What of the Earth Was Saved

Author: Leeladhar Jagoori

Translator: Matt Reeck

Publisher: World Poetry Books (2024)

Acclaimed Hindi poet Leeladhar Jagoori's first book in English translation reflects today's environmental and political concerns through the lens of the tumultuous end of the Indian Emergency in the late 1970s. What of the Earth was Saved, published in Hindi in 1977, is a poignant exploration of love, loss, and living in nature. Yet, many of these poems resonate as well with a political consciousness shaped by events in postcolonial India. Poems emerge that are subtly provocative-protest poems that seek to direct attention to human suffering caused by injustice. And, often as well, poems return the reader to the mountains of Jagoori's youth, and the lives of those there.