Mahadevi Varma

Mahadevi Verma (26 March 1907 – 11 September 1987) was an Indian Hindi-language poet, essayist, sketch story writer and an eminent personality of Hindi literature.

She is considered one of the four major pillars of the Chhayawadi era in Hindi literature.

She has been also addressed as the Modern Meera.

Poet Nirala had once called her "Saraswati in the vast temple of Hindi Literature".

Varma had witnessed India both before and after independence.

She was one of those poets who worked for the wider society of India.

Not only her poetry but also her social upliftment work and welfare development among women were also depicted deeply in her writings.

These largely influenced not only the readers but also the critics, especially through her novel Deepshikha.

She developed a soft vocabulary in the Hindi poetry of Khadi Boli, which before her was considered possible only in Braj bhasha.

For this, she chose the soft words of Sanskrit and Bangla and adapted them to Hindi.

She was well-versed in music.

The beauty of her songs lies in the tone that captures the euphemistic style of sharp expressions.

She started her career with teaching.

She was the Principal of Prayag Mahila Vidyapeeth.

She was married, but she chose to live an ascetic life.

She was also a skilled painter and creative translator.

She had the distinction of receiving all the important awards in Hindi literature.

As the most popular female litterateur of the last century, she remained revered throughout her life.

Verma was born on 26 March 1907 in a Hindu Chitraguptavanshi Kayastha family of Farrukhabad, Uttar Pradesh, India.

Her father Govind Prasad Verma was a professor in a college in Bhagalpur.

Her mother's name was Hem Rani Devi.

Her mother was a religious, passionate and vegetarian woman with a keen interest in music.

Her mother would recite for many hours of Ramayana, Gita and Vinay Patrika.

On the contrary, her father was a scholar, music lover, atheist, hunting enthusiast and cheerful person.

Sumitranandan Pant and Suryakant Tripathi Nirala were close friends of Mahadevi Varma.

It is said that for 40 years Varma kept tying Rakhis to Nirala.

Verma was originally admitted to a Convent school, but upon protests and an unwilling attitude, she was admissioned to Crosthwaite Girls College at Allahabad.

According to Verma, she learned the strength of unity while staying in the hostel at Crosthwaite.

Here students of different religions lived together.

Verma started to write poems secretly; but upon discovery of her hidden stash of poems by her roommate and senior Subhadra Kumari Chauhan (known in the school for writing poems), her hidden talent was exposed.

"While others used to play outside, me and Subhadra used to sit on a tree and let our creative thoughts flow together...She used to write in Khariboli, and soon I also started to write in Khariboli...this way, we used to write one or two poems a day..."

She and Subhadra also used to send poems to publications such as weekly magazines and managed to get some of their poems published.

Both the budding poets also attended poetry seminars, where they met eminent Hindi poets, and read out their poems to the audience.

This partnership continued till Subhrada graduated from Crosthwaite.

In her childhood biography Mere Bachpan Ke Din (My Childhood Days), Verma has written that she was very fortunate to be born into a liberal family at a time when a girl child was considered a burden upon the family.

Her grandfather reportedly had the ambition of making her a scholar; although he insisted that she comply with tradition and marry at the age of nine.

Her mother was fluent both in Sanskrit and Hindi, and was a very religious pious lady.

Mahadevi credits her mother for inspiring her to write poems and to take an interest in literature.

The year 2007 was celebrated as her birth centenary.

Later, Google also celebrated the day through its Google Doodle.