Biography of a Poet

by Trishna Devi Rao

Photo used with permission of the author.

Dr. Muralidhar Advikolanu (1929-2006) was an Indian poet, lyricist, freelance writer, playwright, and novelist in Mumbai. Born in Eluru, Andhra Pradesh, he wrote in two languages and worked for the Shipping Corporation of India in Hyderabad, Mumbai, and Delhi.

Dr. Muralidhar studied English and Telugu literature, wrote novels, poetry, songs, plays, and contributed both short stories and articles to literary magazines in both languages. Dr. Muralidhar took a master’s degree in English Literature and was conferred D. Lit by the World University, Tucson, Arizona. He was among the best writers at the Sahitya Akademi (India’s National Academy of Letters).

He contributed to poetry journals and reviews for university journals, and worked as a translator in Telugu, English, and Hindi. His poems were published in both national and international anthologies. Dr. Muralidhar wrote documentaries, radio serial plays, broadcast poetry, and hosted shows for A.I.R. Hyderabad. His articles have been published in Maharashtra Academy of Engineering and Educational Research’s (MAEER) MIT Pune Journal. He has been an award-winning copywriter for some of the most reputed advertising agencies in Mumbai and was listed in Who’s Who in International Poetry, 1983 (Cambridge).

Dr. Muralidhar studied mysticism and comparative religious philosophy and was knowledgeable about esoteric sciences. His poetry reflects his mystic touch and his ability to take every person’s life experience, human hardships, and emotions, and put them into a written form.

Those who read his poetry can know his thoughts on humanity and spirituality; those who fully read him can fully understand and remember him.

The one who held his hand, showed him light, and guided him through life was none other than his wife. Her name is Lakshmi Narasu Advikolanu. Dr. Muralidhar Advikolanu is survived by his wife, his son, his daughter, his grandson, and his granddaughter

Translated by Trishna Devi Rao

Trishna Devi Rao

About the Translation

Writing an English-to-Telugu translation of an “Biography of a Poet” for my late grandfather, Dr. Muralidhar Advikolanu, was a process which required passion. To make this translation as accurate as possible, the external resources and people I relied upon were my grandmother (who is a Telugu writer with published books of her own), my mother, and an online Telugu-English “Andhra Bharathi” dictionary. I had to find an online Telugu keyboard which contained all the letters, vowel-marks, and consonant-marks needed to get the work done; I found the “Lexilogos” website’s keyboard to be the most effective. I wrote in English first and worked on translating one sentence at a time. Certain words in English, such as “mysticism”, “comparative literature”, and “experience” had Telugu equivalents which were not part of my Telugu vocabulary. When such cases occurred, I searched for a word in the “Andhra Bharathi” dictionary which best suited the context of the sentence. After the Telugu version was finished, I sent drafts to my grandmother for approval and made corrections based on her advice and our discussions, until we both felt satisfied with the final copy.

Author’s Note