On Valentine’s Day, events across Chennai city revolved around themes such as romance, intimacy, and dating. But inside the four walls of Crosswords, Phoenix Marketcity, something else transpired. The conversations effortlessly transcended conventional narratives, exploring themes of identity, self-discovery, and folklore.
While some stories born out of these themes are well-documented, others have faded with time. But in between, many stories linger, as though they are waiting for someone to tell them. And it was precisely these stories, told by award-winning writer, poet, and illustrator, Sharanya Manivannan, that captured the audience.
Drawing from her roots across India, Sri Lanka, and Malaysia, Sharanya’s words carried a sense of displacement, the impact that those places and their people left behind, and her quiet effort to preserve intangible heritage.
A majority of the discussion that took centre stage revolved around Sharanya’s memories of Batticola, Sri Lanka. The place, brimming with folklore around mysterious events that unfold on every full moon day and kadal kanni (mermaid), was passed down generations among the fisher community. She said, “We often think of mermaids in a very Eurocentric way. But they exist across cultures, and there is something universal about them.” She even admitted to having arrived at this conclusion after a conversation with one of her professors, who reasoned the imagery as something that could have come out of the importance that fisher communities place upon fish and women.
Largely lost in documentation today, she confessed to intentionally revisiting those stories and letting them serve as inspirations for two of her graphic novels: Mermaids in the Moonlight and Incantations Over Water. “I honoured the folklore of void. I know the fact that there are losses which will not be reclaimed, but that doesn’t mean I can go on without acknowledging some of the losses,” she asserted, adding that these stories are acts of resistance against erasure. “As someone who grew up off the island but remains a member of the diaspora and is very aware in so many ways of the erasure of my culture, of my language, of the history of my people — which is my own history — these books are acts of resistance,” she reiterated.
But before penning these stories, she said she allows them to consume her first. “Many things I create live inside me for a long time, before they turn into stories. That waiting is also part of the process,” she said. Following the discussion was also a brief reading of Incantations Over Water. As she read, silence and stillness fell over the room. Her words were simple, but they left a lasting impact. “All is love. All is longing...,” she read on.
She parted with the audience on a note — a gentle and practical reminder: “If you carve out even half an hour to read, you will read more than by setting big targets.”