Poet and journalist Rotho Rafi passes away

Poet, translator and journalist Rotho Rafi has passed away. He was 51.

His brother, Ehtesham, confirmed his death.

He breathed his last around 8pm on Thursday while undergoing treatment at Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College Hospital in the capital.

Rafi had been receiving treatment in the hospital’s medicine department since Monday. The reclusive poet had long been suffering from complications involving his lungs and kidneys.

Rotho Rafi was known in Bangla poetry for his unadorned yet distinctive style. He developed a voice of his own in both poetry and translation, carving out a place in contemporary literature without seeking the limelight. He leaves behind his only poetry collection, Akkhor O Balir Prithibi (A World of Letters and Sand), translations of poems by writers from across the world, and a devoted community of readers. His death marks the loss of a singular voice in Bangla poetry.

Born on 31 March 1975 in Ashuganj upazila of Brahmanbaria, Rafi worked as a journalist, but his primary identity was that of a poet. Although he studied chemistry formally, his intellectual and creative life was shaped by poetry and translation. He emerged as a poet in the 1990s and remained closely associated with the little-magazine movement and anti-establishment literary circles for decades. He was a regular contributor to Gandib, a little magazine known for its opposition to literary institutions, and remained connected with it even as the publication gradually declined.

One of the defining features of Rafi’s literary life was his reluctance to publish books. Despite going years without bringing out a poetry collection, he established a significant presence in contemporary Bangla poetry. His first and only collection, Akkhor O Balir Prithibi, was published at the Amar Ekushey Book Fair in 2020. The 432-page volume contains more than 200 poems written over two decades, from 1999 to 2019.

His poetry ranged widely in subject and thought. Questions surrounding birth and death appeared alongside religious, philosophical and cultural references, including Krishna’s flute and Jesus’s journey to the cross. These varied elements were explored through a poetic language and sensibility distinctly his own. Rather than relying solely on emotional expression, Rafi sought to bring intellectual depth to his work.

He also made an important contribution to Bangla literature through translation. He translated poems by internationally renowned poets, including Erich Fried, Charles Bukowski, Muhammad al-Maghut and Jaroslav Seifert. His translations sought to convey the emotional force, ideas and philosophical dimensions of the original works while retaining a distinctive character in Bangla. Through these efforts, he introduced Bangla readers to diverse traditions and voices in world poetry.

At the heart of Rafi’s poetic philosophy was intellectual inquiry. He believed that poetry should offer more than an emotional response; intellectual achievement was equally important. This conviction, along with his individual style and reluctance to publish, set him apart from many of his contemporaries. With his death, Bangla poetry has lost a voice whose stature rested less on public visibility than on the depth of his creative work.