"Poetic Style" book by Dr. S. V. Ranganna

This is a remarkable 3 Volume work, full of erudition & uncanny insights into the world of Kannada Poetry. The learned author ranges freely over the world of poetry even in the western world to emphasise relevant points in Kannada Poetry.

Like English poets being classified roughly as "major" & "minor" for convenience in analysis, Dr. Ranganna classifies Kannada Poets into Excellent, medium & ordinary grades for ease of analysis & not to cast aspersions on their creativity. As he cogently points out, if it were not for ordinary & medium poets, the excellence of the topmost poets could not be recognised.

As he uses a global yardstick, he classifies Homer, Valmiki, Milton, Shakespeare, Pampa, Ranna & Kumaravyasa as occupying the highest grade. Just below them, but still higher than the medium grade are Wordsworth, Shelley, Racine, Pushkin, Raghavanka & Ratnakaravarni.

The medium grade poets in Kannada are Janna, Rudrabhatta, Harihara, Lakshmeesha & Nagachandra.

The ordinary ones are Nayasena, Aandayya, Purandaradasa, Kanakadasa, Narahari, Sarvagna, Sanchi Honnamma & Shadaksharadeva.

It may be noted that Vachana Sahitya (Basava, Allamaprabhu & Akka Mahadevi) has been kept out of the ambit of this survey.

Dr. Ranganna also approvingly quotes Dante as saying that the only subjects for all literature are Religion, Love & War.

Profuse examples of their work have been quoted to justify the categorisation of these poets. Probably this is the finest work on Kannada Poetry appreciation to date.