What is the opposite of Kavi (i.e. poet)....some kidigedis (i.e. rascals) say it is Kanavi....another Kannada poet....
Ramachandra Sharma one of the great Kannada poets passed away last week.....they last link in the Kannada 'navya kavya' chain is lost....Ramachandra Sharma appeals to me for another reason because he made Ehiopia way back in 1957 where he moved to become a English professor.....then he spent a lot of time in Zambia, UK etc. as a educationit....since I am not a big fan of poems.....my exposure to Sharma was limted from tabloids like 'Lankesh Patrike' editor of which Lankesh was a good buddy of Sharma....
Sharma's first collection of poems was titled 'Hesaragatte' (i.e. mule or sort of donkey)...it is joked that people mistook the name of the book as the name of the poet...this used to infuriate Sharma from time to time......
Also...another Kannada columnist N.K.Kulkarni or Nani Kaka also passed away this week.....he was 93....he was sort of more dear to me as his house was in the same neighborhood where my house was....his house was near railway station which I used to pass by everyday sometimes multiple times day on my way to school.....he wrote good prose....he was very frank in his writings....one of his columns contained his experiments with condoms...it was way back in 1940s and condoms were really new to India...Nani Kaka wrote such a nice artcile documenting his first experiment with condom and his embarssment using it for the first time and his usual first time goof ups etc....what an open minded person....
cheers!
Posted by Mahesh
at 12:07 AM EDT
