Siddhi charan shrestha images

Yadunath Khanal

Mr. Siddhicharan Shrestha is one of the most outstanding of our poets. Ever since Mr. Surya Vikram Gewali drew our pointed attention to his remarkable poetic qualities sometime in the thirties, he remained at the forefront of our literary stage. For this reason, I have reflected a great deal on him during the last seven years with a view to understanding him and, if possible, assessing him as a poet. I have read and re-read his poems, particularly the anthology entitled Mero Pratibimba (My Image) and the long poem called Urvasi. I have read critical studies about him, notable by Mr. Ratna Dhoj Joshi and Mr. Vijaya Bahadur Malla. But I am afraid he has eluded me; he has remained always a litter remote and distant.

Is it because he is rather a lonely person socially and poetically? Away from the town, he says, somewhere in the distance he hears somebody calling him; he wishes to walk alone. He seems to feel lonely even in the midst of poets and scholars. We miss the spark of personal and social communication. Perhaps this is what makes him a little distant. But he is remote, not because he says little about himself. Indeed he says a great deal even in a direct manner with sincerity that is at once deep and trans

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