news

Targeted writer Murzban F. Shroff aided by International PEN

Murzban F. Shroff, a contributor for the New Madrid Winter 2010 issue “Dynamics of Poverty and Wealth,” has been targeted for content in his book Breathless in Bombay, published by St. Martin's Press in the U.S. and Picador in India. The Mumbai-based writer and his family have come under threat, and IndiaWest reports that charges issued against Shroff could result in a three-year prison sentence. A two-time Pushcart nominee, Shroff has been shortlisted for the 2009 Commonwealth Prize in the best first book category, Europe and South Asia. He states that the context of the work in Breathless in Bombay is about class bias, and conveys a unifying message, not divisive. International PEN, the world's foremost advocacy organization for literature, has come to his aid, contacting the highest Indian authorities requesting that the charges be dropped. See the full story in IndiaWest here.

Richard Robbins’ Radioactive City wins 2009 Bellday Poetry Prize

The distinguished poet and scholar Linda Gregerson selected Radioactive City by Richard Robbins of Mankato, Minnesota as the winner of the 2009 Bellday Poetry Prize. About the winning entry, Professor Gregerson said, "It is conceptual freshness, and a beautiful instinct for emergent shape, that makes this poetry radioactive. Robbins can spin a hitherto-undiscovered cosmos out of a single, wayward proposition, but he never loses footing in the radiant, mortal, given world. Richest invention is tempered by submission to the textures of material and social and ethical life. Vision and insight both, in other words: what more can one ask of a book of poems?" Robbins contributed to the Summer 2009 issue of New Madrid.

 

masthead

Summer 2010 Issue