An international symposium at Kwantlen Polytechnic University (KPU) will bring together scholars and experts to explore Nepali literature rooted in the Himalayas and beyond.
The two-day symposium and workshop, Aug. 27 and 28 at KPU Surrey, will delve into what it means to read Nepali literature through the lens of world literature. The event is co-convened by KPU scholars Dr. Asma Sayed and Dr. Pushpa Raj Acharya.
“Nepali literature, emerging from the Himalayan borderlands, offers a rare vantage point — seeing South Asia and the world through both regional traditions and national imagination. Yet, given the hegemony of India in the subcontinent, Nepali literature rarely gets the attention that it deserves,” says Sayed. “Our aim is to centre on this understudied area of South Asian literary studies and bring it to the global map of world literary studies thus challenging the mostly Euro-centric and Indi-centric focus.”
Writers, translators and scholars will participate in the event, which will feature a series of presentations and collaborative workshops aimed to reflect on the global circulation of Nepali texts, the politics of translation and the complex relationship between local literary traditions and the world.
Sayed, the Canada Research Chair in South Asian Literary and Cultural Studies in the Department of English at KPU, and Acharya, a Postdoctoral Fellow in South Asian Literary and Cultural Studies at KPU, will present an essay exploring the epic poems of Nepali poet Laxmi Prasad Devkota.
Devkota’s epics, Śākuntala Mahākāvya, in Nepali, and Shakuntala, in English, present an intriguing literary phenomenon: two original epics inspired by the same mythic episode. Instead of translating one work into another, Devkota composed two distinct epics in two different languages and poetic traditions.
“Our paper explores Laxmi Prasad Devkota’s epics — one in Nepali, rooted in Nepal’s cultural heart and connected to Sanskrit literature, and the other in English, engaging with both South Asian and English cosmopolitanisms,” says Acharya. “This work illustrates how a timeless love story, such as that of Shakuntala’s, can be reimagined for local and global audiences.”
The symposium presentations are expected to result in an edited book illustrating the dimensions of Nepali literature and firmly giving it a place within global literary studies. Abstracts and biographies of presenters are available on the event webpage.