''Ashwattha'' (

Gujarati Gujarati may refer to: * something of, from, or related to Gujarat, a state of India * Gujarati people, the major ethnic group of Gujarat * Gujarati language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by them * Gujarati languages, the Western Indo-Aryan sub- ...

: અશ્વત્થ) is a collection of poems written by Natwarlal Kuberdas Pandya, also known as Ushnas, in

. The book won the Sahitya Akademi Award for Gujarati in 1976. It is considered Ushnas's finest work in Gujarati.

History

Ushnas wrote the poems between 1966 and 1973. They were published in various Gujarati literary magazines including ''Kumar'' and ''Samarpan''. The book was first published in 1975 by Vora & Company, in

Ahmedabad Ahmedabad ( ), also spelled Amdavad (), is the most populous city in the Indian state of Gujarat. It is the administrative headquarters of the Ahmedabad district and the seat of the Gujarat High Court. Ahmedabad's population of 5,570,585 ...

Content

The book consists of 128 poems composed in different forms, including

sonnet A sonnet is a fixed poetic form with a structure traditionally consisting of fourteen lines adhering to a set Rhyme scheme, rhyming scheme. The term derives from the Italian word ''sonetto'' (, from the Latin word ''sonus'', ). Originating in ...

s, geets,

free verse Free verse is an open form of poetry which does not use a prescribed or regular meter or rhyme and tends to follow the rhythm of natural or irregular speech. Free verse encompasses a large range of poetic form, and the distinction between free ...

haiku is a type of short form poetry that originated in Japan. Traditional Japanese haiku consist of three phrases composed of 17 Mora (linguistics), morae (called ''On (Japanese prosody), on'' in Japanese) in a 5, 7, 5 pattern; that include a ''kire ...

ghazal ''Ghazal'' is a form of amatory poem or ode, originating in Arabic poetry that often deals with topics of spiritual and romantic love. It may be understood as a poetic expression of both the pain of loss, or separation from the beloved, and t ...

s and muktak.

Awards

The book won the

Sahitya Akademi Award The Sahitya Akademi Award is a literary honour in India, which the Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters, annually confers on writers of the most outstanding books of literary merit published in any of the 22 languages of the ...

(1976) for Gujarati language.

References

External links

* 1975 poetry books Gujarati-language books Gujarati-language poetry collections Indian poetry collections 20th-century Indian books Sahitya Akademi Award–winning works {{poetry-stub