chaturangik/SQUARES
A chessbook of collaborative poetry
from CinnamonTeal Press distributed by Kaurab
Pat Clifford & Aryanil Mukherjee
Introduction
chaturangik/SQUARES is a book length collaborative poem by Pat Clifford and Aryanil Mukherjee. The book is inspired by Satyajit Ray's seminal film Shatranj Ki Khiladi (The Chess Players). The work deals with the mechanics of chess and politics in both a thematic and formal way. At times the language is opaque and confrontational. In other places there is a resigned melancholy. In the first three sections the text is alternated. In the last section lines are woven together. Often what started as longer poems were chopped or condensed. In the end, each installment was placed into the boxes of a chess grid.
== Blurb by Charles Bernstein ==
chaturangik/SQUARES is a delightfully inventive work of multilectical poetry: Bengali warping into English, English hopscotching into Bengali. An elegant realization of cross-cultural dialog at the level of the tongue, chaturangik/SQUARES resists linguistic stasis in the name of poetic possibility.
Chapter Raja/King - A sneak preview of the book
A goodreads review by Rodney Koeneke
A reading of chaturangik/SQUARES at PENNSOUND
Book-release reading video