[Click to enlarge]

This is my most favorite photograph of Writer Sujatha. This picture originally appeared on one of his books, Puthiya Pakkangal published by Kumari Pathippagam. I actually re-shot this from the book using a digicam.

Puthiya Pakkangal was published in ‘93. So this must have been clicked atleast 15-16 years back when Sujatha was still sporting a moustache and picking up grey hairs. Though he wasn’t exactly from the middle class even then, this picture somehow profiles a middle-aged, middle class Indian with sharp features. The striped shirt adding to the middle class working man’s look.

Simply curious to know if he was actually posing for the flick. Or it could be clicked while he was still thinking how to complete next week’s thodarkathai. Photographer isn’t credited in the book but he surely did a good job with this photograph. I wish this will be used as the official photograph.

[Image & Text Source - Kumudam]

How much ever we know about our favorite author, we are never contented with the available information. We always would like to know that extra personal story or scoop of him/her. His favorite books, favorite authors, his childhood, his inspirations and the origin of the creativity that amazes us through his writings. More and more. That’s one I reason, I’m very excited, writing this post.

This fortnight’s Kumudam Snehidhi has a special interview with Sujatha . Not Mr. Sujatha Rangarajan but the actual Sujatha in his name, his wife. After reading it, one couldn’t avoid a feeling that they just had a direct one-on-one chat with Lady Sujatha. She seems to be extremely modest and out-spoken. Who else other than his wife can talk more of this super star of Tamil book industry. Having been around him for 43 years, lady Sujatha lists the best and not-so-best Rangarajan with atmost ease. Though she talks about how he spends money lavishly on books, she saves the best of him to the end of the interview.

Reading the interview was a revelation for me. Truly. Not just because Sujatha is one of my favorite but it subtly shows a peak into a writer’s life. I for once thought it was only Charles Dickens who wrote and wrote and wrote spoiling his health and burning midnight oil. Though I’m not comparing Sujatha to Dickens[else the puritans would jump on me fiercely], Sujatha has unconsciously sacrificed a good amount of his life for writing. As lady sujatha says that he was so immersed in his own world of books that they weren’t even intimate during the early stages of their mariage life. And after moving to BEL in Bangalore, Sujatha became so busy in his writing world that he wasn’t able to spend time with his boys during their childhood.

On the flip side, she calls him a genius for the kind of self-taught he is. Especially in music. She says that Sujatha could play guitar and many musical instruments so well without having taken training for them.

Do take time to read this rather lengthy and interesting interview. You would need a UID/Pass to read Kumudam and its free on registration.

[Source - Hindu]

Writer Indra Parthasarathy’s radio interview to Stanford 90.1 FM radio show, It’s Different, is available here[Part 1 and 2]. Via RKK.

I wish the interview was Tamil but this is certainly a rare interview. The interviewer has very important questions for I.Pa on his fiction and plays. I.Pa is very spontaneous and spirited as usual. BTW, I.Pa is here in Bay area for a drama workshop. He is also staging a play for Bay Area Tamil Mandram, Ramanuja.

Through books. Not bucks.

Josh Kaufman’s The Personal MBA. Neat Stuff. Via Seth ji.

[Source - Asokamithran caricature by Ananthapadmanaban in Vikatan]

This is MY Blog.

Vote MY Site.

This is MY Photoblog.

Go here to read MY REVIEW.

Go there to read MY THOUGHTS on that book.

I’ve blogged about it, Go here to read MY POST.

It sucks. Sorry to be so harsh but the moment I read such sentences, I’m terribly put-off. Now, before you dig deep into this blog and find out such an usage, I agree that it’s been done in this blog too. Long back but not anymore. Even if you don’t ask me why, here’s why.

It’s a sheer brag. Though it sounded like a normal usage to me, I’ve moved from that thinking, some time back. When ? That’s when I started reading Ashokamitran. Atleast three years back. To quote[not verbatim] Ashokamitran, To say something as my creation or my writing seems very egotistic and very violent. Violent ? While reading this sentence, I paused there for a moement, trying to make sense of what he said. Honestly, I’ve always felt bad when stars and writers and celebrities brag egotistically about themselves. When someone could define this brag as being violent, it stayed with me, deep within. I began to consciously avoid the such I - My brags. Even during pressing situations, I’ve tried and minimize it.

There’ a way to avoid such bragging posts. Lets say, there is this review that I penned on Shankar’s Sivaji and it got published in Hindu. How would I say that on the blog ? The usual way - I wrote a review on MY blog here and that got re-printed in Hindu. The Ashokamitran way - The review which was posted here was also published in Hindu here. The ‘I’ and the ‘My’ could be avoided and you would be humble in saying that. Personally, I have to say it has changed the way I look at things. I have to be stop here abruptly as this is not a self-development blog.

The reason to brag(!!) about this here is certainly not to detail on this quality of mine. It’s about Ashokamitran. His writings are far superior and much simpler than many Tamil writers. There are no word plays, no confusing language and no beating around the bush. His writing is so simple that even a long time Tamil literary reader would doubt if there is anything special about his writings. That’s his speciality. Such simplistic usage of language is also evident in Ashokamitran’s columns.

His protagonists aren’t heroes. They are common people like you and me. They don’t even stand out because they are common. Just common-common. To explain this better, let’s take another favorite writer, Sujatha. If Sujatha writes about a common man, by his genius descriptions, the common man loses his commonality and becomes special. Not with Ashokamitran. The common man from Ashokamitran’s pen is just common and there is nothing to much to describe his commonness. Nor he writes about some great hero from the history books. His characters live in this world and all that Ashokamitran does is to describe them with simple words and place them in a situation. This situation is never as critical as the kalinga war. Its just another common situation like drinking water or going to a movie. That’s where Ashokamitran pauses to throw light on this incident. He shows us the minds and the hearts and the lives of the people from such trivial situations. The result, truly astonishing and over-powering. He has touched the grey areas of the middle class lives that no one else has ever thought to write about. Ashokamitran is not to be confused with Aathavan who is on a slightly different league. Ashokamitran’s protagonists are usually the helpless and cowardish middle class. Imagine Kamal in Mahanadhi, who hopelessly losses his kids in the river of life. Think about Raj Kiran in Thavamai Thavamirindhu who is blinks dispiritedly for being unable buy new clothes for his kids on the Diwali eve. These are some of ideal backdrops in Ashokamitran’s shortstories.

Ashokamitran till date hasn’t had a magnum opus. Cause there can never a magnum opus for a simplistic writer like him. Even the most popular ones like Thanner and Pathinetavathu Atchakkodu are written for being common novels and not an epic.

Ashokamitran is such a funny speaker that he would come to stage as the last person and win over the bored crowd. The last time, I got a chance to meet Ashokamithran was during Uyirmmai Publishers’ function. He spoke in a hearty manner about trying to rope 500 copies of Kanaiyazhi together and posting it across the nation. Even during the Ashokamitran 50 function, he was very humorous. You could listen to that recording on Badri’s blog.

If you are starter in Tamil literature start with Ashokamitran for you will come back a full circle to Ashokamitran. This writer’s writer has something for all of us to learn and imbibe. Being simple.

[Pics - Theeranadhi]

How much ever I dislike to talk about the petty issues surrounding the Tamil literature circles, Kutti Revathi’s interview to Kumudam’s Theeranadhi was more meaningful than just throwing duppatas. This interview is a must read if you understand what the paragraph below is trying to convey.

I completely agree with these statements made on the state of tamil literary reviews. Especially the last 4 lines draws a vivid picture. And before you start reading the complete interview, I have to say this, What’s said here is also applicable to Indian Blogosphere.

P.S - Just in case you login to Theeranadhi to read the interview don’t miss, Kamala Pudumaipithan’s re-collection of pudumaipithan days.

I’ve been constantly asking friends to buy tamil literature books that I couldn’t get here in the US and they have been sending them in regular instalments. Now I seem to have books for more than a year’s worth of reading as I’m still waiting for to the next set to arrive.

Last week, some more books from Chennai, arrived. And I was waiting to get my hands all over them. This set includes this year’s most talked about books in The Chennai Book Fair 2006. The most expected was Aathavan’s Shortstory Collection with which I now own all of Aathavan’s works published recently. I know I’ve been rambling about Aathavan for sometime now and that’s because of a simple reason, thamizh kurum nallulagam has missed a great writer and given him to the floods. I have just started to read this one but I’ve to say Kizhakku Pathippagam has done a noble job of compiling the aathavan’s shortstories to feed his hungry fans. Indra Parthasarathy’s foreword where he talks about his student Aathavan, clearly details the sorrow of missing a great writer.

Aathavan had a unique style which I couldn’t compare to anyone before or even after him. I have this feeling that no one, literally no one details the middle class urban life as we see and live it. Sujatha to a large extent came closer to this. However, some of his urban stories moved away from the middle-class life that some(!!) of us lived. They moved away into a fantasy world which makes you earn for a middle-class life like that. Sample, the scene where Arvind Swamy smokes before his mom in Roja. Didn’t most(!!) of us think, what a cool idea it is to have a mom like that ? Whether its morally/physically wrong or right, didn’t we feel that the conversation they had in that scene, however exaggerated it seemed, was so damn cool. That’s Sujatha. Aathavan was a little different. He wrote and wrote about the urban family life and he wrote it just like that. Just like that. The exaggerations were minimal. In this arena, we don’t have a author in Tamil, parallel to Aathavan.

In Chennai Book Fair 2005, when I was in Kizhakku Pathipagam stall, a co-blogger introduced me to a gentleman, Era Murukan. While I knew nothing about him, to my surprise, he knew about Lazy Geek and spoke in length about Tamil writings. He said he worked for a software company and was extremely humble. As a foot note, he also mentioned that he wrote a book which was published by Kizhakku Pathipaggam. Though I believed it, the writers whom I’ve met before was nothing like him. He wasn’t dressed in a Veshti/Jibba and didn’t have a jolna bag like me. I moved on after talking to him. Now when I read his Moondru Viral, I wish I read this book a year back. Amazing details and vivid descriptions. Will complete the book and will certainly put up a post on this book.

Alpha is also one of the books that came along in this set. I am still awaiting to get Sujatha’s Collection Of Plays and Sujatha Kaelvi Pathil Part 1 and 2. Though I’ve read most, infact all, of Sujatha’s plays, this one will be in my collection. Sujatha virtually wrote all his plays only for Poornam Vishwanathan. Though Sujatha’s plays are unknown to the outside world, his play named Dr. Narendiranin Vinotha Vazhakku (The Weird Case Of Dr. Narendran) is a class apart. If only theatres groups like EVAM could play such unique plays, the world outside Chennai would discover a playwright in Sujatha.

A zillion thanks to Ramki for getting these books straight from the publishers.

The girl sitting opposite to me was reading a book. This was in the bus, during my morning commute to office. The book looked like a pulp fiction paperback. As the bus approached Downtown Seattle, she suddenly turned to last page of the book and continued reading from there. She was approximately in the middle of the book before took this wild jump to the last page.

She completed the last page, read the blurb in the back of the book and got down from the bus. Donno how much fun it was to do that ?

One of the best column in Tamil print media, Writer Sujatha’s Katrathum Petrathum in Ananda Vikatan, has stopped again. Sujatha has decided to take a break and continue it later. Katrathum Petrathum has had 3 three servings until now. All the three times, the column has appeared atleast 54 weeks before it ended. And every time, I couldn’t wait for Sujatha to start it again.

This old man is a heap of intelligence, who at times is mistaken for being a pseudo intellectual. It’s his immense popularity that make his contemporaries corner his writing as popular writing and not include him in the so called ’serious literature writing’. They don’t get that popular writing is as much literature as a ’serious literature’ attempt. Sometimes though he makes couple of superficial statements like this, his column has been a quintessential read. This 3rd serving of Katrathum Petrathum has been in action for over 90 weeks now.

In this final week of Katrathum Petrathum, Sujatha writes about the new year party hosted by Kamalhassan. The party is supposed to include Kollywood’s Who’s Who and many other top stars of Indian cinema. Thats when Kamal chose to discuss the Dasavatharam storyline by remarking to Sujatha, Bruce Arasuvoda Naaiya Konudaraan, Sir. And now people would go bonker bonks on guessing who would be Bruce and Arasu. I think, both are two of the 10 characters enacted by Kamal Hassan himself.

If not for such teasers of Kamal and Shankar flicks, Katrathum Petrathum had in itself a gamut of topics from Sci-Fi, Haiku, Tamil books/writers, Contemporary Literature and the most famous Best of Year columns. It had become a sort of weekly dose of all the topics I would love to read. And a habit of reading it, similar to drinking filter coffee, couldn’t be stopped so easily. More than other weekly columns it had a tinge cynical humor that makes you relate to every single issue, so easily. Until such time, when Sujatha prefers to start it again, we will wait. Rather I would.

[From Badri]

It’s that time of the year, when I’m repent for not being present in Chennai. Chennai Book Fair 2006 is happening from 6th to 16th of Jan. This is the 2nd time in the last two decades when I got to miss the Chennai Book Fair. Ramblings apart, the last few years have witnessed a phenomenal increase in the sales of books in the Chennai Book Fair and I’m expecting that probably very soon, Chennai Book Fair would turn out to be the Khumb Mela of books in India. Ofcourse, the book fair certainly needs more english books to reach there.

Uyirmmai Publishers are staging two gala shows on account fo this book fair. 10 books of Sujatha are being released on Jan 6th at the Sound Indian Chamber of Commerce. This includes 6 new releases and 4 re-prints. Desikan has compiled these books and has more information on his blog. Few interesting ones are the compilation of Sujatha’s stageplays and Sujatha’s mystery stories. Also their second function to be held on Jan 7th has some very interesting book releases including S. Ramakrishnan’s Vizhithirupavanin Iravu and Jeyamohan’s Aazhnathiyai Thedi.

Badri Seshadri’s Kizhakku Pathipagam has a special blog for Chennai Book Fair 2006. Kizhakku Pathipagama is releasing Aathavan Sirukathaikal by Aathavan. This is one book that I’m personally looking forward. Being a huge fan of Aathavan and his amazing literary works, I’m expecting to get my hands on this book ASAP. I think this is probably the first compilation of Aathavan’s shortstories, ever.

If you are in and around Chennai, do drop in. For you may not get this oppurtunity ever. Dear friend, please get ready to recieve an email with some 30 odd book names that I want you to buy and send across.