The Welsh National Opera’s Migrations, a series of six stories exploring migration from different angles, is composed by Will Todd and opens on October 3, 2020. Shreya Sen-Handley (Memoirs of My Body, Strange) is one of the six writers, and the first South Asian woman to have written a libretto for an international opera. She focusses on the experiences of the first Indian doctors in Britain.

Other than Jeet Thayil and Amit Chaudhuri, not so many Indian/Asian writers of either sex have had an opportunity to write international opera.

Jeet Thayil is the author of the libretto for the opera, Babur, commissioned by Opera Group, UK, with music by Edward Rushton. The world premiere of Babur took place in Switzerland in Shreya Sen- 2012. Handley

Amit Chaudhuri made his Royal Opera debut in 2016/17 as librettist for Ravi Shankar’s Sukanya. which received its posthumous premiere in a co-production between The Royal Opera, London Philharmonic Orchestra and Curve, Leicester:

Shreya may very well be the third notable librettist.

Effectively then, it is three cheers for Shreya Sen-Handley! Way to go, Shreya!