Re: Who's a Poet?

Ramakrishna S. Pillalamrri (pkrishna@ARL.MIL)
Wed, 28 May 1997 20:12:58 -0600 

bhaLA! SAbAs! Hear, hear!

Ever since this forum has been graced by the august presence of vE.vE.rAvu,
I have been trying hard to find a post of his which I can whole-heartedly,
un-conditionally, absolutely agree with. Sort of like Diogenes with the
lamp in search of the honest ...

>     expert commentary by SirOmaNi sannidhaanam sooryanaaraayaNa
>     Saastri. Sree Saastri's comments are sharp bullets!

The search is over. Call off the troops. The wake can now be broken. I have
absolute confidence that this recent post would be endorsed by the people
on either side of the fence; even by those sitting on it! And to top it
all, quoting from our mAShTaru gAru!

Well, almost! adiyan has the good fortune to have studied in the great
Mahbub College High School (est 1862) immortalized in the "Secunderabad
..." post. (inquiring minds would do well to employ one of the popular
search engines, and find it in the bowels of the Internet). Sree
sannidhAnam sUryanArAyaNa SAstri was one of the telugu panDits (and the
head of the telugu department) at that school.

However, through the seven years of study there (1st thro 7th forms -
adiyan's batch was the first of the Multipurpose Higher Secondary System of
education), I was never in a class where he was the assigned teacher! He
was considered the best. Only on a handful of occasions he came to our
class, to substitute for one of the other teachers. Would you believe one
of the other teachers (I had him for hindi, not telugu) was a Sree mehboob,
a muslim gentleman from the Andhra (I mean Krishna or Guntur districts)
region, who taught hindi and telugu at the high school level, came to the
school clad in dhOvati and uttareeyam! He used to tell stories of his
involvement with gOrA.

While all of the prabandha poets paid homage to su-kavi-s, many did not
perform the flip side of it, ku-kavi-ninda. And even when they did, I think
they dismissed that group with one poem, as opposed to many on the other
side.

peddana in manu-caritra says:

        bharamai tOcu kuTumba rakshaNakugA brAlmAli cintan niran-
        tara tALee-daLa sampuTa prakara kAntArambunan dardhapun
        deruvATul degi koTTi, tad-j~na-parishad-vij~nAta courya kriyA
        virasunDai koratan baDun gu-kavi pRthvee-bhRt-sameepa-sthitin

VSN in SRKV dismissed the chore saying "ika kukavi-ninda yaprastutamu gAna..."
He also concluded his su-kavi-stuti with

        okka vAlmeeki gAka vErokka DevaDu
        sukavi Sabda vAcyun-Dika kukavi ninda
        ... yaprastutamu gAna ....

Somewhat recently someone wondered aloud as to "who is writing classical
poetry nowadays!". Well, I am sure some are doing it even now. One of the
more famous ones, right in our backyard (Manitoba, Canada), is Dr. tirumala
kRshNa dESikAcAri; yes, the gentleman who developed the telugu
fonts/software. He primarily did that to be able to type-set his books,
himself. Now we are all using it, in various ways.

In one of his works, "mahA Silpi jakkana caritramu", he says:

        oka vacanambu vrAsi, payi noohaku dOcina yaTlu daaninin
        Sakalamulan bonarci, pada-soushTavamun, rucira-ardha pushTiyun
        vikalamu cEsi, cEsiti gavitwa maTancu samud-dhatin supad-
        ya kavita dooru nak-kukavi .............................

one more from the book, not on su/ku-kavi stuti/ninda.

        kaLalaku nella moolamayi, kanjaju mOmule yAlayammugA
        melageDu vANinin, jalada-mEcaka-vENini goorci, tallirO!
        sulalita-bhAvanA-kalita-sundara-kAvya-sumasrajambu nee
        gaLamuna gooru bhAgyamunu kalpana sEyu maTancu vEDedan

        (kanjajuDu: brahma, jalada-mEcaka-vENi: kAru mabbula lAnTi juttu gala
        sumasrajambu: poola mAla)
and
        nee pada dhooLi sOku neDa nilcina cinnari rellu pOcanai,
        nee palukul vinan baDeDi nElanu bolcina kOkilambanai,
        nee paramEkshaNa prabhalu nekkonucO dilakampu mrAnunai,
        O paramEshThi rANi! paDi yunDi tarinceDu bhAgya meegadE!
and
        SreenAthu, bhUri yaSah-
        Sree nAthu, napoorwa kAvya Silpa kaLA su-
        Sree nAthu, napAra prati
        bhA nAthun-nuti yonartu bhakti talirpan

and if anybody comes up to say "aap kE taareef",

        tirumala vamSa sambhavuDu; tenguna, samskRtamandu bhAratee-
        vara karuNA-viSEshamuna bAnDiti gontaga ganna vADu; Sree-
        karamagu nuttara-amerika khanDamu-nanduna nunna vADu; Sree-
        hari-caraNa-ambujAta-nirata-arpita-cittuDu; dESikAkhyuDun

Ramakrishna "looking to di-versify himself" Pillalamarri