Absent People, Absent Places is a collection of poems that observes the trajectory of chronic depression in its colourful, varied, multiplicitous forms. The speaker of these poems moves from fighting absence to finding and inhabiting presence. This process of recovery and growth from depression leads eventually to self-acceptance as she comes to terms with flaws-her own, and the nation state’s. If absence represents the disintegration of the nation, then presence represents recognising and then piecing together the fragments, however fractured. Through the non-linear, looping journey away from depression, the speaker asserts herself: this is who I am; this is where we are; this is who we’ve become.
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Press
Book Review by Aranya Padil for Outlook
Excerpts from the book for Scroll
saranya subramanian 