Today is the 63rd death anniversary of Jibanananda Das, a Bengali poet, writer, novelist and essayist, reports BSS.
He is often acknowledged as the premier poet in Bengali literature after Rabindranath Tagore and also considered as one of the greatest modern poets in Bengal. Jibanananda is also dubbed as "Ruposhi Banglar Kabi".
Das was born in 1899 in a Vaidya-Brahmin family in the small district town of Barisal, located in the south of Bangladesh.
His mother Kusumkumari Das was a poet who wrote a famous poem called Adorsho Chhele ("The Ideal Boy").
Jibanananda used to write poems while in his teens. His first poem Varsa Abahan was published in the Brahmabadi in 1919.
His first essay was written in lucid Bangla in remembrance of late Kalimohan Das. In the first phase of his writing poems, he was influenced by Satyendranath Dutta, Mohitlal Majumdar and Kazi Nazrul Islam. Most of the poems of his book Jhara Palak represent the influence of their style. During the latter half of the twentieth century, Jibanananda emerged as the most popular poet of modern Bengali literature.
Popularity apart, Jibanananda Das had distinguished himself as an extraordinary poet presenting a paradigm hitherto unknown. Whilst his unfamiliar poetic diction, choice of words and thematic preferences took time to reach the hearts of readers, by the end of the 20th century the poetry of Jibanananda had become a defining essence of modernism in 20th-century Bengali poetry.
In his books Dhusar Pandulipi (1936), Banalata Sen (1942), Mahaprithivi (1944), Sat-ti Tarar Timir (1948), Bela Abela Kalbela (1980) and Ruposi Bangla (1984), he created a poetic style and language that helped him in giving a new genre in the trend of modern Bangla poetry.
The delicate sensuousness of beauty, taste and touch has given his poems a unique distinctiveness.
His major poetries are Jhora Palok (Fallen Feathers), Dhushor Pandulipi (Grey Manuscript), Banalata Sen, Shaat-ti Tarar Timir (Darkness of Seven Stars), Rupasi Bangla (Bengal, the Beautiful) and Bela Obela Kalbela (Times, Bad Times, End Times). He died in a tram accident in Kolkata on October 22 in 1954.