The quiz session from the FB group Quiz-Wiz on 10.04.18

1. © anirban biswas
Quiz-Wizwall| 10.04.18

2. Mirza Ghalib had dedicated many
beautiful poems to his muse, Purani
Delhi.
In one of his mid 19th century poems,
we see Ghalib lamenting:
"Dilli na rahi, chhavni hai
Na qila, na shaher,
na bazar, na nahar
Qissa mukhtasar
Shahar Sahra ho gaya"
What was Ghalib describing?

3. The fall of Delhi in 1858.
Written after the English forces took Delhi from the Sepoy forces
during Sepoy Mutiny.

4. Ernest Dowson was a turn of the
century English poet, often
associated with the decadent
movement.
Died only 32, in 1900, his primary
fame rests upon two of the
English phrases that he given to
us.
If one of the phrase is days of wine
and roses, what's the other?

5. “I have forgot much, Cynara!
gone with the wind,
Flung roses, roses riotously
with the throng…”
-Non Sum Qualis eram Bonae
Sub Regno Cynarae, 1894.

6. One Mechanical Engineer from BE College, thus
remembers his old flame:
"আমরা দুজনে মমনে মজনে গেমি বহুমিে হনো।
গোমার োনের রঙ এখনো আনের মনো, েনব
েু মম আর মহন্দু গেই, খৃষ্টাে হনেনিা।
েু মম আর আমম মিন্তু দুজনেই বুন া হনে গেমি... "
Id both.

7. Binoy Majumdar & Gayatri Chakraborty Spivak

8. X is a fictional donkey, meaning ‘silvery’
in Spanish.
A creation of poet Juan Ramón Jiménez, X
is considered one of the famous
characters Spanish literature has ever
seen.
Originally written for children, Jiménez
continued with X in his poems as well,
creating the donkey as an alter ego of the
poet.
Since, X has crossed boundaries and even
one Bengali poet also fell under its charm.
Id X.

9. Platero.
First published in Platero y yo
(Platero and I) by Jimenez.
The Bengali poet was Shakti
Chatterjee, who has sonnet
sequences featuring Platero.

10. It was 1915, the WW1 was raging and two poet friends,
one American and one British, were spending their life in
the warmth of English countryside.
One day, the American counterpart sent one of his
freshly written poem to his friend, a poem about choices,
and it became a decisive moment.
Inspired by the poem, the British friend shrugged off all
his hesitations and joined the Great War, only to be killed
in action. His friend returned to America, dejected.
Who are these poets? And which is the decisive poem
that made all the difference?

11. Robert Frost & Edward Thomas
The decisive poem was “The Road Not Taken”,
which Frost wrote in 1915 and Thomas was its
first reader.

12. After Premendra Mitra won the
1958 Sahitya Akademi for his book
of verses সাের গেনি গেরা, a joke
came circulating in the literary
circles.
Contrary to the apparent belief that
the poem was written after a trip to
the sea, a rumour was started that
the title poem as well as the whole
collection was named so for one
certain reason.
What reason?

13. That Sagarmoy Ghosh, the
legendary editor of গিশ once
rejected these poems.
Premendra Mitra compiled the
rejected poems and named his
collection সাের গেনি গেরা

14. Allen Ginsberg visited India for the second time
in 1971.
Bob Dylan wanted his friend Allen to get a first-
hand experience of the Bangladesh refugee
crisis and Allen came up with ‘September on
Jessore Road’.
While one reads the poem, one of the stanza go
like this:
“Is this what I did to myself in the past?
What shall I do _____ Poet I asked?
Move on and leave them without any coins?
What should I care for the love of my loins?..”
Fill in the blanks.

15. Sunil.
Mentioning his good friend Sunil
Gangopadhyay.

16. X is an 1890 Rudyard Kipling poem,
written to highlight the extreme
hardships of remaining twenty war
veterans of one particular battle, and
the typical British indifference towards
it.
The poem starts from where an earlier
poem had left, even echoing the name.
Though intended to be a sequel of the
earlier poem, X had never achieved the
fame the former attracts.
X?

17. ‘The Last of the Light Brigade’
Which narrates the hardships of the veterans of Battle of Balaclava,
famously featured in the Lord Alfred Tennyson’s poem ‘The Charge
of the Light Brigade’.

18. He was the owner of an
electrical shop in Bankura,
that's why Bimal Kar used to
call him electric poet.
Born in 1933 at Benaras, his
biggest contribution to the
Bengali poetry came in 1965,
when one of his friend wrote a
poem.
Which poem?

19. ‘অবেী বাম আনিা’
Abani Nag was a friend of
Shakti Chattopadhyay and he
was said to be the অবেী of
Shakti Chattopadhyay’s ‘অবেী
বাম আনিা’ fame.

20. The grandeur of this town was well documented as
early as in 15th century, when we found Chand
Saudagar of মেসামঙ্গেিাবয seeing this town en route and
commenting:
“অমিেব সুরপুরী গিমখ সব সামর সামর
প্রমে ঘনর িেনির ধারা
োো রত্ন অমবশাে গজযামেমমে িাাঁ চ চাে
েজমুক্তা প্রেমিে ঝারা।”
The town lost its importance after Mughals laid a
siege and defeated its inhabitants in 1632.
Which town?

21. সপ্তগ্রাম
Established by the
Portuguese in 1533, the
town fell to Mughal forces
after Shah Jehan sent his
army to get rid of the
Harmads.

22. Connect:

23. The poem “শীেিাে িনব আসনব সুপর্মা” by Bhaskar
Chakraborty
“শীেিাে িনব আসনব সুপর্মা আমম মেেমাস ঘুমমনে োিব- প্রমে সন্ধ্যাে
গি গেে ইোমিম িনর বযানঙর রক্ত
ঢু মিনে গিে আমার শরীনর- আমম চু প িনর বনস োমি- অন্ধ্িানর
েীে োেুস উম নে গিে িারা, সারারাে বামজ গপা াে...”

24. Those who were a regular listener of Akashvani
and a certain shortwave transmission from Kolkata
in the early 70s, can still remember frequently
listening to Jibanananda poems over radio.
Jibanananda Das was a known poet to Bengali
bhadralok by that time, but he yet to became an
enigma as he is now.
Still some of his poems got considerable airtime.
Why?

25. Poems from রূপসী বাাংো were used
as codes during Liberation War of
Bangladesh.
Poems from other poets were
also used sometimes, but রূপসী
বাাংো poems were the most
popular among Muktibahini.
The short wave station being
Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra.

26. Neil Perry and his friends were instrumental
in reviving this long defunct poetry club in
the year 1959.
Over the year, they had studied some fourteen
poems in all, which includes:
“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day” by
William Shakespeare,
“She walks in beauty” by Lord Byron and
“Ulysses” by Lord Tennyson.
What’s the name of this poetry club?

27. Dead Poet’s Society
Features famously in the 1989 Robin Williams
movie of the same name.

28. Feng Tang is a Chinese author.
Some three years back, he found himself in
the eye of a storm, when he wrote the
following lines while translating a book of
poems into Chinese:
"The world unzipped its pants in front of his
lover."
The Chinese media and critics lambasted
Feng for unnecessary turning a classic to
obscenity and his publishers had to withdraw
books off the shelf.
The original collection of poems were in
English and was published in 1922.
Who was the poet?

29. Rabindranath Tagore.
Feng was translating the line:
“ The great earth makes herself
hospitable with the help of the grass.”
(Poem XC, Stray Birds )
Tagore’s Stray Birds was a compilation
of lines he had written during Japan
tour in 1921.
Almost all of its English poems were
itself a translation of ক্ষমর্িা and গেখেী।

30. Edger Allan Poe met Jane Craig Stanard in the
year 1820.
Poe was 14 at that time and motherless. She
was 28 and mother of his class friend Robert.
They soon struck a chord and their friendship
flourished until her death in 1824.
Poe immortalised Jane in one of the poem he
wrote in 1831. This particular poem
generates a considerable interest among the
readers of the Bengali poetry.
Why?

31. Edger Allan Poe wrote ‘To Helen’
(1831) in memory of Jane Stanard.
This is the poem, which inspired
Jibanananda Das to write ‘বেেো গসে’।