Seema Jain retd prof is pursuing her literary passion full time; 12 books published

Advertisement

Jalandhar, December 16

Having retired as the vice-principal from Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Seema Jain has accomplished various literary works.

With a total of 12 books to her credit, she has published four books in the last three months. Two of these books are works for the Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi. Seema Jain, who also served as Dean Academics, Associate Professor and Head of the PG Department of English till she retired in March 2020, decided to pursue her literary passions full time and joined many online poetry groups.

As a result, she was able to connect with reputed poets across the globe. Although she already had five published poetry collections and a book of translated poems, she has recently edited two poetry anthologies titled ‘Vibrant Voices: 21st Century Indian Women Poets’ (under publication with the Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi) and ‘Mosaic of Poetic Musings: Contemporary Women Poets from India’ that is on Amazon.

These two anthologies are a compilation of 138 women poets from all over India and countries like the US, Canada, Middle East, Malaysia, etc. With many celebrated voices like Deepti Naval, Arundhathi Subramaniam, Sanjukta Dasgupta, Anita Nahal, Kavita Ezekiel, etc, included in it, it can serve as a useful academic resource for gender studies and curriculum development.

Jain is also on the Editors’ Board of the Creative Pages of the English Scholars Beyond Borders’ online Scopus Indexed Journal. Along with her editorial forays, Seema has also done well in the domain of translation. She has translated a Sahitya Akademi award-winning Rajasthani novel ‘Gavaad’ into English as ‘Mohalla’ that has been published by the Sahitya Akademi. Another Hindi novel translated as ‘The Vanquished Queen: the Diary of Kaikeyi’ has been published by the acclaimed Hawakal Publishers. She has also translated a collection of poems (Hindi to English) P’oetic World of Narendra Mohan’, besides having her translated poems published in reputed American journals.

As a poet, Seema has contributed poems, forewords, interviews, etc, to more than 100 anthologies, books and e-zines and has had the honour of being published with many stalwarts of Indian English poetry. Her poems have been housed in the digital archives of Stanford University. Many articles, reviews, etc, on her works have appeared in prestigious international papers and journals like the Statesman, Setu, etc. She regularly presents her poems on TV and radio, and for many online poetry shows.

Seema attributes her success to the constant support and motivation from her family members, personal and literary friends, her KMV family and Principal Prof Dr Atima Sharma Dwivedi. She has many projects lined up for the future and aspires to work for promoting literary sensibility among people in general and the youth in particular.