Filmmaker Mani Ratnam’s magnum opus Ponniyin Selvan 1 has revived an interest in the 1950s Tamil classic that will now be accessible to non-Tamil audiences through an English audio book
A moment from the trailer of Mani Ratnam’s adaptation, Ponniyin Selvan 1. Pic courtesy/Madras Talkies on Youtube
Scheming kings; beautiful, but powerful and intelligent queens; a lost prince, surviving amidst spies and conspiracies are elements that George RR Martin might weave into his next Game of Thrones title. But in 1955, Kalki Krishnamurthy had already serialised a novel along similar lines on the complex Chola Empire that became a seminal work of modern Tamil literature. Mani Ratnam’s cinematic adaptation, Ponniyin Selvan 1 (PS-1), that released on September 30, has generated an interest in the epic among non-Tamil readers.
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The readership boom
Pustaka Digital Media has been publishing Tamil audio books, including Kalki’s novel. They have now tied up with e-book and audio book subscription service, Storytel, for the English adaptation of the novel in audio form. “The story is a mixture of different genres. It has the ingredients of a good masala movie,” Dr Rajesh Devadas, director, Pustaka, explains, pointing to Mani Ratnam’s success. The movie, in turn, has spurred a ten-time increase in the purchase of the audio books, the publisher adds.
An illustration of Ponniyin Selvan. Pic courtesy/Pustaka.co.in
Theatre artiste Bombay Kannan, who conceptualised the Tamil audio books reveals, “Children don’t have a habit of reading regional literature. They are familiar with Harry Potter, but not folktales. The audio books have changed that.” Kannan’s work includes 78 hours of audio recordings spanning the entire novel, complete with a musical score and songs. It is not just children, but the elderly and visually challenged who have also taken to the books, he reminds us. “I conceived it as a teleplay,” he says, “But it became an audio book.”
Childhood legacy
Kannan adds that one of the reasons the novel remains popular is that its hero is one of the people — a common soldier, Vandiyathevan. “He is one of us, a universal character of the man on the street. That’s why people love him,” he reasons. Then, there is the characterisation itself. Sathish Krishnamurthi, who helms the English project, reveals, “Each of these characters is etched carefully. The novel has a gradual build up with well-rounded characters, unlike the film.”
Rajesh Devadas and Bombay Kannan
Kannan adds that the story has inherent elements of Tamil culture that have made it iconic. He recalls reading it as a young boy and falling in love with the characters. For Krishnamurthi though, the novel was challenging. “It took me a while to finally read and fall in love with,” he admits. The complexity and scale of the story has earned it comparisons with Martin’s Game of Thrones. But Kalki’s magnum opus is closer to Hillary Mantel’s Wolf Hall in its combination of well-researched history blending seamlessly with fiction.
Lost in translation
While Devadas is thrilled by the increasing interest of non-Tamil readers in the books, Kannan expresses some concern. “I am not always in favour of translations, but if it reaches more people I have no complaints. However, the nativity is sometimes lost,” he points out, adding that the magic of the novel lies in the Tamil prose.
Krishnamurthi disagrees. He notes that all great literature has been translated from Fyodor Dostoevsky to Guy de Maupassant. He says, “If I had to learn Russian to read Dostoevsky, I may spend years before getting one sentence right. I agree that translations do not compare to the fluidity of native languages, but they are essential to the spread of literature.”
For Devadas, the rising global audience — with readers/listeners in Australia, Japan and France — validates the English translation’s success. The publication has already recorded three volumes of Kalki’s magnum opus, with the remaining two to be released by February 2023. “We plan to pre-empt the movie,” he says.
Describing the interest for non-Tamil readers, the publisher says, “The story is from the point of view of one character and travels along with his journey. This kind of writing is new and very interesting.” The trends online compel one to agree.
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