Recent Events

On 30 October 2009, at the Nehru Centre, London, William Radice and Valerie Doulton led a discussion after a showing of David Lean’s film of A Passage to India, as part of a two-day celebration of E. M. Forster, organized by Valerie Doulton.

On 12 June 2009 William Radice gave at The Nehru Centre, London a revised version of his lecture ‘Two sides or one?  Poetry as a guide to truth’, as the 2009 Kathleen Raine Lecture.  It had previously been given at the India International Centre, New Delhi, 25 March 2008 (see below).

On 9 May 2009 (Tagore’s birthday), William Radice spoke in Santiniketan, West Bengal, about his translations of The Post Office and Card Country (see Recent Books) at a book launching ceremony held in the presence of Mr Gopalkrishna Gandhi, Governor of West Bengal.

On 21 April 2009, William Radice chaired a panel on ‘India Translated’ at the London Book Fair, Earl’s Court.

In the early part of 2009, following at article in The Times on 13 January (‘In joy or grief, this country needs a poet’), William Radice was involved in a campaign to put him among the contenders for the Poet Laureateship.  The campaign attracted a great deal of national and international support, and raised him from 33/1 to 16/1 in the William Hill betting stakes.  The point of the campaign was not so much to win – Carol Ann Duffy was the inevitable and deserving winner – but to make a case for public poetry with an international and multicultural appeal.  Click here for a poem commissioned by the Newcastle Journal that gave prominence to the campaign in the North-East of England (cartoon by Nicholas; see also http://www.journallive.co.uk/culture-newcastle/culture-latest-news/2009/02/11/laureate-quest-is-poetry-in-motion-61634-22900992/) and here for two poems that he circulated when the winner was announced.

On 9 January 2009, William Radice gave the tribute to his stepmother Mrs Marie Radice (née Guise) at her funeral at Golders Green Crematorium in London.  To read the tribute click here

On 3 December 2008 at the Institut für Indologie und Iranistik at Ludwig-Maxmilians-Universität, Munich, William Radice gave a lecture in German on ‘The sun, the lion and the elephant: Michael Madhusudan Dutt’s Meghnadbadh kabya’.

On 4 December 2008 at the Lyrik Kabinett in Munich he took part in a poetry reading to celebrate the 25^th anniversary of Babel Verlag.  Helen Radice played the harp. 

On 15 September 2008, William Radice attended the Memorial Service for Michael Marland CBE, at the Union Chapel in Islington.  Tagore’s song ‘Peyechi chuti, biday deho bhai’ was sung by members of The Tagoreans and The Tagore Centre UK.  To read his translation of the song, click here

On 19 July 2008, William Radice gave the keynote poetry reading that concluded a conference on Poetry and Translation held at the University of Stirling, 16-19 July.

On 16 June 2008 at the Museum der Arbeit in Hamburg, William Radice spoke at the launch of the dancing mouse/die tanzende maus (see Recent Books).  The book was launched by Dr Martin Kämpchen.  To read Dr Kämpchen’s address, click here

On 14 June 2008, William Radice took part in a Centenary Poetry Celebration for Kathleen Raine, at the Nehru Centre in London.  He read out the ‘Song for Kathleen Raine’ that he wrote on her ninetieth birthday in 1998.  To read the song, click here

In March and April 2008 William Radice went on a lecture tour of India and Bangladesh and gave the following talks, readings and lectures. 

In Bangladesh (programme arranged by The British Council):

17 March, Institute of Modern Languages, University of Dhaka: ‘Teaching Bengali poetry’.

18 March, Independent University of Bangladesh, Dhaka: ‘Bangla’s global future’.

19 March, Insititute of Bangladesh Studies, Rajshahi: ‘A Bengali Iliad: Michael Madhusudan Dutt’s Meghnadbadh kabya’, a lecture in memory of Dr Priti Kumar Mitra.

20 March, Jahangirnagar University: ‘From epic to song: translation challenges in Meghnadbadh kabya and Rabindrasangit’.  Followed by a poetry translation workshop.

In India:

25 March, India International Centre, New Delhi: ‘Two sides or one?  Poetry as a guide to truth’.  A lecture in memory of Kathleen Raine and L. M. Singhvi.

30 March, India International Centre, New Delhi, as part of the Tagore Utsav, 27-30 March 2008: ‘Poetry or song?  A presentation exploring the relationship between poetry and song in Tagore’s work’.

1 April, Gujarati Sahitya Parishad, Ahmedabad: ‘Poetry in Britain today’.

2 April, Gujarati Law Society Auditorium, Ahmedabad, by invitation of Rabindra Bhavana: ‘Painting the dust and sunlight: Rabindranath Tagore and the two Gitanjalis’.

4 April, at the auditorium at National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), Bangalore, following a performance of The Prophet and the Poet by Shailesh Parekh, William Radice commented on the performance and read out his poem ‘Talking at night to Rabindranath’. (To read the poem, see below, November 2005.)  The event was organized by Vijay Padaki and the Academy of Theatre Arts, Bangalore Little Theatre Foundation in collaboration with the Literary, Arts & Heritage Forum of NIAS.

5 April: he visited the Bangalore School of Drama by invitation of its director, Dr Zulfia Shaikh, and watched the children perform some of their production of 2007 of Card Country by Rabindranath Tagore, translated by William Radice.

10 April at 120 Lenin Sarani, Kolkata: he spoke at an ‘Adda’ hosted by ‘Srijan’ and organized by Debashish Raychaudhuri.

11 April at the Rotary Club Auditorium, Kolkata: ‘On being modern: Buddhadeva Bose’s poetic style’, a lecture for Buddhadeva Bose’s centenary year.

12 April at Visva-Bharati University, Santiniketan: ‘Religion, science and poetry: reflections on the role of reason in poetry’.

16 April at Oxford Bookstore, Kolkata: he spoke at an event on Tagore’s Gitanjali organized by Parul Prakashani in connection with their book Gitanjali: Song Offerings edited by Subhankar Bhattacharyya and Mayukh Chakraborty.

On 14 October 2007, William Radice gave a talk at SOAS on ‘Tagore: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow’, as part of a day-long seminar, ‘India’s Tryst with Destiny’, organized by The Tagoreans to commemorate India’s 60 years of independence.

On 15 July, at Shepherd’s Dene, Riding Mill, Northumberland, a hymn was sung by members of the Riding Mill madrigal group, specially written by William Radice to mark the retirement of Rev. Christopher Lewis as Vicar of St James, Riding Mill.  The hymn was written to the famous Welsh tune Calon lân.  For the words and music, click here. 

Card Country (Tasher desh) in William Radice’s translation (see Forthcoming Books) was performed in the summer of 2007 by the Bangalore School of Speech and Drama.

On 6 September 2007 William Radice gave a talk called ‘Combining Bengal with Riding Mill’ to the Women’s Institute in Riding Mill, Northumberland.

On 9 June 2007, he gave a talk called ‘The Future of Rabindrasangit’ in Glasgow, invited by the Glasgow branch of The Tagore Centre UK.

On 14 March 2007 he gave a talk at Sunderland University called ‘Translating Rhythm’.

On 15 November 2006 he spoke at Wadham College, Oxford on Creativity in Poetry and Mathematics, invited by Dr Marcus du Sautoy.  (See Sound)

On 26 October 2006 he spoke at the Literary and Philosophical Society of Newcastle upon Tyne on Tagore’s songs.

At the ‘Voices of Bengal’ festival, British Museum, September-November 2006, he spoke on Tagore’s poetry at the Tagore Study Day on 14 October.

On 22 March 2006, he gave a talk on ‘Tagore’s Gifts to English’ as part of an evening function entitled ‘Tagore’s Gifts to English’, sponsored by the English-Speaking Union and the Royal Commonwealth Society, and masterminded by Mr Michael Marland, CBE.  The talk has been published in the volume Gitanjali: Song Offerings (Kolkata, 2007: see Other Publications).  To read it, click here.

In March 2006 William Radice was given an honorary D.Litt by Assam University, Silchar, India for his services to Bengali language and literature.  In April 2006 he was made an Honorary fellow of the Bangla Academy (National Academy of Letters) in Dhaka, Bangladesh – the first non-Bengali to be given this honour.

On a lecture tour of Kolkata, Santiniketan and Dhaka in March-April 2006 he gave the following lectures:

He plans to collect these and other related lectures and essays into a book to be called TAGORE OR MADHUSUDAN? LECTURES AND ESSAYS 1995-2006, to be published by D. C. Publishers in Delhi.

In November 2005, he contributed a paper on the songs of Rabindranath Tagore to the conference CLAIMING A CULTURAL ICON: INTERPRETATIONS & MISREPRESENTATIONS of RABINDRANATH TAGORE, held at New College, University of Toronto and sponsored by the Chancellor Jackman Program for the Arts.  At a dinner on 12 November he read out a poem he had written during the night before: ‘Talking at Night to Rabindranath’.  To read the poem, click here.

On a trip 30 May – 7 June 2005 to Eastern Europe, William Radice gave lectures on Tagore in the Universities of Koper (Slovenia), Budapest (Hungary) and Miercurea Ciuc (Transylvania in Romania).  He also gave poetry readings in Ljubljana (Slovenia) and Miercurea Ciuc.  The poetry reading in Ljubljana was held at the Cankarjev dom and was given jointly with the Slovenian translator Ana Jelnikar.  For her translation of William Radice’s poem Autistic Children, click here.

On 7 May 2004 at The Bleddfa Centre in Powys (www.bleddfacentre.com), William Radice gave a day-long workshop entitled, ‘Teach me the Tune: the life and works of Rabindranath Tagore’.