All You Who Sleep Tonight

All you who sleep tonight
Far from the ones you love,
No hand to left or right,
And emptiness above -

Know that you aren't alone.
The whole world shares your tears,
Some for two nights or one,
And some for all their years.

--Vikram Seth

Biography 

A small, wiry soap opera enthusiast with well-defined features and a ready smile, Vikram Seth was born in Calcutta in 1952 (also the home of Indian literary giant Rabindranath Tagore). Throughout Seth's childhood, his father Prem Seth was a shoe company executive and his mother Laila Seth served as a judge (Bemrose). Vikram Seth is the oldest of three--his brother conducts Buddhist meditational tours and his youngest sister serves as an Austrian diplomat (Robinson, Rachlin). 

After completing his primary education, Seth left India to study at Oxford University, England, earning degrees in philosophy, economics, and politics. He further enrolled at Stanford University, intending to earn a PhD in Economics, but never completed his study. While at Stanford, Seth was also a also a Wallace Stegner Fellow in Creative Writing from 1977-1978. During a period from 1980-1982, he studied classical Chinese poetry and different languages at Nanjing University, China. Seth mentions that he "never had any passion for economics, not what I felt for writing poetry" (Robinson). But Seth does comment upon his failure to complete a PhD: "I feel a bit of regret that I didn't finish my Ph.D. I'm interested in it, but it's not a passion, the way writing is" (Rachlin). 

Vikram Seth has published eight notable works - six collections of poetry and two novels - with a ninth novel soon to come. During the period before and after Seth published his first novel, he contributed poetic works for more than a decade. Seth's books of poetry include Mappings (1980), From Heaven Lake (1983), which discusses a hitchhiking trip through Nepal into India that Seth took while studying in China, The Humble Administrator's Garden (1985), All You Who Sleep Tonight (1990), Beastly Tales (1991), and Three Chinese Poets (1992). 

In 1986, Vikram Seth wrote The Golden Gate, his first novel, called "Byronesque" by some critics (Perry). The Golden Gate, which is a novel composed entirely of rhyming tentrameter sonnets--690 of them to be precise--is a satirical romance describing the stories of young professionals in San Francisco throughout their quests and questions to find, then deal with, love in their own lives as well as each others'. After this initial work, Seth slowly produced A Suitable Boy, the 1,349 page colossus whose publication in 1993 propelled Seth into the public spotlight. 

In addition to Vikram Seth's literary and poetic achievements, he was 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. Orion Children's Books subsequently published a picture book based on the opera in which Vikram Seth's words are illustrated by the internationally acclaimed artist Jane Ray. The book has since been made into a twenty-five minute animated special entitled "Arion and the Dolphin" which has shown in Australia, Canada, Iceland, Malta, New Zealand, and throughout the United Kingdom. 

 "A Suitable Boy" won The Connect Award in 1993 and launched Seth into a slew of interviews, talk shows, and book signings on his book tour. He mentioned, "By the end of this, by the time this is over, I'll be a most unsuitable boy" (Robinson). However, many readers and critics alike were dismayed when A Suitable Boy was left out of the race for the Booker Prize in 1993. Seth's work was not among the six novels nominated for the prize, which was ultimately awarded to Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha on October 26, 1993

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