Top Indian Poets You Must Know About: Part 1

Ayushi Prakash
Apr 22, 2019 • 68 views

We are all individuals, but on the basic emotions, we feel joy, hate, sadness, madness & love like everyone else. Poetry is just a way of telling the world as it is, no questions asked.

Here's a list of some Indian poets you will love to read :-

1. Toru Dutt (4 March 1856 – 31 August 1877)
A Bengali poet, who wrote in English and French.
In 1876, she published A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields, a volume of French poems she had translated into English. This volume came to the attention of Edmund Gosse in 1877, who reviewed it quite favorably in the Examiner that year. She wrote poems such as Sîta, Lotus and many more. Her poem, Our Casuarina Tree, has become one of the more popular poems in modern Indian literature. It is often taught in high schools as a part of the English curriculum.

Poems:-

Christmas
Love Came To Flora Asking For A Flower
Our Casuarina Tree
The Broken Bell
The Young Captive

2. Rabindranath Tagore (May 7, 1861- August 7, 1941)
Born in Kolkata(Calcutta). He was a Bengali poet, writer, song composer & painter who introduced new prose and verse forms into Bengali literature. He played an important part in introducing Indian culture to the West and vice versa in early 20th-century.

In 1901, he founded an art school in West Bengal at Shantiniketan, where he blended the Indian and Western forms. It played an important role in supporting the fight of freedom.

Poems:-

Amidst the rush and roar of life...
Come as you are...
Crossing 16
Epigrams
The Gift
Gitanjali 35

3. Sarojini Naidu (Feb 13, 1879-March 2, 1949)
Born in Hyderabad. Known as the ‘Nightingale of India’, was a political activist, feminist & poet. She was the 1st woman to be president of the Indian National Congress & to be appointed an Indian state governor.

She became a part of India’s Congress movement & Non Cooperation Movement. In 1924 she traveled in eastern Africa and South Africa in the interest of Indians. She toured to North America, lecturing on the Congress movement, in 1928–29. Her anti-British activity brought her a number of prison sentences (1930, 1932, and 1942–43).

Poems:-

A Love Song From The North
A Rajput Love Song
Alabaster
An Indian Love Song
Autumn Song
Corn Grinders

4. Sumitranandan Pant (20 May 1900 – 28 Dec 1977)
Pant was born in Kaui village, Bageshwar District, Uttarakhand.
He was one of the most celebrated left-wing Communist 20th century Hindi poets. He was known for romanticism in his poems which were inspired by nature, people and beauty within. Pant mostly wrote in Sanskritized Hindi.

Apart from Chhayavaadi poems, he also wrote progressive, socialist and humanist poems, but eventually moved beyond this style.

Poems:-

Moh
Vinay
Vasant - shri
Jhar parta jiivan daali se

5. Mahadevi Verma (26 March 1907- Sep 1987)
A Hindi poet, freedom fighter and educationist from India. She is widely regarded as the "modern Meera".[1] She was a major poet of the "Chhayavaad", a literary movement of romanticism in modern Hindi poetry.

In 1930 Verma began teaching at village schools around Allahabad. Although she did not actively participate in political activities, but she adopted Gandhian ideals, including giving up speaking in English, and dressing primarily in khadi. She was appointed as the first headmistress of Allahabad (Prayag) Mahila Vidyapeeth in 1933. Later, she became the chancellor of this institute. Her editorials were later collected and published in a volume titled Srinkhala ke Kariyan (The Links of Our Chains) in 1942.