Subhash Mukhopadhyay (poet)

Subhash Mukhopadhyay
Subhash Mukhopadhyay
Born	(1919-02-12)12 February 1919 Krishnanagar, Bengal Presidency, British India
Died	8 July 2003 (aged 84) Kolkata, India
Occupation	Poet
Nationality	Indian
Genre	novels, poetry, libretto

Subhash Mukhopadhyay ( Shubhash Mukhopaddhae ; 12 February 1919 – 8 July 2003) was one of the foremost Indian Bengali poets of the 20th century. He is also known as the "podatik kobi" in the field of Bengali literature .A book of thirty of Subhash's best known poems in English translation, titled ' As Day is Breaking', was published in 2014 by Anjan Basu,a Bangalore-based writer/critic. The book includes a rather detailed introduction to the poet's work as well.

Mukhopadhyay was born in 1919 in Krishnanagar, a town in Nadia district in the province of West Bengal. An excellent student, he studied philosophy at the Scottish Church College in Calcutta, graduating with honours in 1941.

Like his contemporary Sukanta Bhattacharya, Mukhopadhyay developed strong political beliefs at an early age. He was deeply committed to the cause of social justice, and was active in left-wing student politics through his college years. Following graduation, he formally joined the Communist Party of India. He thus became one of a handful of literary practitioners with first-hand experience as a party worker and activist.

In 1940, while still a student, he published his first volume of poetry Padatik (The Foot-Soldier). Many critics regard this book as a milestone in the development of modern Bengali poetry. It represented a clear departure from the earlier Kallol generation of poets; and Subhash's distinctive, direct voice, allied with his technical skill and radical world-view, gained him great popularity. In his poetry, Subhash grappled with the massive upheavals of that era which ruptured Bengali society from top to bottom. The 1940s were marked by world war, famine, partition, communal riots and mass emigration in Bengal. Subhash's writings broke away from the traditional moorings of the establishment poets, and instead addressed the despair and disillusion felt by the common people. He remained throughout his life an advocate of the indivisibility of the Bengali people and Bengali culture. His radical activism continued unabated. He was one of the leaders of the "Anti-Fascist Writers' and Artists' Association", formed in March 1942 in reaction to the murder of Somen Chanda, a fellow-writer and Marxist activist. Subhash remained attached with the Communist Party until 1982, and spent time in jail as a political prisoner briefly in the late 1960s. From the late 1950s onwards, Subhash's poetry evolved into something more personal and introspective. The lyricism of Phul phutuk na phutuk, aaj Boshonto, one of his most famous poems, was a result of this period.