Bhanu Kapil is a poet, and author of books, including ''The Vertical Interrogation of Strangers'' (2001), ''Incubation: A Space for Monsters'' (2006), and ''Ban en Banlieue'' (2015).

Career

Kapil's first book, ''The Vertical Interrogation of Strangers'', was written in the late 1990s. She has cited

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's 1980 Booker Prize win as a formative experience for her: "...perhaps then, for the first time, I understood that someone like me: could. Could look like me and write.". In early 2015, '' The Believer'' held a round-table discussion of her work over the course of three days. Kapil's work can be difficult to classify, occupying a space between poetry and fiction. 2009's ''Humanimal: A Project for Future Children'' took its inspiration from the nonfiction account of Amala and Kamala, two girls found "living with wolves in colonial Bengal." Douglas A. Martin has described ''Incubation: A Space For Monsters'' as "a feminist, post-colonial '' On the Road''." Kapil also contributed the introduction to Amina Cain's short story collection ''I Go To Some Hollow''. Her creative work also encompasses performance art and her public readings sometimes blur the line between a traditional reading and performance. Her poetry appeared in a collection edited by Brian Droitcour that was produced as part of the

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's 2015 Triennial. ''Incubation: A Space for Monsters'' was a Small Press Distribution best-seller. ''Ban en Banlieue'' was named one of ''Time Out New York'''s most anticipated books of early 2015. In March 2020 Kapil was awarded one of eight Windham-Campbell Literature Prizes. In January 2021, Kapil was awarded the 2020 T.S Eliot Poetry Prize for her book: ''How to Wash a Heart''.

Works

* ''The Vertical Interrogation of Strangers'', Kelsey Street Press, 2001, * ''Incubation: A Space for Monsters'', Leon Works, 2006, * ''Humanimal: A Project for Future Children'', Kelsey Street Press, 2009, * ''Schizophrene'', Nightboat Books, 2011, * ''Ban en Banlieue'', Nightboat Books, 2015, * ''How to Wash a Heart'', Liverpool University Press, 2020,

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kapil, Bhanu 1968 births Living people American women writers of Indian descent Naropa University faculty 21st-century American poets 21st-century American women writers American women poets American women academics Fellows of Churchill College, Cambridge