Sasenarine Persaud



Sasenarine Persaud is a Canadian poet, essayist, novelist, and short story writer.

Life
Persaud was born in Guyana and has lived for several years in Canada. He has served as a Vice-President and chair of the membership committee of the League of Canadian Poets, as a director on the Board of Directors of the Scarborough Arts Council (Toronto), and on juries for the Toronto Arts Council and the Ontario Arts Council. He presently resides in Tampa, Florida.

Publications

 * Lantana Strangling Ixora (TSAR Publications, 2011)
 * Unclosed Entrances: Selected Poems (Caribbean Press, Warwick & Georgetown, 2011)
 * In a Boston Night (TSAR Publications, 2008)Reviews
 * The Wintering Kundalini (Peepal Tree Press, Leeds, 2002)
 * A Writer Like You (TSAR Publications, Toronto, 2002)
 * The Hungry Sailor (TSAR Publications, Toronto, 2000)
 * Canada Geese and Apple Chatney (TSAR Publications, Toronto, 1998)
 * A Surf of Sparrows' Songs (TSAR Publications, Toronto, 1996)
 * The Ghost of Bellow's Man (Peepal Tree, Leeds, 1992)
 * Dear Death (Peepal Tree, Leeds, 1989)
 * Demerary Telepathy (Peepal Tree, Leeds, 1989)
 * Between the Dash and the Comma (Toronto, 1989)
 * A Surf of Sparrows' Songs (TSAR Publications, Toronto, 1996)
 * The Ghost of Bellow's Man (Peepal Tree, Leeds, 1992)
 * Dear Death (Peepal Tree, Leeds, 1989)
 * Demerary Telepathy (Peepal Tree, Leeds, 1989)
 * Between the Dash and the Comma (Toronto, 1989)
 * Dear Death (Peepal Tree, Leeds, 1989)
 * Demerary Telepathy (Peepal Tree, Leeds, 1989)
 * Between the Dash and the Comma (Toronto, 1989)
 * Between the Dash and the Comma (Toronto, 1989)

Awards
Awards Include: the K.M. Hunter Foundation Award (Toronto, 1996), the 1999 Arthur Schomburg Award (New York) for his writing and his pioneering of Yogic Realism, and Fellowships at the University of Miami and Boston University. Persaud has a Master's in Creative Writing from Boston University. His fiction was shortlisted for the 1997 Journey Prize (Toronto) while his poetry was nominated for the 1998 Canadian National Magazine Award, and several times shortlisted, most recently in 2011, for The Guyana Prize for Literature.

Yogic Realism
Sasenarine Persaud has pioneered Yogic Realism a term he originated to describe his literary aesthetics; his essay, “Kevat: Waiting on Yogic Realism” was published twice in India. His other essay on Yogic Realism, “I hear a voice, is it mine? Yogic Realism and the Short Story” (originally a paper presented at the Sandhills Writers Conference, Augusta, GA) was published in World Literature Today (74:3, University of Oklahoma, Summer 2000). Yogic Realism and Sasenarine’s work has been the focus of a doctoral dissertation by an Indian Scholar.

Anthologies
Persaud's work has appeared in journals and anthologies in Canada, England, India, Singapore, Malaysia,the Middle East, the United States, and the West Indies and has been widely anthologized, appearing in such publications as: A Rainbow Feast: New Asian Short Stories (Marshall Cavendish, Singapore, 2010); Concert of Voices: An Anthology of World Writing in English (Broadview Press, Ontario, 2009); Anthology of Colonial and Post Colonial Short Fiction (Houghton Mifflin, Boston & New York, 2007); The Oxford Book of Caribbean Verse (Oxford University Press, 2005); The Oxford Book of Caribbean Short Stories (Oxford University Press, 2000); The Journey Prize Anthology: short fiction from the best of Canada’s new writers (McClelland & Stewart, Toronto, 1997); The Heinemann Book of Caribbean Verse (Heinemann, London, 1992); Another Way to Dance: Contemporary Asian Poetry from Canada and the United States (TSAR, Toronto, 1996); and Caribbean New Voices (Longman, London, 1995).