporary Women Writers from Tamilnadu. New Delhi: Women Unlimited (an associate of Kali for Women), 2019.
- The Unmistakable Presence of Absent Humans. (Anthology of poems). Mumbai: Poetrywala: 2019.
- All the Worlds Between: A Collaborative Poetry Project Between India and Ireland. New Delhi: Yoda, 2018. Co-edited with Fiona Bolger.
- Once there was a girl (translation of a Tamil novel by Vatsala). Kolkata: Writers Workshop, 2012.
- Table for Four, (a novel) Penguin, India, 2011 (Long-listed for the Man Asian Literary Prize, 2009)
- Arriving Shortly (collection of poems) Kolkata: Writers Workshop, 2011.
- The Rapids of a Great River: The Penguin Book of Tamil Poetry Penguin Book of Tamil Poetry, (co-edited with Lakshmi Holmstrom and Subashree Krishnaswamy), New Delhi: Viking/Penguin India, 2009.
- Short Fiction from South India. (co-edited with Subashree Krishnaswamy), New Delhi: OUP, 2008.
- The Other Half of the Coconut: Women Writing Self-Respect History (an edited anthology of women’s writing from the Dravidian Self-Respect movement with an introduction) published by Kali for Women, New Delhi in 2002.
- “Ways of Approaching a Poem: Lessons from the Field” in Kavya Bharati25, 2013 (pp 139-146)
- “Fissures, Continuities and a Translating Consciousness: A Reading of AK Ramanujan’s Oeuvre” in The Atlantic Critical Review, January-March 2012, Vol.11, No,1 (pp.30-42)
- “Writing, Real Work, Silences” in JSL (Journal of the School of Languages, JNU edited by GJV Prasad). Autumn 2011.
- “Green mountains outside the Kitchen Window: An Eco-critical Reading of Ambai” in Indian Journal of Eco-criticism, August 2008, Vol 1. Issue 1 (pp.55-59)
- “Creating a New Constituency of Readers: Chintamani and Jaganmohini, JSL(Journal of the School of Language, Literature and culture Studies,) published by JNU and Pencraft International, Spring 2006.
- “What Creative Writing is not: Some Theoretical and Pedagogic Issues” JEFL (Journal of English and Foreign Languages, published by EFLU), No.34, December 2004
- “Indian Writing in English and Regional Literatures: The Engagement with the Local” in the Year Book of the Goethe Society of India: 2001-2002. Chennai: 2003
- “Looking for Other Stories: Women’s Writing, Self-Respect Movement and the Politics of Feminist Translations” in Inter-Asia Cultural Studies(Routledge), Vol.3, No.3, December 2002
- “The Story of the Up-market Reader: Femina’s `New Woman”and the Normative Feminist Subject” in the Journal of Arts and Ideas (April 1999).
- “Gender and the Self-Respect Movement: The Question of Female Agency” in the Enreca Occasional Paper Series(4) published by the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta (1999).
Awards and Grants:
- Grant awarded for research on alternative versions of the Mahabharata by the India Foundation for the Arts (2022-2024)
- Charles Wallace India Trust writing residency fellowship, University of Stirling, Scotland – 2010
- Long listed for the Man Asian Literary Prize, 2009 (for the novel Table for Four)
- Unisun-British council poetry Prize 2007
- Short-listed for the Little Magazine new writing award – 2006 for the story “Sarasu”.
- Gouri Majumdar Poetry Prize, 2001.
- First prize in the All India Poetry Competition organized by the British Council and the Poetry Society, India in 1998.
Area of Research
- Indian Literatures in Translation
- Gender and Literary Narratives
- Creative Writing Pedagogy
