Nayyirah Waheed revives decade-old dispute with Rupi Kaur

Poet Nayyirah Waheed has reignited her long-running dispute with Rupi Kaur, renewing allegations that Kaur drew from her work and received recognition for ideas Waheed says originated in her poetry collection salt.

The controversy dates back nearly a decade and has resurfaced after Waheed shared a series of posts on Instagram. She announced that salt, which she self-published in 2013, would be distributed through stores internationally, saying readers would now have greater access to the work she considers the foundation of the dispute.

In one post, Waheed accused Kaur of taking credit for what she called her literary innovation and linked the issue to the commercial success of Kaur’s 2014 collection milk and honey. She also referred to the financial success and wider popularity of the style associated with contemporary minimalist poetry.

Waheed has argued that the dispute extends beyond similarities between two books. She has connected it to broader issues involving race, recognition and power within the publishing industry, particularly the treatment of Black women writers.

In a separate statement published earlier this month, Waheed said she had invited Kaur and her team to participate in a formal discussion with a major media organisation acting as mediator. According to Waheed, the invitation had not received the response she sought.

She accused Kaur and her team of avoiding acknowledgment of the issue and described the alleged conduct as part of what she sees as a wider pattern of erasure and appropriation. Kaur has not publicly accepted Waheed’s allegations.

Waheed also cited several historical music disputes involving artists and claims of creative appropriation, using them to argue that conflicts over artistic credit are not unusual in popular culture.

The disagreement between the two poets first gained widespread attention after milk and honey became a major commercial success. Kaur’s collection has sold millions of copies worldwide and has been translated into numerous languages.

Kaur addressed the accusations in a 2018 interview. She said the literary techniques at the centre of the dispute were not owned by either poet and noted that lowercase writing and short-form poetry had been used by other writers before them.

The similarities between salt and milk and honey have remained the subject of debate. Some commentators have pointed to similarities in presentation, language and poetic structure, while others have argued that minimalist poetry, short verses and lowercase writing predate both collections.

Previous analyses have examined the similarities without establishing a definitive finding of plagiarism.