In a move characteristic of the times we live in, the living author Perumal Murugan announced his death on Facebook in January 2015: “The author Perumal Murugan is dead. Since he is no god, he cannot revive himself.” going to do. He doesn’t even believe in reincarnation. An ordinary teacher, he will live as P. Murugan. Leave him alone.”
She faced protests from local caste-based groups who discovered the novel in 2010, four years after it was published, forced her to write an apology, and publishers threatened to withdraw all her books from the shelves. Gave. Controversy centered on his novel Madhorubagan, a raw and poignant but fictional record that points to some of the customs associated with the Ardhanarishvara temple in Tiruchengode, a small dusty town in western Tamil Nadu. Caste resentment gradually spread across the state, organized by a powerful intermediate community, and prompted a sensitive writer to announce the writer’s death.
Thankfully Murugan was indeed reborn. Instead of his words, the regressive proclamation of many countries came true: ‘King is dead, long live the king’. Perumal Murugan was indeed resurrected, not in a cave, but in the corridors of the Madras High Court, which struck hard in favor of freedom of expression. The court also called for restoring his books for sale and setting up a committee to protect the right of creative artists to express themselves.
The International Booker Prize jury noted this intense struggle when it placed its novel funeral pyre , Pukuzhi), translated by Anirudhan Vasudevan in its long list.
As the red dust of the Kongu (Western) soil slowly settled, Murugan evolved before our eyes into a giant of modern Tamil literature. In his rebirth, the womb from which the author emerged: Tiruchengode and its surroundings, its dialect, its flavours, myths, folktales and landscapes, its rhythms that beat in him only became more alive. This true son of the soil who began firmly in a central position in modern Tamil writing was nurtured by Kalachuvadu Prakashan, an equally pioneering force in Tamil publishing.
tales of struggle
His experiences are rooted in the geography of his homeland, but universal in his depiction of the human plight. In the agricultural landscape, with rain-fed fields as well as palm trees growing on dams, and the rising heat of the summer almost palpable, there are conflicts between farmer and land, man and wife, father and son, farm laborer and landowner Earth and rain, faith and convenience, good and evil, tradition versus modernity. It’s no wonder that his work isn’t the easiest to translate. Many translators have worked on his novels and anthologies, and some admit that he has been time-framed, and yet, this Tamil professor’s translated works have won awards. In addition to several awards for the author himself, in 2005 Murugan’s novel Palm season was shortlisted for the Kiriyama Prize, and in 2017, the English translation of midsectionOr one part womanWon Sahitya Akademi translation award.
Murugan’s work now spans many genres: poetry, essays, analysis, novels, collections of short stories. In his day work as a professor of Tamil literature, he is acknowledged to have made significant contributions to the study of the literature of the Kongunadu region, creating a dictionary of words, idioms and phrases unique to the region. His research on Kongu folklore is now well documented, making him a veritable encyclopedia of the country’s culture and traditions.
Her recent meeting with Booker has her fans thrilled. But they say this is only the beginning, only a sign of the distance this Perumal Murugan will cover in the future – taking its dusty, small Tamil towns, with their own quaint customs and vocabulary, to Global Forum.