Dhanashree Halbe

Dhanashree Halbe (Marathi: धनश्री हळबे)(born December 13, 1928) is a well-known Marathi writer. She is also a translator,^[1] poet and a writer for children's stories. She has written more than 15 books, hundreds of short stories and articles for various age groups. She has translated 10 books from Malayalam to Marathi. She has also contributed to the "Encyclopedia on Women's Literature in Indian Languages"(Bahratiya Stree Sahityacha Magova) and "Encyclopedia on Theatre"(Marathi Natya Kosh). She won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 2000 for the translated novel Awespchi Mule (Malayalam novel by T.Shiva Shankar Pillai).

Biography

Dhanashree Halbe was born on December 13, 1928 in the town of Nagpur. She had her early education at the Shree Ganesh High School at Bhandara. She took a master's degree in Sanskrit from Nagpur University in 1951. She wrote for All India Radio, Nagpur, in her college days. Soon after her matriculation she took up a job of a school teacher. After her marriage she relocated to Calcutta. She was a headmistress at Lajpat Balika Vidyalaya in Calcutta until 1957. She left her job as a headmistress to take care of her children and to give more time to writing. Her first short stories were published in popular Marathi magazines "Vasant", "Vangmay Shobha", "Kirloskar","Amrut", etc. She actively participated in cultural activities of Maharashtra Mandal (a regional association of Marathi speaking population in Bengal),Calcutta. While in Calcutta, she traveled to a lot of places across the globe. This exposure to foreign cultures influenced her work. She relocated to Cochin (Kerala) in 1976 and published her first original book Antarctica: Ek Ruperi Swapna (Antarctica: A Silver Dream) after extensive study on the subject. She researched on the history, culture and literature of Kerala and published several articles in popular Marathi magazines and newspapers. During her stay in Cochin she mastered Malayalam language and translated many books written by famous Malayali authors including S.K. Pottekkatt, Lalithambika Antharjanam, Vaikom Muhammad Basheer. After her husband's retirement she relocated to Pune, Maharashtra in 1991 and continues to contribute to Marathi literature.

She has three children: Shivanandan Halbe, Vandana Chakrabarti and Ranjana Kumar.

References