Passing the literary torch

By N Vinoth Kumar

Published: 02nd May 2013

Like any other person living in this world I am also a social animal. Hence it is quite natural that my writing is my world and vice versa — he wrote once in an essay that appeared in Indian Literature, a bi-monthly literary magazine published by the Sahitya Akademi. His words are true and are reflected in his writings — be it a poem or short story or a novel. By weaving human feelings together he makes a reader become a part of his work. Maybe it is this uniqueness that had Tamil literary critic Ka Na Su write about Thalaimuraikal as one of the ‘Ten Great Novels of India’. The man who has earned such praises is none other than Neela Padmanabhan.

An eminent litterateur, he celebrated his 75th birth anniversary on April 26, a couple of weeks after he was honoured by Ilakkiya Chinthanai, one of the prominent Tamil literary organisations in the State, for his contribution to literature.

Born in the year 1938 in Thiruvananthapuram, Neela Padmanabhan is well-versed with Tamil and Malayalam. As a bilingual writer he brought out his works in multiple platforms as poems, short stories, novels, essays and literary criticisms. He served as a Deputy Chief Engineer at the Kerala State Electricity Board. Though he started to write at the age of 12, it was his debut novel Thalaimuraikal written at the age of 30, shot him to fame in the literary world. The novel was later translated by Ka Na Su under the title The Generations. A couple of years ago, the novel has turned into a Tamil film titled Magizhchi directed by Va Gowthaman, who had earlier made a documentary on Neela Padmanabhan for the Sahitya Akademi.

His novel Ilai Udhir Kaalam fetched him the Sahitya Akademi Award in the year 2005. His other novels such as Pallikondapuram, Uravugal, Koondinul Pakshigal were also well received by readers and critics. He has penned more than 20 novels, 11 collection of short stories, four volumes of poems and 11 collections of essays, all in Tamil, to his credit. Besides, he has also penned nearly 10 novels in Malayalam and English. His work has been translated in several Indian languages and other such as English, German and Russian as well.

Neela Padmanabhan who was in Chennai recently, shared his literary journey with City Express.

“I was born into a middle class family,” he shared. “And I spent my childhood days in a small circle — home, street, drama theatre, school, and a small rivulet near the school, temples and ponds. This is where I think the sensitivity, shyness, imaginative nature and a feeling of isolation lead me to read more and thereby engage in writing,” he added.

He went on, “It was only after 10 years of my birth that the states were reorganised on the basis of language. Until then we were in Travancore, whose southern boundary was Kanyakumari. After Kanyakumari became one of the districts of Tamil Nadu, we became strangers to other Tamils and Malayalis, since the Tamil we speak has a Malayalam accent and vice versa.” This can also be accounted as a reason for the success of his novels like Thalaimuraikal, which has a local slang, the author points out.

“If you want your language to be an international language, then you need to give up its purity,” he said. When asked about his poems of metaphysical nature, he responded, “I want readers to think and so I am writing metaphysical poems.”

“A writer has been moulded by his surroundings and the circumstances he faces. This is reflected in his writings and so I deliberately avoid imitating myself in each of my books. Though the world around me hurts sometimes, I must keep writing so that it passes down the generations,” said Padmanabhan.

To encourage young writers, he instituted two awards titled ‘Neela Padmam’ and ‘Thalaimuraikal’ for best poem and short story respectively, through the Thiruvananthapuram Tamil Sangam. This year’s awards were presented to Rajeshwari for best poem and Kasi Viswalingam for best story.

Courtesy: The New Indian Express