Books & Authors Quiz: Hindi Literature and Its Authors

He composed the Ramcharitmanas in Awadhi in the sixteenth century, retelling the story of Rama in seven books, and it remains the most widely read work of Hindi devotional poetry.

The Padmavat, written in Awadhi, tells of Ratnasen of Chittor and Padmavati of Singhal and carries a Sufi meaning under the love story; Jayasi also wrote the Akhrawat.

He first published under the name Nawab Rai and then took the pen name Premchand, under which he wrote Godan, Gaban, Nirmala, Sevasadan, Rangbhoomi and Karmabhoomi, and stories such as Kafan, Panch Parmeshwar and Bade Ghar ki Beti.

Kamayani is his long poem built on the figures of Manu, Shraddha and Ida, and it is held to be the highest achievement of Chhayavad; Prasad also wrote the plays Skandagupta and Chandragupta and the collection Ansu.

He gave Hindi prose its modern shape through plays such as Andher Nagari and Bharat Durdasha and through journals such as Kavi Vachan Sudha, and the first age of modern Hindi literature is named the Bhartendu Yug after him.

Bihari was a court poet of Jaipur, and his Satsai, praised for holding much meaning in few words, is the most quoted book of the Ritikal, the age of ornament and courtly love that Ramchandra Shukla placed between Samvat 1700 and 1900.

He was the court poet of Prithviraj Chauhan, and his Prithviraj Raso, in Braj mixed with Rajasthani, is the longest and most discussed work of the Adikal or Veergatha Kal.

He is the poet of national feeling in modern Hindi, and Urvashi, Rashmirathi, Kurukshetra and Hunkar are his chief works; Urvashi brought him the Jnanpith Award in 1972.

The Bijak gathers Kabir’s verse in three parts — the Sakhi, the Sabad and the Ramaini — and it carries his Nirgun teaching, that god has no form and no image, and his attack on ritual and caste.

Maila Anchal, set in a village of north Bihar just after independence, is counted the first major regional novel, or anchalik upanyas, of Hindi; Renu also wrote Parti Parikatha and the story Maare Gaye Gulfam, on which a well known film was based.

He received the Jnanpith Award in 1968 for his collection Chidambara, the first Hindi writer to be honoured with it; the award itself began in 1965, when it went to the Malayalam poet G. Sankara Kurup.

His Hindi Sahitya ka Itihas set out the division into Adikal or Veergatha Kal, Purva Madhyakal or Bhaktikal, Uttar Madhyakal or Ritikal and Adhunik Kal, and examinations still follow that scheme; he was also a critic of standing, whose essays and work on Surdas are widely read.