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Skylark Publications UK and Word Masala Foundations are "non-profit enterprises".
The Skylark Legacy
Skylark was founded in Aligarh, India, in 1969 by the late Baldev Mirza. Yogesh Patel, then a student of optometry at the state medical faculty, joined him the same year as co-editor, and together they steered the magazine jointly through its hundred-issue journey.
Skylark began as a quarterly devoted to contemporary poetry in translation — from around the world and from the regional languages of India — alongside emerging voices in Indian English, a literature then only in its second postcolonial decade. The aim was simple and radical: new voices should stand on the same podium as international poets.
The conditions were anything but simple. Working before email, the editors battled with stamps, currency conversion, postal packing requirements, queues at post offices, and no intercity telephone lines. To meet the budget, they set up letterpress printing in an Aligarh slum — and Skylark continued to print in that rickety fashion until its final issue.
Many issues of Skylark and books published by us are now lost, and Baldev Mirza has passed away, but the magazine's influence on early postcolonial Indian English literature remains: a podium where new voices stood alongside the world's poets.
Skylark was known for its landmark special issues:
A Dalit poetry issue — a daring act at the time, part of the magazine's struggle against discrimination
German writers in exile — poems from those who fled the Second World War
The first American women's poetry special number
Diplomat poets — inspired by embassies buying special issues in bulk
Poems from Bosnia and Herzegovina and a showcase of Austrian poetry
A reader's note found tucked inside an issue that survives from those years. It is by Oxford's Terry Cuthbert and captures what the magazine became: "Wazir Agha (Pakistan) is very much an excellent poet & you must be proud of getting his work in your magazine. You seem to be an important cultural event in India..."
What Skylark published
Across one hundred issues, poets from more than twenty countries — Korea, Italy, New Zealand, Australia, Austria, the UK, USA, Canada, China, Bosnia, Argentina, Germany, the Arab region, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Russia, Japan, Israel, Norway, Chile, Hungary and more — appeared in its pages alongside names such as Borges, Neruda, Yehuda Amichai, Amrita Pritam, Wazir Agha, Shiv Kumar Batalvi, Jayant Mahapatra and Niranjan Mohanty — great poets and unknown ones alike.
The reinvention in England
After completing its journey in India, Skylark was reborn in England as Skylark Publications UK, continuing its founding mission: helping diasporic and expat literature find its readers.
Free anthologies, including UNSEEN, edited by Yogesh Patel, created to introduce overlooked diaspora poets to national curricula and university courses (free download)
Today Skylark promotes poets and writers through:
Today Skylark promotes poets and writers through:
Skylark Books, our publishing imprint
Skylark ezine, since 2015 honouring a Poet of the Month, celebrating important poets of the diaspora
Events, awards and launches, including a packed evening of readings, projects, awards, and book launches at the House of Lords, marking the launch of the Word Masala Foundation
The people
The people
Director & Publisher: Malhar and Mrudang Narker
Editor: Yogesh Patel MBE, awarded the MBE in the Queen's New Year Honours List 2020 for services to literature.
Patrons: Lord Parekh · Lord Dholakia
Our books are available from any good bookshop, if not in stock, by request in the UK and globally, including from Waterstones, Foyles, Blackwell's, Gardners, Starkmann, and Ingram.
A fuller memoir of the Skylark years, "In that rickety fashion" by Yogesh Patel, appeared in PN Review 245 (January-February 2019) and can be read on the PN Review website.
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