Sudha Dipak’s poetry book ‘Hiraeth’ released  

Chandigarh, July 13, 2023: Kalakshetra, a vertical of The Narrators Performing Arts Society, unveiled 'Hiraeth', an English poetry book penned by Sudha Dipak, exclusively for the media at a press meet held at Novotel Hotel in Chandigarh. A conversation between poet Sudha Dipak and Nisha Luthra, founder and director of The Narrators, also took place at the book launch. The duo announced that in a grand show involving a select audience a film ‘The Sehgal House’, directed by Nisha Luthra, and which is based on the poetry book, will be screened at Tagore Theatre 6 pm onwards on July 15th. 

Meanwhile, the Poet, while sharing details of her poetry collection titled 'Hiraeth', said that 'Hireath' means an unsatiated and deep longing for something. Each and every poem in the book justifies the title and has a very deep meaning which will be understood by reading the poems. The book, published by Abhishek Publication, has 61 poems that are epiphanies, or unusual experiences the poet had at different stages of her life. Each poem has an illustration created by Anubhav Som, who has also designed the cover of the book.

Poet Sudha Dipak is originally from Delhi and is a homemaker. She is trained in yoga and music. Sudha while interacting with the media said, “Many years back, my close friend, Meenaxi Verma motivated me to give words to my thoughts. However, I slipped into a comfort zone and the resultant procrastination delayed my sitting and penning the poems. I am happy that the chance of writing reviews of two books authored by Dr Vimal Kalia gave me the desired push to write my poems. I then put together my collection. The simplicity of my poems was appreciated by Nisha Luthra who took it upon herself to get them published. She picked up 8 pieces of poetry and weaved the characters, story sketch and screenplay based on the core emotion and the title of the book – 'Hiraeth', which means deep longing for someone's home.”

Nisha Luthra said, “During my personal interactions with Sudha, I was immensely touched by her poems. The essence of her poetic collection left a deep impact on my mind and I decided to get them published and further carved a story - 'The Sehgal House' - around some select poems. ‘The Sehgal House’ is a story that revolves around human emotions interwoven with basic human relationships. The film walks around various emotional passages along with the characters of the family. With each recital, many layers of the family bond are at disposal for the audience to absorb and leave a trail of emotions and hope for the next chapter.”

“It is an honour for me that my poems have been selected to create a story by Nisha. In what is certainly a first, Nisha used the poems as a base to write a screenplay, which went into a proper shoot with character artists and post-production. Most poems are about different realizations at the different stages of our life in different situations. Some are motivational because basically, I am a motivational writer, some show an incessant struggle between heart and mind. It took one year to put together the collection because I am a slow writer and I write only when something from inside pushes me. The poem ‘Tears’ is closest to my heart,” added Sudha.

Nisha informed at the press meet that Divya Sharma, Divjot Gulati, Anuraag Verma, Mugdha Arora, Shivani Kashyap, Surjeet Singh, and Puneet have acted in the film, which is edited by Krishna Rodge. SS Sidhu, Anuj Birwan, Rajan K Bathejaa, and Neena Bhatnagar are the Director of Photography (DOP), Assistant Cinematographer, Assistant Director, and Makeup Artist respectively. The music of the film is done by Gagneet Singh and Hitesh Giri. The Narrators have always used the medium of storytelling in its most varied and significant ways. Like its two other films -‘Brinda’ and ‘Outside the Safehouse’, this film will also be travelling to National and International film festivals. Come July 15 and art aficionados will have something to look forward to with the special screening of the film which will be followed by a special launch of the poetry book.