Vikram Seth
Biography
Vikram Seth CBE, FRSL (born 20 June 1952) is an Indian novelist and poet. He has written several novels and poetry books.
He has won several awards such as Padma Shri, Sahitya Academy Award, Pravasi Bharatiya Samman, WH Smith Literary Award, and Crossword Book Award.
Seth's collections of poetry such as Mappings and Beastly Tales are notable contributions to the Indian English language poetry canon.
Seth has published eight books of poetry and three novels. In 1980, he wrote Mappings, his first book of poetry. The publication of A Suitable Boy, a 1,349-page novel, propelled Seth into the public limelight. It was adapted into a BBC television drama miniseries in 2020.
His second novel, An Equal Music, deals with the troubled love life of a violinist. Seth's work Two Lives, published in 2005, is a memoir of the marriage of his great-uncle and aunt.
In addition to The Golden Gate, Seth has written other works of poetry including Mappings (1980), The Humble Administrator's Garden (1985), All You Who Sleep Tonight (1990), and Three Chinese Poets (1992).
His children's book, Beastly Tales from Here and There (1992) consists of 10 stories about animals. He has written a travel book, From Heaven Lake: Travels through Sinkiang and Tibet (1983), an account of a journey through Tibet, China, and Nepal.
He was also commissioned by the English National Opera to write a libretto based on the Greek legend of Arion and the Dolphin. The opera was performed for the first time in June 1994.
A sequel to A Suitable Boy, A Suitable Girl, was announced in 2009.
Seth is bisexual. He was in a relationship with the violinist Philippe Honoré for ten years and dedicated his novel An Equal Music to him.
In 2006, he became a leader of the campaign against Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, a law against homosexuality. When Section 377 was reinstated in 2013, Seth continued campaigning against the law.
