Mappings

In this, Vikram Seth’s first book of poems, we are introduced to work written

in his twenties, when he was a student in England and, later, California.

These poems—about love, life and landscape—are intimate, inventive and

immediate. Interspersed with original poems are translations of a poem each

by Du Fu (Chinese), Faiz Ahmed Faiz (Urdu), Heinrich Heine (German) and

Suryakant Tripathi Nirala (Hindi).

The poems in Mappings enchant and impress with their controlled emotion

and lyricism, classical learning, wit and perceptiveness—all facets of Vikram

Seth’s now famed achievement.