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{{Infobox writer
| name = Arun Kolatkar
| image = Arun-kolatkar gowri-ramanathan-hindu.jpg
| caption =
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1932|11|1|df=y}}
| birth_place = [[Kolhapur]], [[Kolhapur State]], [[British India]]
| death_date = {{Death date and age|2004|09|25|1932|11|1|df=y}}
| death_place = [[Pune]], [[Maharashtra]], [[India]]
| occupation = Poet
| notableworks = [[Jejuri (poem)|Jejuri]]
| movement = [[Indian literature|Indian]] [[postmodernism]]
| awards = {{plainlist|
* [[Sahitya Akademi Award]]
* [[Commonwealth Poetry Prize]]
}}
| spouse = Darshan Chhabda (div 1966); Soonu Kolatkar
| parents =
| children =
}}

'''Arun Balkrishna Kolatkar''' ([[Marathi language|Marathi]]: अरुण बालकृष्ण कोलटकर) (1 November 1932 – 25 September 2004) was an [[India]]n poet<ref>{{cite web|title=Sahitya Akademi : Who's Who of Indian Writers|url=http://sahitya-akademi.gov.in/sahitya-akademi/SASearchSystem/sauser/writerinfo.jsp?wrids=3809|website=Sahitya Akademi|publisher=Sahitya Akademi|access-date=27 October 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304190551/http://sahitya-akademi.gov.in/sahitya-akademi/SASearchSystem/sauser/writerinfo.jsp?wrids=3809|archive-date=4 March 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref> who wrote in both [[Marathi language|Marathi]] and English. His poems found humour in everyday matters. Kolatkar is the only Indian poet other than [[Kabir]] to be featured on the World Classics titles of [[New York Review of Books]].

His first collection of English poetry, ''[[Jejuri (poem)|Jejuri]]'' won the [[Commonwealth Poetry Prize]] in 1977.<ref name=hoskote/> His Marathi verse collection ''Bhijki Vahi'' won a [[Sahitya Akademi Award]] in 2005. An anthology of his works, ''Collected Poems in English'', edited by [[Arvind Krishna Mehrotra]], was published in [[United Kingdom|Britain]] by [[Bloodaxe Books]] in 2010. Trained as an [[artist]] from the [[J. J. School of Art]], he was also a noted graphics designer.

==Life==
Kolatkar was born in [[Kolhapur]], [[Maharashtra]], where his father Tatya Kolatkar was an officer in the Education department. He lived in a traditional patriarchal [[Hindu]] extended family, along with his uncle's family. He has described their nine-room house as "a house of cards. Five in a row on the ground, topped by three on the first, and one on the second floor.".<ref name=akm2>{{harvnb|Mehrotra|1993|pp=52–55}} Kolatkar introduction</ref> The floors had to be "plastered with cowdung every week".

He attended Rajaram High School in [[Kolhapur]], where [[Marathi language|Marathi]] was the medium of instruction. After graduation in 1949, much against his father's wishes, he joined S. B. College of Arts, [[Gulbarga]], where his childhood friend Baburao Sadwelkar was enrolled. His college years saw a "mysterious phase of drifting and formal as well as spiritual education",<ref name=amitc>{{harv|Kolatkar|2006}} From the introduction by Amit Chaudhuri</ref> and he graduated in 1957.

In 1953, he married Darshan Chhabda (sister of well-known painter Bal Chhabda).<ref name=chitre>
{{cite web
|title=remembering arun kolatkar
|author=Dilip Chitre
|url=http://dilipchitre.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!A038B6D880E19298!105.entry
|date=25 September 2005
|access-date=2008-09-21
|author-link=Dilip Chitre
}}{{dead link|date=November 2016 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> The marriage was opposed by both families, partly because Kolatkar was yet to sell any of his paintings.

His early years in [[Mumbai]] were poor but eventful, especially his life as an upcoming artist in the Rampart Row neighborhood, where the Artists' Aid Fund Centre was located.<ref name=chitre/> Around this time, he also
translated [[Tukaram]] into English.

This period of struggle and transition has been captured in his Marathi poem ‘The
Turnaround’:

:Bombay made me a beggar.
:Kalyan gave me a lump of jaggery to suck.
:In a small village that had a waterfall
:but no name
:my blanket found a buyer
:and I feasted on plain ordinary water.
: 
:I arrived in Nasik with
:peepul leaves between my teeth.
:There I sold my Tukaram
:to buy some bread and mince. (translation by Kolatkar)<ref name=amitc/>

After many years of struggle, he started work as an art director and graphic designer in several advertising agencies like Lintas. By the mid-60s he was established as a graphic artist, and joined an eclectic group of creatives headed by
the legendary advertising professional [[Kersy Katrak]]. It was Katrak, himself a poet, who pushed Kolatkar into bringing out Jejuri.<ref>
{{cite news
| title = Flamboyant Adman: Remembering Kersy Katrak
| author = Vikram Doctor
| publisher = [[The Economic Times]]
| url = http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/ET_Features/Brand_Equity_/Flamboyant_Adman_Remembering_Kersy_Katrak/articleshow/2684449.cms
| date = 9 January 2008
| access-date = 2008-09-23
}}</ref> Kolatkar was, in advertising jargon, a ‘visualizer’; and soon became one of Mumbai's most successful art directors. He won the prestigious [[Communication Arts Guild|CAG]] award for advertising six times, and was admitted to the CAG Hall of Fame.<ref>Indian Poets Writing In Marathi, https://web.archive.org/web/20091026144555/http://geocities.com/indian_poets/marathi.html</ref>

By 1966, his marriage with Darshan was in trouble, and Kolatkar developed a drinking problem. This faded after the marriage was dissolved by mutual agreement and he married his second wife, Soonu.<ref name=chitre/>

==Marathi Poetry and influence==

His [[Marathi language|Marathi]] poems of the 1950s and 1960s are written
"in the Bombay argot of the migrant working classes and the underworld, part
Hindi, part Marathi, which the Hindi film industry would make proper use of
only decades later".<ref name=amitc/> For instance, consider the following, which intersperses Hindi dialect into the Marathi:
{| style="text-align:left; background:none" align="center"
|width="200pt"| मै भाभीको बोला
|width="270pt"| main bhAbhiiko bolA
|-
| क्या भाईसाबके ड्यूटीपे मै आ जाऊ ?|| kya bhAisAbke dyuTipe main A jAu?
|-
| भड़क गयी साली || bhaRak gayi sAli
|-
| रहमान बोला गोली चलाऊँगा || rahmAn bolA goli chalAungA
|-
| मै बोला एक रंडीके वास्ते? || mai bolA ek raNDike wAste?
|-
| चलाव गोली गांडू || chalao goli gaNDu (quoted in<ref>{{harvnb|Mehrotra|1993|pp=5}})</ref>
|}
To match this in his English translation, he sometimes adopts "a cowboy variety":<ref name=hoskote>
{{cite news
| title = Poetry loses a major presence (obituary)
| author = Ranjit Hoskote
| work = [[The Hindu]]
| url = http://www.hindu.com/2004/09/27/stories/2004092702971000.htm
| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20041010091655/http://www.hindu.com/2004/09/27/stories/2004092702971000.htm
| url-status = dead
| archive-date = 10 October 2004
| date = 27 September 2004
| access-date = 2008-09-23
| author-link = Ranjit Hoskote
}}</ref>
{| style="text-align:left; background:none" align="center"
|         allow me beautiful i said to my sister in law          to step in my brother's booties                you had it coming said rehman        a gun in his hand              shoot me punk kill your brother i said           for a bloody cunt (''Three cups of Tea''<ref name=saleem/>)
|}

In Marathi, his poetry is the quintessence of the [[modernist]] as manifested in the '[[little magazine movement]]' in the 1950s and 1960s. His early Marathi poetry was radically experimental and displayed the influences of European [[avant-garde]] trends like [[surrealism]], [[expressionism]] and [[Beat generation]] poetry. These poems are oblique, whimsical and at the same time dark, sinister, and exceedingly funny. Some of these characteristics can be seen in ''Jejuri'' and ''Kala Ghoda Poems'' in English, but his early Marathi poems are far more radical, dark and humorous than his English poems. His early Marathi poetry is far more audacious and takes greater liberties with language. However, in his later Marathi poetry, the language is more accessible and less radical compared to earlier works. His later works ''Chirimiri'', ''Bhijki Vahi'' and ''Droan'' are less introverted and less nightmarish. They show a greater social awareness and his satire becomes more direct. Bilingual poet and anthologist [[Vilas Sarang]] assigns great importance to Kolatkar's contribution to Marathi poetry, pointing to ''Chirimiri'' in particular as "a work that must give inspiration and
direction to all future Marathi poets".<ref>
{{cite news
| title = Poems of remarkable resonance
| author = Prabhakar Acharya.
| work = [[The Hindu]]
| url = http://www.hindu.com/lr/2005/10/02/stories/2005100200120300.htm
| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20051030022942/http://www.hindu.com/lr/2005/10/02/stories/2005100200120300.htm
| url-status = dead
| archive-date = 30 October 2005
| date = 2 October 2005
| access-date = 2009-09-30
}}</ref>

He won the Kusumagraj Puraskar given by the Marathwada Sahitya Parishad in 1991 and Bahinabai Puraskar given by Bahinabai Prathistan in 1995.
His Marathi poetry collections include:
* ''Arun Kolatkarcha Kavita'' (1977)
* ''Chirimiri'' (2004)
* ''Bhijki Vahi'' (2004) ([[Sahitya Akademi award]], 2004)
* ''Droan'' (2004)

Kolatkar was among a group of post-independence bilingual poets who fused the diction of their mother tongues along with international styles to break new ground in their poetic traditions; others in this group included [[Gopalakrishna Adiga]]
([[Kannada language|Kannada]]), [[Raghuvir Sahay]] ([[Hindi]]), [[Dilip Chitre]] (also [[Marathi language|Marathi]]), [[Sunil Gangopadhyay]], [[Malay Roy Choudhury]] ([[Bengali language|Bengali]]), etc.<ref>''yeshwant rao'' (poem) http://www.thedailystar.net/2003/10/18/d31018210289.htm</ref>

===Influences===
Marathi devotional poetry and popular theater (''tamasha'') had early influences on Kolatkar. American [[beat poetry]], especially of [[William Carlos Williams]]<ref name=akm2/><ref name=amitc/> were later influences. Along with friends like [[Dilip Chitre]], he was caught up in the modern shift in Marathi poetry which was pioneered by [[B. S. Mardhekar]].

When asked by an interviewer who his favorite poets and writers were, he set out a large multilingual list. While the answer is part rebuff, the list is indicative of the wide, fragmented sources he may have mined, and is worth quoting in full:
:Whitman, [[B. S. Mardhekar|Mardhekar]], [[poet Manmohan|Manmohan]], Eliot, Pound, Auden, Hart Crane, Dylan Thomas, Kafka, Baudelaire, Heine, Catullus, Villon, [[Dnyaneshwar|Jynaneshwar]], [[Namdev]], [[Janabai]], [[Eknath]], [[Tukaram]], [[Wang Wei (Tang dynasty)|Wang Wei]], [[Tu Fu]], Han Shan, C, Honaji, Mandelstam, Dostoevsky, Gogol, Isaac Bashevis Singer, Babel, Apollinaire, Breton, Brecht, Neruda, Ginsberg, Barth, Duras, Joseph Heller ... Gunter Grass, Norman Mailer, Henry Miller, Nabokov, [[Namdeo Dhasal]], [[Patthe Bapurav]], Rabelais, Apuleius, Rex Stout, Agatha Christie, Robert Shakley, Harlan Ellison, [[Balchandra Nemade]], Durrenmatt, Aarp, Cummings, Lewis Carroll, John Lennon, Bob Dylan, Sylvia Plath, Ted Hughes, Godse Bhatji, Morgenstern, [[Ashok Chakradhar|Chakradhar]], Gerard Manley Hopkins, Balwantbuva, Kierkegaard, Lenny Bruce, [[Bahinabai Chaudhari]], [[Kabir]], Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Leadbelly, Howling Wolf, Jon Lee Hooker, Leiber and Stoller, Larry Williams, Lightning Hopkins,Andre Vajda, Kurosawa, Eisenstein, Truffaut, Woody Guthrie, Laurel and Hardy."<ref name=bs/>

==English poetry==
Kolatkar was hesitant about bringing out his English verse, but his very first book, Jejuri, had a wide impact among fellow poets and littérateurs like [[Nissim Ezekiel]] and [[Salman Rushdie]]. Brought out from a small press, it was reprinted twice in quick succession, and [[Pritish Nandy]] was quick to anthologize him in the cult collection, ''Strangertime''.<ref>{{harvnb|Nandy|1977}}</ref> For some years, some of his poems were also included in school texts.<ref name=bs>{{cite news
|title=Speaking Volumes : Arun Kolatkar (1932-2004)
|author=Nilanjana S Roy
|publisher=[[Business Standard]]
|url=http://businessstandard.com/india/storypage.php?autono=164266
|date=28 September 2004
|access-date=2009-09-23
|url-status=dead
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110708105043/http://businessstandard.com/india/storypage.php?autono=164266
|archive-date=8 July 2011
|df=dmy
}}</ref><ref>''An old woman'', from Jejuri, in a poetry technique course (http://learningat.ke7.org.uk/english/ks4/year11/aow.htm)</ref>

The poem sequence deals with a visit to [[Jejuri]], a pilgrimage site for the local Maharashtrian deity [[Khandoba]] (a local deity, also an incarnation of [[Shiva]]). In a conversation with poet [[Eunice de Souza]], Kolatkar says he discovered Jejuri in ‘a book on temples and legends of Maharashtra… there was a chapter on Jejuri in it. It seemed an interesting place’.<ref name=amitc/> Along with his brother and a friend, he visited Jejuri in 1963, and appears to have composed some poems shortly thereafter.
A version of the poem ''A low temple''<ref>
{{cite web|title=Anthology of Indian Poetry in English Translation |url=http://geocities.com/kavitayan/arun_kolatkar.html |author=Rajendra Kishore Panda and Bhagirathi Mishra |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091026172959/http://www.geocities.com/kavitayan/arun_kolatkar.html |archive-date=26 October 2009 |url-status=dead }}</ref> was published soon in a little magazine called ''Dionysius'', but both the original manuscript and this magazine were lost. Subsequently, the poems were recreated in the 1970s, and were published in a literary quarterly in 1974, and the book came out in 1976.

The poems evoke a series of images to highlight the ambiguities in modern-day life. Although situated in a religious setting, they are not religious; in 1978, an interviewer asked him if he believed in God, and Kolatkar said: ‘I leave the question alone. I don’t think I have to take a position about God one way or the other.’<ref>
Bruce King,
''Modern Indian Poetry in English''
[[Oxford University Press]], 1987/1989, p. 170
</ref>

Before Jejuri, Kolatkar had also published other poem sequences, including ''the boatride'', which appeared in the little magazine, ''damn you: a magazine of the arts'' in 1968, and was anthologized twice.<ref name=saleem>Contemporary Indian Poetry in English: An Assessment and Selection, 1972, ed. [[Saleem Peeradina]]</ref><ref>Ten Twentieth-Century Indian Poets. Ed. [[R. Parthasarathy]]. Delhi: Oxford UP, 1976; repr. 1989</ref> A few of his early poems in English also appeared in [[Dilip Chitre]]'s ''Anthology of Marathi poetry 1945-1965'' (1967). Although some of these poems claim to be an 'English version by poet', "their Marathi originals were never committed to paper." (this is also true of some other bilingual poets like [[Vilas Sarang]].<ref name=akm1>{{harvnb|Mehrotra|1993|pp=1–8}} Introduction</ref>

===Later work===
A reclusive figure all his life, he lived without a telephone,<ref>Arun Kolatkar, Two Poems, http://www.littlemag.com/vox/kolatkar.html</ref> and was hesitant about bringing out his work. It was only after he was diagnosed with cancer that two volumes were brought out by friends<ref name=hoskote/> – the English poetry volumes ''Kala Ghoda Poems'' and ''Sarpasatra'' (2004).

''Sarpa Satra'' is an 'English version' of a poem with a similar name in ''Bhijki Vahi''. It is a typical Kolatkar narrative poem like ''Droan'', mixing [[mythology|myth]], [[allegory]], and contemporary history. Although Kolatkar was never known as a social commentator, his narrative poems tend to offer a whimsical tilted commentary on social mores. Many poems in ''Bhijki Vahi'' refer to contemporary history. However, these are not politicians' comments but a poet's, and he avoids the typical [[Dalit]] -[[Leftist]]-[[Feminist]] rhetoric.

While ''Jejuri'' was about the agonized relationship of a modern sensitive individual with the indigenous culture, the Kala Ghoda poems<ref>[http://www.cse.iitk.ac.in/~amit/books/kolatkar-2004-kala-ghoda-poems.html Book Excerptise: Kala Ghoda Poems] (extended extracts)</ref> are about the dark underside of Mumbai's underbelly. The bewilderingly heterogeneous [[Megalopolis (city type)|megapolis]] is envisioned in various oblique and whimsical perspectives of an underdog. Like ''Jejuri'', ''Kala Ghoda'' is also 'a place poem' exploring the myth, history, geography, and [[ethos]] of the place in a typical Kolatkaresque style. While ''Jejuri'', a very popular place for pilgrimage to a pastoral god, could never become Kolatkar's home, ''Kala Ghoda'' is about exploring the baffling complexities of the great metropolis. While ''Jejuri'' can be considered as an example of searching for a belonging, which happens to be the major fixation of the previous generation of Indian poets in English, Kala Ghoda poems do not betray any anxieties and agonies of 'belonging'. With ''Kala Ghoda Poems'', Indian poetry in English seems to have grown up, shedding adolescent `identity crises’ and goose pimples. The remarkable maturity of poetic vision embodied in the ''Kala Ghoda Poems'' makes it something of a milestone in Indian poetry in English.

After his death, a new edition of the hard to obtain ''Jejuri'' was published in the [[New York Review Books Classics]] series with an introduction by [[Amit Chaudhuri]] (2006). Near his death, he had also requested [[Arvind Krishna Mehrotra]] to edit some of his uncollected poems. These were published as ''The Boatride and Other Poems'' by Pras Prakashan in 2008. His ''Collected Poems in English'', edited by [[Arvind Krishna Mehrotra]], was published in Britain by [[Bloodaxe Books]] in 2010.

He was survived by his wife Soonu Kolatkar.

==Appearances in the following poetry Anthologies==
* ''The Golden Treasure of [[Writers Workshop]] Poetry'' (2008) ed. by Rubana Huq and published by [[Writers Workshop]], [[Calcutta]]<ref>{{cite web |title=Rubana Huq, ed. The Golden Treasury of Writers Workshop Poetry. Review : ASIATIC, VOLUME 3, NUMBER 1, JUNE 2009 |url=http://journals.iium.edu.my/asiatic/index.php/AJELL/article/view/82/67 |website=journals.iium.edu.my |publisher=journals.iium.edu.my |access-date=4 September 2018}}</ref>
* ''Ten Twentieth-Century Indian Poets'' (1976) ed. by [[R. Parthasarathy]] and published by [[Oxford University Press]], [[New Delhi]]<ref>{{cite web |title=Ten 20th Century Indian Poets |url=https://www.cse.iitk.ac.in/users/amit/books/parthasarathy-1976-ten-20th-century.html |website=cse.iitk.ac.in |publisher=cse.iitk.ac.in |access-date=23 August 2018}}</ref>
* ''The Oxford India Anthology of Twelve Modern Indian Poets'' (1992) ed. by [[Arvind Krishna Mehrotra]] and published by [[Oxford University Press]], [[New Delhi]]<ref>{{cite web |title=The Oxford India Anthology of Twelve Modern Indian Poets |url=https://www.cse.iitk.ac.in/users/amit/books/mehrotra-1993-oxford-india-anthology.html |website=cse.iitk.ac.in |publisher=cse.iitk.ac.in |access-date=26 August 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Book review: 'Twelve Modern Indian Poets' by Arvind Krishna Mehrotra |url=https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/indiascope/story/19920815-book-review-twelve-modern-indian-poets-by-arvind-krishna-mehrotra-766731-2013-01-03 |website=indiatoday.in |publisher=indiatoday.in |access-date=26 August 2018}}</ref>
* ''Strangertime: An Anthology of Indian Poetry in English'' (1977) ed. by [[Pritish Nandy]] and published by Hind Pocket Books, [[New Delhi]]

==Further reading==
* [[Amit Chaudhuri|Chaudhuri, Amit]]. Estranging India. ''New Left Review'', Vol. 40 (July/August), 111-126, 2006.
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110110233445/http://www.newquestindia.com/Archive/171/Html/Article_Arun_Kolatkars_SARPA_SATRA.html Pankti Desai, Arun Kolatkar's Sarpa Satra as an Allegory of Extremism .]
* [https://archive.today/20121130003313/http://66.220.11.194/visit/viewarticle.asp?AuthorID=73590&id=34758 A Third Way of Reading Kolatkar Sachin Ketkar]
* [[Saleel Wagh|Wagh, Saleel]]. Arun Kolatkar : Marathi Kavitecha Bhishma, ''Blog Pahila''. Time & Space Communications. 2007.
* [[Saleel Wagh|Wagh, Saleel]]. Arun Kolatkaranchya Teen Kavita : (Three Poems of Arun Kolatkar), ''Blog Pahila''. Time & Space Communications. 2007.
* [[Saleel Wagh|Wagh, Saleel]]. Arun Kolatkaranchi Manavsankalpana : (Arun Kolatkar's Concept of Man), ''Navakshardarshan''. Savantvadi, Maharasjtra 2013.
* Zecchini, laetitia. Moving Lines, The celebration of impropriety and the renewal of the world in Arun Kolatkar's poetry. [https://web.archive.org/web/20141121090902/http://www.arias.cnrs.fr/Fiches/Laetitia_Zecchini/moving_lines_kolatkar_zecchini.pdf ]
* Zecchini, Laetitia. Dharma reconsidered: the inappropriate poetry of Arun Kolatkar in Sarpa Satra, in Diana Dimitrova ed. Religion in Literature and Film in South Asia, New York : Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.

==See also==
{{portal|Poetry}}
* [[Indian English Literature]]
* [[Indian Writing in English]]

==References==
{{Reflist|2}}

==External links==
* {{Cite book
| title = Jejuri
| last = Kolatkar
| first = Arun
| editor = Amit Chaudhuri
| editor-link = Amit Chaudhuri
| publisher = Pub Group West
| isbn = 1-59017-163-2
| year = 2006
| url-access = registration
| url = https://archive.org/details/jejuri0000kola
}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kolatkar, Arun}}
[[Category:Indian male poets]]
[[Category:English-language poets from India]]
[[Category:Marathi-language writers]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian translators]]
[[Category:Marathi-language poets]]
[[Category:1932 births]]
[[Category:2004 deaths]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Sahitya Akademi Award in Marathi]]
[[Category:Sir Jamsetjee Jeejebhoy School of Art alumni]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian poets]]
[[Category:Poets from Maharashtra]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian male writers]]

Arun Kolatkar - Revision history

>JPxG at 04:17, 11 June 2021