Kalagora in Poetry Review
Kalagora the book was reviewed by Todd Swift in the winter edition of Poetry Review. Below are excerpts:
Bose is also a “hybrid” poet, in the post-colonial sense of the term – his work in Kalagora aiming to merge, bridge, fuse, and intertwine (as they say), the diction, themes, and experiences, of various centres, some cosmopolitan, others less so, in a far more earnestly engaged (and academic) way than Daljit Nagra does. It may be a rule of thumb that the more experimental the poet, the more serious, the less funny. This is the kind of poetry with yin and yang in it, and lots of indents.
You can get this excellent edition of the journal here
Posted May 23, 2012
Three cities, three experiences, one man
Last night Siddhartha and I travelled to the chilly, hilly North East to present Kalagora at The Central, Gateshead. It was promoted by anarchic spoken word and music night Trashed Organ in association with the brilliant arts organisation GemArts, and the whole thing was part of the Festival of Belonging.
The Central is a lovely old boozer, a stone’s throw from the famous Tyne Rail Bridge. It serves fantastic ale and is decorated with dozens of posters and paintings of trains and railway stations. The upstairs room is a far cry from the well resourced theatres we’re used to touring to, so it was a challenge to transform the space into the three cities of Kalagora’s global journey. Nevertheless, it was a really fun show, and we had a great response from the audience. Big thanks to everyone who came down, and to John and Melanie (Trashed Organ) and Vikas (GemArts), our lovely hosts.
- Tom (Kalagora Producer)
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Blog reviews
This was a tight script. Fast paced, bursting with ideas, with rich impressions and still telling a roller-coaster story. I was there. This was a conversation. Ingenious and unforgettable. (More…)
Bose’s rich use of language and physical performance reaches out to the audience: this [is] not just a poetry reading. (More…)
It is perhaps too easy to compare elements of Kalagora to Dante’s Divine Comedy or William Blake’s infernal London, or even Joyce’s Ulysses, but those are the works that this brought to my mind. Kalagora would be a decent show if it just stuck to that, so what made this dazzling performance shine was Bose’s energy – from melancholy to rage; hope to despair – Bose and his riotous trip across the globe brought all the power of a full-cast, 3 hour play and bundled it into a one hour, one-man (and one director) package that resonated far beyond the confines of its explosive performance. (More…)
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Photos by Spurious Nonsense (Jonathan Parker)
Posted May 3, 2012
Kalagora: Wasafiri/ Camden People’s Theatre
Kalagora the book was recently reviewed by Charles Beckett in Wasafiri, the journal of international contemporary writing. Below are excerpts:
There is a sense of an Odyssean voyage, a continuous exile, full of temptation and danger [...] This is a collection that is always dramatic, always in tune with the sensational possibilities of language and the spectacular turn of phrase [...] fusing cities together and describing a planet that is globally interconnected and globally aware.
The new issue of Wasafiri also has Sid’s interview with poet, musician and librettist Jeet Thayil on his debut novel Narcopolis.
And here’s another great review of Kalagora the play (‘one of the stand-out spoken word shows of last year’s Edinburgh Fringe’) at Camden People’s Theatre by Isabelle Koy-Dibly in Plays to See:
[...] the writing is superb, yet the play’s true skill lies in Bose’s deliverance of this script. As a performer, Bose incorporates an array of voices and physical movements to depict the multiple personas he meets upon his journey [...] While this is a one-man performance, his ability to transform into a range of characters truly heightens the authentic and multi-dimensional nature of this play.
Read the full review here
Posted April 30, 2012
‘Animal City’, live at Ronnie Scott’s
A second performance from the night at Ronnie’s. ‘Animal City’ was first published in The Wolf, one of the most internationally minded literary journals, edited by James Byrne. You can read the poem here on The Wolf website
Posted January 23, 2012
‘Sketching (slight return)’, live at Ronnie Scott’s
One of the highlights of the past few months was performing at Jumoke Fashola’s Jazz Verse Jukebox at London’s legendary jazz club Ronnie Scott’s. I shared the stage with some remarkable artists including Randolph Matthews and Carol Grimes. The night was special. This is a performance of ‘Sketching (Slight return)’, a poem that closes Kalagora, the book of poetry.
Posted January 18, 2012
Road to Edinburgh film
Hi and a very happy new year to you all! It’s been a while since I wrote on this site. It was a busy second half of 2011 with writing, performance, teaching, and performance-based research as a Leverhulme Fellow in Drama at Queen Mary, University of London.The year ended with an intensive two-week R&D phase with Ravi Jain of WhyNotTheatre, Toronto, with whom I’m currently developing a theatre project called Komagata Maru. It was special working all day as an actor with some great actors from the UK, Canada, Ireland, Australia, Cape Verde, and India.
After a hectic 2011, I thought that I’d start the new year with films and footage. Post-Edinburgh, Kalagora (the play) went to the Decibel showcase in Manchester, returned to London at the wonderful Rosemary Branch theatre, and closed the year out with a couple of shows in the Harold Pinter Studio at QMUL (Pinter was one of my early favourites, so this was special).
And so here’s a short film made by Kalagora co-filmmaker and video-designer, Maria Tzika, which captures the play’s journey to the Edinburgh Festival. And of course there’s the madness of the Fringe! This is for all of us who there last year and made the festival what it was: the performers, the audiences, and the city itself. Special thanks to Ansghar Hoeckh for the footage from the actual show. Hope you dig it. Love and warm wishes, Sid
Posted January 6, 2012
