on it was pronounced and it continued to be so for a considerable time even after. The ultimate restoration of the Assamese language to its legitimate orbit, and the publication of the Jonaki in 1889 by a group of students in Calcutta who gave real momentum to the progress of Assamese literature after the spell of fade-out it suffered in the post-Ahom transition period. The role of the Jonaki that had its birth like Plato's Symposium that had its at a supper party of poet Agathan, is a most dynamic one for the Assamese literature of the British period. As a matter of fact, the two periodicals, the Oronodoi (1846) and the Jonaki (1889), are the two milestones in modern Assamese literature that effected epoch-making chan- ges in literary trends and technique.
(The Red River and the Blue Hill-p. 109)"
The influence of the Western literature could be seen in Assamese literature since the last part of the 19th century. From the compilation of the Anglo-Assamese dictionary (1868) down to the writing of Assamese poem in the model of English was a noticeable feature that deserves consi- deration. The Baptist Missionaries survived the Assamese language from its collapse due to the State-wide influence of Bengali literature. Bholanath Das and Ramakanta Chaudhury stand first in the writing of Assamese poem in blank-verse in imitation of Milton and Michael Madhusudan Dutta. Ramakanta Chaudhuri's Avimanyubadh Kavya (1875) provides good evidence of it.
Lakhinath Bezbarua, Hemchandra Goswami and Chandrakumar Agarawala are the outstanding personalities who piloted the romantic move- ment in Assamese literature. Padmanath Gohain Barua is another name who contributed much to the enrichment of Assamese literature at that time. Bezbarua with his 'Bahi', Gohain Barua with 'Usha', besides their own written books, inspired the intellectual class of that time. Besides, different poets in different parts of the country made name in the romantic movement. They were greatly indebted to the English Romantic Move- ment which was piloted by the romantic English peots ;-Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, Byron to mention a few. Bezbarua's 'Awasesh' leads us to Shelley's poem "Music, when soft voices die......". Bezbarua's.. "Kadamkali”, Chandrakumar's "Pratima". Hem Goswami's "Phular Chaki", Gohain Barua's 'Jurani", Durgeswar Sarma's "Anjali" are poems that carried the idea and spirit of English literature.
