Prabhatkumar Mukhopadhyaya was born in Ranaghat, Nadia, in 1892. After passing the Entrance examination, he joined college at the National Council of Education at Bowbazar where he came into contact with inspiring teachers like Benaykumar Sarkar and Radhakumud Mukherjee. He was a voracious reader and loved history and biography. But he could not complete his education because of ill-health. Through Himansuprakas Roy he came into contact with Rabindranath who called him to Santiniketan in 1909. At Santiniketan he received a non-formal education and even while he was studying, he was appointed a teacher of the school in 1910. In 1918 Prabhatkumar joined Patha-Bhavana as a Librarian and teacher. In 1929 the Rabindra Parichay Sabha, of which he was a founder member, assigned him the task of writing a biography of the poet. The four-volume moumental work, Rabindra-Jivani took over twenty-five years to complete and it laid the foundation for further research on Rabindranath.
