Château de Lavigny International Writers' Residence

Usha Rajagopalan was invited to The Château de Lavigny International Writers' Residence. Usha used the residency to translate a selection of Tamil poems by Subramania Bharati into English.

The Château de Lavigny International Writers' Residence was founded by the late Jane Rowohlt in memory of her husband, the German publisher, Heinrich Maria Ledig-Rowohlt. After a long successful career as a leading publisher of several renowned twentieth century writers, Ledig-Rowohlt and his wife settled in their newly acquired Château at Lavigny, a small village between Geneva and Lausanne. It was their home from 1972 till their demise. The International Writers’ Residence was set up in 1996 to honour her wish to bequeath their home, the Château de Lavigny, to foster “a spirit of international community and creativity.”  

As one of the five writers invited to attend the first session from 2nd to 22nd June 2009, Usha Rajagopalan was a part of a truly international community for the other writers were from South Africa, Russia, Spain and the U.S.A.  Rachelle Greeff wrote in Afrikaans, Alan Cherchersov in Russian and Ossetian, José Luis de Juan in Spanish and Catalan while Allen Hibbard from US was translating from Arabic to English. Usha was there in the capacity of a translator from Tamil to English. She used this residency to finalize her manuscript, Selected Poems of Subramania Bharati, translations from Tamil to English during the three weeks.  

For the public reading Usha Rajagopalan had written a short biographical note on the Mahakavi. She read a short poem “False? Or True?” Subramania Bharati had set many of his poems to music so, instead of reciting, she chose to sing the Tamil original.  

"I am delighted that the public presentation of my work at the Chateau de Lavigny went off extremely well. It was well attended. I used this residency to translate a selection of Tamil poems by the national poet, Subramania Bharati. Therefore, at the public presentation, I read out my translation of a short poem and, instead of reading the original, sang the Tamil song. It was for the first time that the audience were hearing Tamil and I had to take an encore bow!! I truly appreciated the opportunity I got to introduce Subramani Bharati to the Swiss audience."
-- Usha Rajagopalan