Pure Lizard

Book excerpt: Born in India, her mother tongue Gujurati, educated in America and now living in Germany, Sujata Bhatt in her writing bridges continents, languages and identities. In Pure Lizard she further explores the dislocations and transformations first encountered in her acclaimed first collection Brunizem (1988). A being with 'pure lizard' skin appears as a Sibyl; Jane Eyre haunts a laboratory in Baltimore; monkeys inhabit new spaces; a field of sunflowers in Pennsylvania is set beside sunflowers grown in Chernobyl to remove toxic waste from the soil... Pure Lizard continues Bhatt's dialogue with other art forms: the etchings of Paula Rego, the music of Telemann and Philip Glass. Grounded in a world of science, history and minute observation, Bhatt's inventinos are made palpable and moving by her profound sympathy, her distinctive vision through language.