Author Archives: Subhashree P

Born: 1785
Died: 1862

one of the greatest poets of Odisha, was born in Parlakhemundi, then a tributary state under the British, in the southern Odisha, in an affluent family. His father Banabasi Pattanayak, a poet of some merit, was patronized by the then king of Parlakhemundi, who permitted him to receive the revenue income from 19 villages for his own living. His mother was Lalita Devi, a quiet, religious lady. Gopalkrishna received his education in the traditional manner and read Sanskrit grammar and poetry, particularly ancient Odia poetry and works by Vaishnava scholars. He was married at the age of 23 to
Sulakhyana Devi. But immediately after his marriage, due to the king’s displeasure with his father, their property was looted and they had to leave Parlakhemundi under adverse conditions. They went to a place called Ganjam, at about 160 kms north of Parlakhemundi, near present Berhampur, and settled there. But the family’s banishment was a temporary one. It seems Gopalkrishna was invited by the king of Parlakhemundi, Gajapati Narayan Deb, to forget the past and return to his own place, where he was appointed in an important and responsible position. Gopalkrishna accepted the invitation, returned to Parlakhemundi with his family, and did the king’s job loyally and efficiently. The privations of Ganjam days were forgotten, and the poet
settled in Parlakhemundi in comparative affluence and comfort. But his life was not an unmixed bliss. His two sons, Gourchandra and Karunanidhi, died young and the poet had to reconcile himself to the loss. But when he died in 1862, in a changed political condition in the country, his name had already become a legend, and his poems were being sung far and near all over Odisha.

It is said that while in Ganjam, under the influence of Chakrapani Bakrabak Pattanayak, a well-known witty poet of the place, Gopalkrishna was inspired to write poems, which he continued to do after his return to Parlakhemundi. His poems were mostly about love, secular in tone and content till, finally, in his middle age, he accepted Vaishnavism, under the instruction of Lokanath Das alias Binayak Das Goswami, a wellknown Guru belonging to Gaudiya Vaishnava sect. The conversion substantially affected Gopalkrishna’s poetry, as its mode and direction changed and it came to reflect chiefly the intention and intimacy of Vaishanva belief. Attempts were made to compile Gopalkrishna’s poetry after ‘his death. The first attempt was made by the late Damodar Pattanayak towards the end of the 19th century. Subsequently in 1919, the first single collection of Gopalkrishna’s poetry was published by the poet’s great-grandson, the late Ramkrishna Pattanayak, under the auspices of king Krishnachandra Gajapatai Narayan Deb of Parlakhemundi. The book contained 307 poems. At a later date, around 1959-60, another enthusiastic connoisseur, the late Babaji Baishnabcharan Das, collected and edited about 300 unpublished poems; and
published them along with the ones already published in a volume entitled Gopalkrishna granthabali o Gopalkrishna padabali. The book contained a total of 619 poems, and till today, i.e. till other unpublished poems of the poet are unearthed, it may be reckoned as the most authoritative source of Gopalkrishna’s poetry. The editor acknowledged his source to be one monk Gopal Das of a Vaishnava monastery, called Radhakanta Matha, in the village Kharada in the Parlakhemundi state, where it is presumed the poet wrote most of his poems as he stayed there off and on, doing his religious duties. Almost all the poems carry the poet’s name at the end except a few, which have ended, purely as a mark of courtesy, in the names of the then kings of Parlakhemundi, such as Prataprudra Gajapati Narayan Dev, Gaurachandra Dev and Padmanav Dev, etc.

Thematically Gopalkrishna’s poems may be divided into four broad groups. The first-and earliestcontains such poems that may be termed as secular love-poetry, that is, the love of a youngman for a youngwoman and vice versa, in an idyllic, rural surrounding. Though these poems generally conform to the tradition of earlier Odia love-poetry, yet in the background one can sense the presence of the ‘sly, startled
girl’ and the ‘love-lorn youth’ of the Vaishnava love-poetry. The poems portray many moods, beginning from melancholic feelings due to separation to strong, ecstatic desire for love-act and they have precise, compact and extremely musical structures. Some representative poems are, ‘Smare dei bandhu na jare’ (Don’t please, leave me to Cupid), ‘Chahingala ki bhabila mane ki panchila’ (Did she look, did she think, did
she devise any plan?) and ‘Jiban bandhu maguni maguchire etiki’ (Oh, my life’s friend, I’m asking for leave), etc. The second group contains such poems which are related to feelings of bhakti, and they were written not in any particular period, but at different times in the poet’s career. The element of love is present, but it is not the secular communication between two young hearts. Instead it is the unilateral feelings of love of the devotee making a total offering of himself before his Lord. The moods are ‘shanta’ and ‘dasya’ and in some cases ‘sakhya’, and the poems include janana, bhajana, kirtan, etc as well as hymns to Sri Gauranga, Sri Guru, etc. The poems have a lot of variety, and in most of them the poet refers to beauty and grace and glory of Radha and Krishna with great love and devotion. The third group includes poems dealing with parental love or ‘vatsalya rasa’, and they are among the most memorable and finest poems of Gopalkrishna. They are generally expressed through Jashoda’s feelings for Krishna as a child, but can be taken as expressing every mother’s feelings for her child. In the process Krishna as a divine being is forgotten and he emerges as a mischievous, fun-loving child whose games and pranks fill a mother’s heart, as nothing else can. Some good examples are, “uthilu ede begi kahinkire’ (why have you got up so early?), ‘Mo Krishna chandrama pari ana ke achi sari’ (Is there any body like my Krishna?) and ‘Brajaku chora asichi gheni neba sua tuni hoi re’ (The thief has come to Braja, he will take you away, please sleep quietly). The fourth large group consists of Gopalkrishna’s most important poems. The theme of love continues but with much greater intensity and expansion. The protagonists are Radha and Krishna, and the mood is ‘madhura rasa’. Love in its many aspects has been described, such as through feelings of affection, anger, restlessness, agony,
suffering as well as through innumerable situations that bring great happiness to the pair and completely identify one with the other. In the final reckoning the poet sees love not as physical or personal, but as love emerging at a point of great joy and beauty where all separation, anger and agony end in bliss. Gopalkrishna’s poems depicting the love between Radha and Krishna exhibit the whole world of moods,
emotions and mental situations. On the one hand, one may say, he was conforming to the prevailing Vaishnava tradition; on the other, and which is more important, he was sensitively reacting to the complicated motivations of human heart and behaviour to which he gave a shape through the meaning and significance of words. Thus his Radha tries to control her emotions while she sits with her seniors and hears
Krishna’s flute.

But the condition becomes different when Radha meets Krishna on the bank of the river Jamuna.
I met him face to face today on Jamuna.
Sitting on a stone on the bank
I was rubbing my body lazily
When my friend warned me.
I got up quickly,
My friend covered me
And my whole body shivered;
My hair was loose
My clothes were untied
They were not where they should be;
Wait, wait-my friend cried,
And I was losing my senses; As he came on
I could not know what to do,
Dip in water-my friend said. (tr.)

Gopalkrishna was both a Vaishnava and a Vaishnava poet. But he was more than that. Vaishnavism for him was like a catalytic agent and Radhakrishna themes were like so many objective correlatives. What he really gave was a sensitive, creative reaction to what was dominant in the minds and hearts of the people at the time. His belief in Vaishnavism illumined him, as his understanding of men and women provided him with necessary nourishment. What finally came out was a rare vision of immense beauty and grace.

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