Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s suite of seven Venice poems, presented with photographs by Naveen Kishore, treats the city as both a place of cultural beauty and a place with histories of enslavement and racialized experience. The June 2, 2025 Scroll.in feature that presents the suite frames it as a posthumous celebration of the poet’s love of truth, justice and generosity. The poems were translated by Ngũgĩ himself from Gĩkũyũ, and the photographs were made by Kishore, who is explicit that they do not interpret the poems.
What the presentation contains
The feature pairs seven poems by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o with photographs of Venice by Naveen Kishore. The article credits Seagull Books as publisher and states that all the poems were translated by the author from Gĩkũyũ. Kishore credits himself for all the photographs. The feature reproduces correspondence between the two men in which Ngũgĩ agrees to share his own take on Venice, so the project was conceived as a conversation between a writer and a photographer rather than an illustrated book.
Poems and photographs: two separate artistic acts
The most important point for any reader is the relationship between the two halves. Kishore says the photographs do not interpret the poems, and that the poems were not written for the photographs. Readers should therefore not look for a one-to-one match between a verse and a picture. The poems are the authored literary treatment of Venice; the photographs are a parallel visual record by a second artist. Placing them side by side invites comparison, but the feature does not present the images as commentary.
What the poems cover
The sequence moves through recognizable Venetian places and experiences: tourist crowds on the bridges, restaurants and squid-ink pasta, the Ponte del Diavolo, glassmaking on Murano, and several versions of Shakespeare’s Othello. It ends with Peter Kariũki, a boy whose family and identity connect Kenya and Italy. Across the sequence, the poems also take up migration, labor, love, and the possibility of understanding across different origins.
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The feature singles out three poems for close reading. Each is a grounded reading of one piece, and none of them stands for the whole suite.
“Ponte del Diavolo, Venice”
This poem retells a local legend about lovers separated by war. It uses the story to turn toward an appeal against hatred.
“La Serenissima”
This poem invokes Venice’s literary aura, then asks readers not to let the city’s serenity hide the history of enslaved people who were part of its life.
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“Resurrection in Venice”
This poem sets familiar artistic representations of Othello against the mixed Kenyan and Italian identity of Peter Kariũki. The juxtaposition is the poem’s central move: a canonical figure of Venetian drama is placed beside a living young person whose origins cross continents.
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The feature quotes a sentence from an email Ngũgĩ sent Kishore on October 21, 2020:
“Art is a journey without an end, because / Because it continues its self-resurrection / Into new selves”
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It also reproduces his reply in correspondence dated August 24, 2019, which accepts the idea of sharing their takes on Venice: “And yes, please let us share our take on Venice! The camera and the pen on Venice!!!”
Kishore’s introduction describes the presentation as a celebration of Ngũgĩ’s “love for truth and justice and generosity,” delivered through a suite of Venice poems alongside his photographs. That is the contributor’s framing of the project, not an independent assessment of it.
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Language and mission context
The Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o Foundation states: “Language, any language has a dual character: it is both a means of communication and a carrier of culture.” The Foundation describes its mission as empowering African languages, promoting cross-cultural translations, and advancing humanity. This context explains why the poems’ origin in Gĩkũyũ matters: the suite was written in that language and then rendered into English by the author himself, a point the feature stresses.
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Dates: what is and is not established
The feature appeared on June 2, 2025, and states that Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o died on May 28. It does not give composition or first-publication dates for the individual poems. The 2020 and 2019 emails are the only dated material in the article. Publication in 2025 should not be read as evidence that the suite was written that year.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Finding the suite and its edition
The feature names Seagull Books as publisher but does not identify a standalone purchasable edition of this specific suite, and it does not establish current retail availability. Readers looking for the poems should check Seagull Books directly, and should treat any other edition as unconfirmed until the publisher’s listing shows the seven Venice poems with Kishore’s photographs.
A separate Venice poetry event
La Biennale di Venezia’s 2026 introduction describes a poetry procession in the Giardini inspired by Koyo Kouoh’s Poetry Caravan. That is a different event from this 2025 presentation and does not include these poems, so it should not be confused with the suite.
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Limits of this account
The account above relies on the June 2, 2025 feature for the poems’ content, credits and correspondence, and on the Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o Foundation for its mission statement. The feature does not describe all seven poems individually, so this article covers the three poems it discusses and the themes it identifies across the sequence. No other statistics or measured figures are attached to the project.
- Seven poems, translated by the author from Gĩkũyũ.
- Seven photographs-based pairing credited to Naveen Kishore; the photographs are not interpretations.
- Publisher credit: Seagull Books.
- Dated material: emails from August 24, 2019 and October 21, 2020; article dated June 2, 2025.
Readers who want the full text of individual poems should consult the feature itself and the publisher.
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