From: sundar@indigo1.hsis.uci.edu (M. Sundaramoorthy)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.tamil
Subject: Eezhaththu Ilakkiyam - 1
Date: 4 Sep 92 17:21:29 GMT
Article-I.D.: news.2AA79B19.4422
Organization: University of California, Irvine


	Following is a part of charter for SCT. 

IV . Tamil Literature Society.
-------------------------------
*  Translation of Tamil novels ,short stories and poem in English.
   (Contemporary literature) 1950 - present
*  Translation of Tamil literature of 19 th century and early 20
   th Century. 1800- 1950
*  Translation of Ancient Tamil Literature. 300 B.C to 1800 A.D.

	The classifications based on time periods look very vague. What is the
significance of 19th century and why are the first five decades of 20 century
included in that category?.

	Tamil Literature in 19th century is not very rich and in my opinion
there were only few important events in literature. There was only one poet
worth mentioning, Ramalinga Adigal and the first novel 'pradhaaba mudhaliyaar
charithiram' by Mayuram Vedanayagam Pillai was written in 19th century.

	And I really don't understand 1950-present category. Actually the
modern poetry starts with Bharathiyar. Though the prose writing starts with
novels of Vedanayam Pillai and A. Madhavaiah and the short stories of V.V.S.
Iyer, the truely 'modern' literature start from 'Manikkodi' era in 30s.

	Leaving these aside, if we look what are the proportions of these
three categories in our close_to_2000 postings, the postings in the third
category are 'abundant'. From first and second categories, we see only names
like Bharathiar, Sujatha, Kannadasan, Crazy Mohan etc.

	This is not very surprising, as a great majority of Indian Tamils
don't look beyond, Bharathiar, Bharathidasan, Kalki, Sujatha, Kannadasan (it
may not be surprising, if his films songs are included in TN school text books),
and of course, Thiruvalluvar (since Thirukkural is cosidered as work for all
ages, Valluvar is always 'contemporary'). But it is very intriguing to see
there are no postings from Sri Lankan Tamils, whose literary awarness is 
supposed to be far superior than Indian Tamils. The only two postings were
poems of Ilavaalai Vijendran, by Ravi Sinnaraja, in spite of some nettors
expressing 'great deal of interest'. Moreover, there seems to be more literary
activities among immigrant SL Tamils than Indian Tamils, who would carry
only audio_cassettes of Kannadasan classics and Vairamuthu neo-classics
and subscibe for Kumudam and Ananda Vikatan to update their literature
knowledge.

	Though the names like, Kailasapathi, K. Sivathambi, Pramil (Dharumu
Sivaramu), and Mu. Thalaiyasingam were not new to Indian Tamil literary
circles, from 70s the SL Tamil literature become an important aspect, with
lot of works republished in Tamil Nadu. The new generation of writers
like Cheran, Va.I.Sa. Jayapalan, Sivasekaram, Se. Yoganathan, M.A.Nuhman,
Yesurajah etc. published in literary magazines in Tamil Nadu. Recently,
Se. Yoganathan's novelette 'agadhigaL' won first prize in 'Thi.Janakiraman
ninaivu kuRunaaval pOtti', conducted by 'kaNaiyaazhi'. 

	Kanavu 17 (August, 91) came as a 'ilankai ciRappithazh' with an 
introduction by 'mEman kavi'. Though the issue is thinner than the usual
size, because the editor could not get more from Sri Lanka, the contents
are really good. Most of the authors look new to me, probably because the old
authors migrated out and there is a good proportion of contributions from
'Upcountry' writers. If any one is ready to post them on the net, I can mail a
copy of the issue. Or else, I will post myself.


M. Sundaramoorthy
sundar@indigo1.hsis.uci.edu


P.S: 'Kanavu' is literary quarterly edited and published by Subrabharathimaniyan
from Secundrabad, AP, India.  
Newsgroups: soc.culture.tamil