Yuyutsu Sharma


Yuyutsu Ram Dass Sharma is a Nepalese-Indian poet and journalist. He was born at Nakodar, Punjab and moved to Nepal at an early age. He writes in English and Nepali.

Life and career

Sharma received his early education first at DAV College, Nakodar, Punjab, and later at Baring Union Christian College, Batala and University of Rajasthan. While at Rajasthan, Sharma met American poet David Ray while assisting Ray on an issue of New Letters. Ray introduced Sharma to the work of prominent American poets such as William Carlos Williams and Allen Ginsberg, and encouraged Sharma to publish his own work. Sharma has called meeting Ray a "watershed" moment in his life.
Yuyutsu remained active in the literary circles of Rajasthan and acted in plays by Shakespeare, Bertolt Brecht, Harold Pinter, and Edward Albee. Later he taught at various campuses of Punjab University, Chandigarh and Tribhuwan University, Kathmandu.
He met German Photographer Andreas Stimm in 2004 and his collaboration with Stimm resulted in three books of picture/poetry: Nepal Trilogy:Photographs and Poetry on Annapurna, Everest, Helambu & Langtang.
In 2006, he published The Lake Fewa and a Horse and later in 2008, Annapurna Poems, Selected and New. According to a review of Annapurna Poems by critic Jim Feast, Sharma operates "at the edge of a belief system or way of living that has fallen short", a position from which great poetry emerges according to essayist and American poet laureate Allen Tate.
His 2009 poetry collection Space Cake features artwork by Henry Avignon. Reminiscent of traditions in beat poetry, it chronicles his travels in Europe and America, including an episode in Amsterdam where he accidentally consumes a cannabis edible, from which the collection gets its title.
In 2016 he published Quaking Cantos, a collection inspired by the 2015 Nepal earthquakes featuring Sharma's poetry and photographs by Prasant Shrestha. In the Kathmandu Tribune, Arun Budhathoki wrote that it "immortalized the tragic event and captured the bitter memories of the Himalayan on a grand scale". Andrea Dawn Bryant called it "stunningly heart-wrenching, albeit healing".
In 2020 he published Panaharu Khali Chhan, a collection of poems in Nepali, many translated from English. Critic Bibek Adhikari wrote that "reading Sharma in English is a delightful experience; reading him in Nepali, a somewhat bewildering and disconcerting one".
Sharma is the editor of Pratik, ''A Quarterly Magazine of Contemporary Writing''. As of 2020 he was a visiting poet at Columbia University. He is the recipient of fellowships and grants from The Rockefeller Foundation, Ireland Literature Exchange, Trubar Foundation, Slovenia, The Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature and The Foundation for the Production and Translation of Dutch Literature.

Poetry

The Alchemy of Nine Smiles: Nine Long Poems, Red River, New Delhi, 2024Lost Horoscope: New Poems , Nirala, New Delhi, 2023The Second Buddha Walk: Inspired by the Second Buddha: Master of Time Exhibit at Rubin Museum, New York , Nirala, New Delhi, 2018Quaking Cantos: Nepal Earthquake Poems , Nirala, New Delhi, 2016A Blizzard in my Bones: New York Poems, Nirala, New Delhi, 2016Nine New York Poems: A Prelude to‘A Blizzard in my Bones: New York Poems’, Nirala, New Delhi, 2014Milarepa's Bones, Helambu:33 New Poems, Nirala, New Delhi, 2012 The Nepal Trilogy I-III Photographs and Poetry about the Nepal areas of Annapurna, Everest, Helambu & Langtang, www.Nepal-Trilogy.de,·www.Nepal-Trilogie.de) (english-deutsch, Epsilonmedia, Karlsruhe Germany, 2010www.AroundAnnapurna.de: A photographic and Poetic Journey around Annapurnas, Nepal, Epsilonmedia, Karlsruhe Germanywww.WayToEverest.de:A photographic and Poetic Journey to the Foot of Everest, Epsilonmedia, Karlsruhe Germany, 2006Annapurna Poems, Nirala, New Delhi, 2008Everest Failures, White Lotus Book Shop, Kathmandu 2008Space Cake Amsterdam and other Poems from Europe and America, Howling Dog Press, Colorado, 2009The Lake Fewa and a Horse, Poems New, Nirala, New Delhi, 2005, 2009Poèmes de l'Himalaya, trans. by Nicole Barrière and Camille Bloomfield, L'Harmattan, Paris, 2009Poemas De Los Himalayas: Bilingual Spanish/English Poetry Collection, Translated into Spanish with an Introduction by Veronica Aranda, 2010, Cosmopoeticia, Cordoba, SpainSome Female Yeti & other Poems, Nirala, New Delhi, 1995Hunger of our Huddled Huts & other Poems, Nirala, New Delhi, 1989, 2011A Prayer in Daylight, Poems, Nirala, Jaipur, 1984
IN TRANSLATIONPoemas De Los Himalayas: Bilingual Spanish/English Poetry Collection, Translated into Spanish with an Introduction by Veronica Aranda , 2010, Cosmopoeticia, Cordoba, SpainPoèmes de l'Himalaya, trans. by Nicole Barrière and Camille Bloomfield, L'Harmattan, Paris, 2009Jezero Fewa & Konj Translated from the Slovene by Evald Flisar, Sodobnost International, Ljubljana, Slovenia 2008Pret Re Seni Spevi: Pesmi iz potresnega Nepala, Translated from the Slovene by Barbara Pogačnik, Sodobnost International, Ljubljana, Slovenia, 2018

Non-fiction

Annapurnas and Stains of Blood , Nirala, New Delhi, 2010

Translations

Dying in Rajasthan, 1985, Short Stories by Ramanand Rathi,, Nirala, New DelhiFolk Tales of Sherpa & Yeti, 2008, Shiva Dhakal, Nirala, New DelhiRoaring Recitals: Five Nepali Poets,, Nirala, New DelhiKathmandu: Poems Selected and New, Cathal O’ Searcaigh, Translated from the Gaelic by Seamus Heaney, John Montague, and others; Translated into the Nepali, Nirala, New DelhiBaghdad, February 1991, A Bilingual Nepali /English Edition, Ronny Someck, Translated into Nepali by Yuyutsu RD Sharma, Nirala Publications, New Delhi, 2010Mother’s Hand: Selected Poems — A Bilingual English/Nepali Anthology by Jidi Majai, Translated into Nepali by Yuyutsu RD Sharma, Nirala Publications, New Delhi, 2020I Choose to Cry and Love you, Poems by Yang Qingxiang, Translated into Nepali by Yuyutsu Sharma, White Lotus Book Shop/ Renmin University, 2022
  • ''Ek Asadharan Antarvarta An Extraordinary Interview), Stories by Lao Ma, Translated into Nepali by Yuyutsu Sharma, White Lotus Book Shop, Kathmandu/ Renmin University, Beijing University, 2021''

Edited

Elysium in the Halls of Hell, 1991, Poems about India by David Ray, Nirala, New Delhi,Dispossessed Nests: The 1984 Poems, 1986, by Jayanta Mahapatra, Nirala, New Delhi,Bagar: An Asian Poetry Special Number, Kathmandu, Nepal
  • General Editor, Nirala Series Guest Editor, Omega, Special Issue on Nepali Poetry with Michael Annis, Howling Dog Press
  • Pratik: A Magazine of Contemporary Writing, since 1990Pratik's Special Dutch issue with Harry Zevenbergen as Guest EditorPratik's Special British issue with Pascale Petit as Guest EditorTen: The New Indian Poets; Edited with Jayanta Mahapatra, Nirala Publications, New Delhi, 2013
  • ''Drunken Boat's Special Nepal Folio, Himalayan Arts, 2017''