Vikram Seth Biography

The famous Indian poet, novelist, travel writer and biographer, Vikram Seth was born in Kolkata on June 20, 1952. He lived with his family in a number of cities including Batanagar, near Kolkata,in West Bengal Patna and London. His father worked with Bata India Limited.

He has lived in London for many years now.He studied at The Doon School in Dehradun, before going on to study in the United Kingdom. He moved on to Stanford University but did not complete his PhD.

He received enormous advances for his books. Along with being a novelist, Seth is also a good poet. Five volumes of his poetry have been published, the first of which, Mappings was privately published in 1980. His other poetry collections include The Humble Administrator’s Garden in 1985, All You Who Sleep Tonight in 1990, Beastly Tales in 1991 and Three Chinese Poets in 1992. He has also indulged in travel writing. He is known for his book Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet, published in 1983.

The Golden Gate was his first novel, published in 1986. He published his second novel, A Suitable Boy in 1993. His third novel, An Equal Music was published in 1999. His latest book Two Lives was published in October 2005. He has won a number of prizes including the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award in 1983, the Commonwealth Poetry Prize (Asia)in 1985, the Irish Times International Fiction Prize in 1993 and the Commonwealth Writers Prize in 1994.