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wielded the pen in all branches of literature except poetrythat is how we may describe Shri Gaurishankar Govardhanram Joshi alias Dhumketu. His passiing away on March 11 last year at Ahmedabad at the age of 72 has created a void in Gujarati literature which it is indeed hard to fill. Born on December 12, 1892 at Veerpur, a remote little village in Saurashtra, Gaurishankar had to struggle hard for his secondary education. Facing still heavier odds, he took his B. A. in 1918 from the Bahauddin College, Junagadh. In his childhood, he used to wander about on the outskirts of his village or in the hills nearby. He had a great attraction for streams, rivulets, valleys and ravines where he spent a great deal of his time, drinking deep in the beauty of nature around him. His intense love of nature, which caught him in its grip, was enriched in his later life by his visits to the Himalayas, to Simla, Nainital, Kashmir and other beauty spots in the country. As a student, he came into close contact with Shriman Natturam Sharma of Bilkha Anandashram in Saurashtra. The well known Vedantist exercised a profound influence on the young, boy. Inspired by him, he attempted poetry, but finding it immature and unsatisfying, gave it up. The creative urge in him, however, would not let him alone. Struggling to discover a suitable medium for the expression of his ideas, he made himself familiar with European fiction and found it eminently to his liking. Daksha-yajna-bhanga, his first short story, attracted the attention of a large number of readers and of literary critics in particular. Encouraged by the response, he wrote stories in quick succession and soon secured a place as an original writer. His creative activity received an impetus never known before. With the publication in 1926 of his first collection of short stories, Tanakha Part-I, a new star appeared in the firmament of Gujarati literature. The short story remained Dhumketus passion, and forte, all his life. He has, to his credit, over a dozen collections of short stories, chief among them being Tanakha (Parts I, II, III and IV), Pradeep, Tribheto, Akashdeep, Meghbindu and Vankunj. Some of his stories have been translated into several Indian and foreign languages.
lowest strata of society, their joys and sorrows, their emotions and passions, their loves and their longings, their magnanimity, faith and idealism, their innate humanity and the spiritual beauty of their life. Marked by a new sensibility a new vision of life, deep sympathy and rare art, his stories won him a permanent place in the hearts of the people. Bhaiys Dada depicting the tragic pathos of the life of an old signalman, Post Office portraying the life of the grief-stricken Ali Dosa, a hunter, separated from his daughter, whose long-awaited letter he never receives and, who dies in agony, and Govind-nun-Khetar representing village life, have become milestones in Gujarati literature. One ascends in them high pinnacles of art never attained before. Dhumketu portrayed the reality of life by his lively imagination invested it with emotion, and touched it with a romantic idealism. His stories cast an irresistible spell by the freshness of their theme, style and technique, a rich variety of incident, plot and situation, and their motely world of distinctly individual characters, brilliant and idealistic. Dhumketu is in a class by himself as far as the ability to create atmosphere by a few deft touches, racy style and varied rhythm, and, above all, the beautiful poetry that pervades his stories are concerned.