Kamalakar Bhat H R

Kamalakar Bhat is a Professor in the Postgraduate Department of English and Research Centre at Ahmednagar College, Ahilyanagar, Maharashtra. A bilingual writer and translator working between English, Hindi, Marathi, and Kannada, he has published four collections of poems in Kannada. His poems have been published in AGNI, Indian Literature, Muse India, The Wise Owl, The Parcham, The Teesta Review, The Antonym, Litterateur, Outlook, Kritya, and Anam; and also in anthologies World Poetry Yearbook 2025, Yearbook of Indian Poetry 2024, Earth and Embers: South Asia in Verse, River of Songs: The Chandrabhaga Poetry Anthology, Scent of Rain: Remembering Jayant Mahapatra, among others. His poetry has been translated into Hindi, Marathi, Konkani, Croatian and Korean. His translation of the works of the Marathi poet Namdeo Dhasal was published in 2018. An anthology of poetry translated from ten Indian languages, appeared in 2021. His co-translation of the Marathi poet Hemant Divate's poetry was published in 2024. His Kannada translation of the Hindi poet Ashok Vajpeyi's poetry, appeared in 2025. In January 2026, two translated collections were published: the poetry of Jayanta Mahapatra translated from English, and the poetry of Rati Saxena translated from Hindi. He edited The Word in the World, a collection of lectures and essays by H. S. Shivaprakash, published by Manipal Universal Press in 2019 and internationally by Routledge in 2024. He has also co-edited Sangam, an anthology of world poetry (Sankathana Press, Mandya, 2023), and edited In the Light of Shiva, a selection of H. S. Shivaprakash's English poems (Red River, New Delhi, 2024). His latest book, Courtesy of Criticism: Selected Essays of Kirtinath Kurtkoti, has been published by Penguin Random House India. He is currently translating the tatvapadas of the nineteenth-century Kannada Sufi-bhakti poet Shishunala Sharif into English. Bhat has translated several modern Kannada writers, with his translations appearing in Indian Literature, Muse India, Cesura, The Bombay Literary Magazine, Indian Cultural Forum, Outlook, Guftagu, The Wheel Wagon, and Prologue among other places. He has also translated poetry from English, Marathi, Hindi, and Urdu into Kannada, many of which have appeared in leading Kannada literary magazines. He has guest edited The Bangalore Literary Review (July 2026). He is one of the coordinators of the "Kritya Poetry East and West". He has contributed columns to Kannada magazines and published over forty research papers in national and international academic journals and edited volumes. His essays and reviews have appeared in Indian Literature, Muse India, Outlook, The Wire.in, Scroll.in, Kitaab.org, The Bangalore Review, The Book Review, and Seminar. He has been invited to the Bangalore Literature Festival; Kerala International Literature Festival, Thrissur; Vishwaranga Literature Festival, Bhopal; Mumbai Poetry Festival; Gadyopadyo Poetry Meet, Kolkata; Book Brahma Literature Festival, Bangalore, Kerala Literature Festival, Kozhikod, and SSF Sahityotsav, Kerala. In recognition of his creative writing, he has received the PUTINA Award (2006) and the B. H. Shridhar Award (2023). He received the Mozhi Prize for Translation in 2024.