THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Kamala Das and Vaikom Muhammed Basheer appear to be the unrivalled super stars of Malayalam literary scene. Members of a team of Rajasthani writers which is in the city as part of a translation workshop minced no words in expressing their awe of the doyens. “We read Kamala Das in our late teens and were shaken by the force of her writings. ‘My Story’ is undoubtedly the most celebrated Indian book of the last century. And Basheer is the master of simple writing that portrays universal human emotions,” said Malchand Tiwari, Sahitya Akademi award-winning poet and translator from Rajasthan.
Tiwari is part of the six-member group of authors working on the Sahitya Akademi project to bring out the first Rajasthani translation of Malayalam works. Fifteen representative short stories published in the last century are being translated by the group led by noted playwright, poet and critic Arjun Deo Charan. Former head of Department of Hindi, University of Kerala, and noted translator S Thankamani Amma acts as resource person for facilitating the Malayalam to Hindi to Rajasthani translation process.
“The corpus of works selected for the project represent milestones in Malayalam literature in the last 100 years,” said Deo Charan. “In Rajasthan, English and Hindi translations of Malayalam literature are quite popular in the literary circles. But they are not read by the masses. This collection will hopefully open up the world of Malayalam literature to Rajasthani readers,” he said.
The group consists of eminent writers of Rajasthan such as Meethesh Nirmohi, Bulaki Sharma, Madhu Acharya Ashavadi and Dularam Saharan. Saharan’s Rajasthani translation of Thakazhy Sivasankara Pillai’s ‘Kayar’ was published earlier this year by the Akademi. He is also the editor and manager of ‘Anusrijan’, a magazine that publishes translated works.
Madhu Acharya, the editor of Bikaner edition of the Hindi newspaper ‘Dainik Bhaskar’, is elated about translating Kamala Das’s ‘Idanazhiyile Kannadikal’. “She can shake the reader emotionally and writes about the transactions of human mind with the precision of someone who writes a news report,” he mused.
Lalithambika Antharjanam’s short story ‘Dheerendu Majumdarude Amma’ garnered the appreciation of the team for its realistic portrayal of the life of a Bengali revolutionary. “We hope to continue this literary and cultural exchange. In the near future, we hope to host a Rajasthani to Malayalam translation workshop in Rajasthan,” said Deo Charan.
“Translations done by eminent authors are a rarity, especially within regional languages. The collection will be a noteworthy addition to the translation scene in India,” added Thankamani Amma.
The workshop will end on Tuesday.