Imtiaz Dharker is a poet, artist, and filmmaker born in Pakistan whose work focuses on belonging to multiple cultures, feeling like an outsider, searching for the feeling of home, geographical and cultural displacement, and the experiences of women. Born in Lahore and raised in Glasgow as what she calls a "Muslim Calvinist," Dharker now spends her time between Britain and Mumbai (Brown). She has been called a "truly global poet" who weaves both personal and public topics into her work (Poetry Archive).
Dharker is the author of seven poetry collections. These include Purdah and other poems (1988); Postcards from god (1997); I speak for the devil (2001); The terrorist at my table (2006); Leaving Fingerprints (2009); Over the Moon (2014); and Luck Is the Hook (2018). Dharker was a 2011 recipient of a Cholmondeley Award for Poets and in the same year, became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. In 2014, she was awarded the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry on the basis of her collection Over the Moon and for a lifetime’s contribution to poetry. In 2020, she became the appointed Chancellor of Newcastle University. In order to focus on her own work, Dharker turned down the opportunity to serve as the British Poet Laureate.
Imtiaz Dharker is a poet, artist, and filmmaker born in Pakistan whose work often touches on issues of cultural displacement and the search for the feeling of home. Her poem "Blessing," first published in the 1994 collection Postcards from god, ...
"Living Space," first published in 1997, is a poem by Imtiaz Dharker. Dharker is a poet, artist, and filmmaker whose work traverses the borders of Pakistan, her country of origin, and her adopted countries of India and the UK. Several themes in...
Imtiaz Dharker is a poet, artist, and filmmaker whose work traverses the borders of Pakistan, her country of origin, and her adopted countries of India and the UK. "The right word,” originally published in Dharker's 2006 collection The terrorist...
Imtiaz Dharker is a poet, artist, and filmmaker whose work traverses the borders of Pakistan, her country of origin, and her adopted countries of India and the UK. "Tissue,” originally published in Dharker's 2006 collection The terrorist at my...
