Kuvempu Quotes

Kuppali Venkatappa Puttappa , popularly known by his pen name Kuvempu, was an Indian novelist, poet, playwright, critic and thinker. He is widely regarded as the greatest Kannada poet of the 20th century. He is the first among Kannada writers to be by decorated with the Jnanpith Award.Kuvempu studied at Mysuru University in the 1920s, taught there for nearly three decades and served as its vice-chancellor from 1956 to 1960. He initiated education in Kannada as the language medium. For his contributions to Kannada Literature, the Government of Karnataka decorated him with the honorific Rashtrakavi in 1958 and Karnataka Ratna in 1992. His epic narrative Sri Ramayana Darshanam, a modern rendition of the Indian Hindu epicRamayana is regarded as the revival of the era of Mahakavya in contemporary form and charm. His writings and his contribution to "Universal Humanism" gives him a unique place in modern Indian literature. He was conferred the Padma Vibhushan by the Government of India in 1988. He penned the Karnataka State Anthem Jaya Bharata Jananiya Tanujate.

✵ 29. December 1904 – 11. November 1994
Kuvempu photo
Kuvempu: 11   quotes 12   likes

Famous Kuvempu Quotes

“When I hear Kannada, my heart leaps up and I am all ears.”

Quoted in A Few inches of Ivory, 24 November 2013, Jstor Organization http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/23001425?uid=3738256&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&sid=21102981873241,

“It is not correct to say that Valmiki is the only Ramayana poet. There are thousands of Ramayana poets. There is a Ramayana poet in every village.”

He stated when he deviated from the Valmiki Ramayana epic story and was criticized for the changes made. Quoted in [Mandakranta Bose Director of the Center for India and South Asia Research and the Institute of Asian Research University of British Columbia, The Ramayana Revisited, http://books.google.com/books?id=F_vuoXvAUfQC&pg=PA140, 1 September 2004, Oxford University Press, 978-0-19-803763-7, 140–]

“In me is the sky, in me lies the earth.”

A couplet he wrote in Kannada, before writing his first full poem in the language.
Poet, nature lover and humanist (2004)

“When Manmatha kissed Rati, blood from her lips may have spit on earth and blossomed into rose on the plant and kisses the viewer's eyes with its beauty now!”

The first is a poem on flowers translated from a Kannada poem, 'Poovu', and the second is linked mythological story and both are quoted in Poet, nature lover and humanist, 24 November 2013, Archive Organization http://web.archive.org/web/20060318053230/http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/apr252004/sh1.asp,

Kuvempu Quotes

“It was a day of blackest deed
When Delhi streets of fame
Did glitter well by cursed greed
Of harsh Timoor the lame.”

From Kuvempu’s writings in English on the historical subject of Timoor’s invasion of India. Quoted here. Poet, nature lover and humanist, 24 November 2013, Archive Organization http://web.archive.org/web/20060318053230/http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/apr252004/sh1.asp,

“Amidst the early morning dew
Walking across the greenery
And in the evening that is scary
While taking a breath,
Oh, flower, I listen to your song,
Oh flower, I defeat your love.”

"The Flower", a translation of his first Kannada poem "Poovu".

/ Poet, nature lover and humanist (2004)

Similar authors

Cesare Pavese photo
Cesare Pavese 137
Italian poet, novelist, literary critic, and translator
Samuel Beckett photo
Samuel Beckett 122
Irish novelist, playwright, and poet
John Galsworthy photo
John Galsworthy 48
English novelist and playwright
William Golding photo
William Golding 79
British novelist, poet, playwright and Nobel Prize for Lite…
Walter Benjamin photo
Walter Benjamin 70
German literary critic, philosopher and social critic (1892…
Sinclair Lewis photo
Sinclair Lewis 136
American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright
Guillaume Apollinaire photo
Guillaume Apollinaire 28
French poet
Doris Lessing photo
Doris Lessing 94
British novelist, poet, playwright, librettist, biographer …
Marcel Proust photo
Marcel Proust 41
French novelist, critic, and essayist
Marcel Pagnol photo
Marcel Pagnol 9
novelist, playwright and filmmaker from France