page_title: C. V. Raman Pillai
section_title: Biography
hierarchical_section_title: C. V. Raman Pillai / Biography
caption_attribution_description: CV as a young man
context_page_description: Cannankara Velayudhan Raman Pillai, also known as C. V., was one of the major Indian novelists and playwrights and a pioneering playwright and novelist of Malayalam literature. He was known for his historical novels such as Marthandavarma, Dharmaraja and Ramaraja Bahadur; the last mentioned considered by many as one of the greatest novels written in Malayalam.
context_section_description: Born in Thiruvananthapuram (Trivandrum), capital city of the erstwhile native State of Travancore, on 19 May 1858 to Panavilakath Neelakanta Pillai, a Sanskrit scholar and Parvathy Pillai, a scion of an ancient matrilineal family; both his parents were from middle-class families and employees at the Palace of the Maharaja of Travancore. Pillai got his family name, Cannankara, through matrilineal succession. Fondly called Ramu, he had a traditional Sanskritized education, early in life, under his father's tutelage which included lessons in Ayurveda and even magic and Tantra. He continued education at the first English school in Thiruvananthapuram. Subsequently, he graduated from His Highness Maharaja's College (the present-day University College Thiruvananthapuram), the first-ever College in Travancore, where he reportedly had a brilliant academic career under John Ross, the principal of the institution  and Robert Harvey. and obtained his BA degree from the Madras University in 1881, securing the 7th rank in the Madras Presidency. t was during this period, he started his first periodical named The Kerala Patriot.
  After graduation, Pillai studied law but dropped out and went to  Madras to study for the government pleader examination which was also abandoned in due course. Later, he joined the High Court as a clerk and where he rose to the position of a shirasthadar. Later, joined the Government Press and held the position of a superintendent when he retired from service. In between, he founded three publications, Malayali in 1886, Vanchiraj in 1901 and Mitabhashi in 1920.
  Pillai's first marriage did not last long. He married again in 1887 at the age of 30, and his wife, Bhageerathi Amma, was only 16 at the time of the wedding. The marriage lasted till his wife's untimely death in 1904 and his third marriage was to Janaki Amma, the elder sister of Bhageerathi Amma and the widow of C. Raja Raja Varma, the younger brother of Raja Ravi Varma. He died on 21 March 1922, at the age of 63, survived by Janaki Amma.
caption: CV as a young man
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