Melanie Silgardo (born 1956) is an Indian poet and editor based in London, UK.

Biography

Raised by

Goan Catholics Goan Catholics () are an Ethnoreligious group, ethno-religious community adhering to the Latin Church, Latin Rite of the Catholic Church from the Goa state, in the southern part of the Konkan region along the west coast of India. They are Konka ...

parents in

Bombay Mumbai ( ; ), also known as Bombay ( ; its official name until 1995), is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra. Mumbai is the financial centre, financial capital and the list of cities i ...

, India, she studied under poet Eunice de Souza and became one of India's major English-language poets in the 1970s. With fellow poets Santan Rodrigues and Raul D' Gama Rose, she established the Newground cooperative which published their works. While studying in London, she published ''Skies of Design'' in 1985, which won the Asian Section of the Best First Book Commonwealth Poetry Prize. Until the mid-1990s, she worked at the feminist

Virago Press Virago is a British publisher of women's writing and books on feminist topics. Started and run by women in the 1970s and bolstered by the success of the Women's Liberation Movement (WLM), Virago has been credited as one of several British femin ...

before turning to creative writing and teaching.

Education

Born in 1956 in

, she studied English at the city's St. Xavier's College, graduating in 1976. She went on to earn an M.A. in English literature from the

University of Bombay University of Mumbai is a public university, public List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment, state university in Mumbai. It is one of the List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment, largest univ ...

in 1978.

Works

Her early works were published in ''Three Poets'' – Melanie Silgardo, Santan Rodrigues, Raul d’ Gama Rose (1978). In 1985, while studying at the

London College of Printing The London College of Communication is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London. Its origins are in education for the printing and retail industries; it now specialises in media-related subjects including advertising, animation ...

, she published a second collection of poems, ''Skies of Design'', which won the Asian award under the Best First Book Commonwealth Poetry Prize. From the late 1980s to the mid-1990s, she worked as commissioning editor for the feminist Virago Press where she consulted with clients of colour and developed a large collection of Arab women's contributions to English-language writing in ''Opening the Gates'' (1980). In 2012, together with de Souza, she edited anthology ''These My Words: the Penguin Book of Indian Poetry''. Although she has not published any further poetry, she is still considered to have played an important role in support of women's poetry, not only for her own work but for the interest she has devoted to women's writing. While Silgardo follows in the footsteps of Eunice De Souza, her poems are far more violent, as can be seen in her poem "Bombay", attacking the development of the city. De Souza herself finds that Silgardo's poems are "deeply emotional but never mawkish".

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Silgardo, Melanie 1956 births Writers from Mumbai 20th-century Indian poets Indian women poets Indian editors Indian women publishers 20th-century Indian women writers Poets from Maharashtra English-language poets from India St. Xavier's College, Mumbai alumni Indian women editors Living people

Biography

Education

Works

See also

References