Ramakanta Rath

Born: 13 December 1934

• He is one of the most renowned modernist poets in the Odia literature.
• Heavily influenced by the poets such as T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound, Rath experimented greatly with form and style.
• The quest for the mystical, the riddles of life and death, the inner solitude of individual selves, and subservience to material needs and carnal desires are among this philosopher-poet’s favorite themes.
• His poetry betrays a sense of pessimism along with counter-aesthetics, and he steadfastly refuses to put on the garb of a preacher of goodness and absolute beauty.
• His poetry is full of melancholy and laments the inevitability of death and the resultant feeling of futility.
• The poetic expressions found in his creations carry a distinct sign of symbolic annotations to spiritual and metaphysical contents of life.
• He joined the Indian Administrative Service in 1957, but continued his writing career.
• He received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1977, Saraswathi Samman in 1992, Bishuva Samman in 1990 and India’s 3rd highest civilian honour, the Padma Bhushan in 2006.

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