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Nikita Gill: ‘I read Flowers in the Attic too young. Someone should have stopped me’
Nikita Gill describes how books shaped her life, from childhood reading at sea to the works that influenced her poetry. The Indian-Irish poet says Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s retelling of Draupadi in *The Palace of Illusions* inspired her to become a writer.
Gill recalls returning to *One Hundred Years of Solitude* as a teenager after first trying it at 12, and names Jane Austen’s *Persuasion* as a favourite reread. She credits Arundhati Roy’s writing and advocacy, and Lucille Clifton’s collected poems, with teaching her about literary courage and brevity; she also says she read *Flowers in the Attic* too young.
In short
- *The Palace of Illusions* inspired Gill to write.
- Arundhati Roy and Lucille Clifton shaped her literary outlook.
- Gill says she read *Flowers in the Attic* too young.
Explained simply
Nikita Gill is an Indian-Irish poet whose work often draws on stories, myths and earlier writers. Her reading began in childhood, and she has described books as a lasting influence on both her life and her writing.
The authors she mentions come from different literary traditions. Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s novel The Palace of Illusions retells the Indian epic Mahabharata through the perspective of Draupadi, while Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude is a landmark work of Latin American fiction; Jane Austen, Arundhati Roy and Lucille Clifton are known for novels, public writing and poetry.
Gill’s examples show how a writer’s influences can range from beloved books to works encountered before a reader feels ready for them. Her reflections offer context for the books and writers that helped shape her own approach to poetry.