The Dragon’s Heart World Poetry in Translation

Edited by Priya Sarukkai Chabria and Mrinalini Harchandrai

“…this anthology stands as testament to the vastness of literary expression, offering an invitation to explore translation in all its nuanced forms. The anthology honours plurality, not only in featuring 33 languages across India and the world, but also in the methods by which the written word is reimagined and rendered into English. What makes this anthology especially unique is the inclusion of ‘Translator’s Notes’ for each contribution. In these ‘Notes’, readers encounter a wide-ranging spectrum of translation practices and are invited into the intimate process of literary transformation, where imagination and strategy intersect. The anthology is further enriched by insightful introductions provided by the Editors and a host of distinguished Guest Editors, whose ‘Editor’s Notes’ set the tone and provide essential context for each translated work. The Dragon’s Heart is a global literary mosaic, and in every sense, this volume is a fitting tribute to the power of translation, the enduring pulse of poetry and the transformative beauty of language itself.

– Namrata in Kitaab, 8 May, 2025

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“At its core, The Dragon’s Heart: World Poetry in Translation (Jadavpur Press, 2025) is a celebration of poetry’s boundless capacity to traverse linguistic, cultural, and imaginative frontiers. This rich and diverse anthology, drawn from the pages of Poetry at Sangam, a distinguished online literary journal, gathers poetic voices from across the globe that over the course of more than a decade transformed the digital platform into a crucible of international and Indian poetics. Co-edited by Founding Editor Priya Sarukkai Chabria and Deputy Editor Mrinalini Harchandrai, the volume stands as both archive and renewal, curating the dynamic exchanges that translation enables, and honoring poetry as a medium of enduring human connection. …
…this anthology stands as testament to the vastness of literary expression, offering an invitation to explore translation in all its nuanced forms. The anthology honours plurality, not only in featuring 33 languages across India and the world, but also in the very methods by which the written word is reimagined and rendered into English. What makes this anthology especially unique is the inclusion of ‘Translator’s Notes’ for each contribution. In these ‘Notes’, readers encounter a wide-ranging spectrum of translation practices and are invited into the intimate process of literary transformation, where imagination and strategy intersect. The anthology is further enriched by insightful introductions provided by the Editors and a host of distinguished Guest Editors, whose ‘Editor’s Notes’ set the tone and provide essential context for each translated work."

– Stepping Across Absolutes to Explore and Create Anew by Simran Chadha. 
The Book Review Literary Trust, September 2025, Volume 49, Number 9 

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“…This compendious five-hundred pages of poetry entitled The Dragon’s Heart is a carefully curated compilation of translations in English undertaken over the past ten years, for ( )Poetry at Sangam… Apart from procuring veritable gems from across all conceivable corners of the globe, this labour of love pushes postmodernist frontiers regarding translation-theory and that too without vaunting aloud about doing so. None would challenge the fact that the performative multivalences which translation theory hinges upon, forge connections across linguistic and cultural divides thereby disseminating humanism in a world starved for the same. This review however will refrain from extolling those virtues and dwell rather on the aesthetic of the poems in question. As Priya Sarukkai Chabria, one of the two editors of this compilation points out, translation per se enables an expansion of the reader’s creative imaginary. So, whether we refer to the act of deep-reading and interpretation as what Roland Barthes pronounced to be ‘death of the author’, or prefer to be on safer shores with perfunctory adherences to overall context and such like, readers of these poems will undoubtedly forge connections as per their inclinations, whether subjective, cultural and/or political.”