LEGENDARY actor and thespian of the Telugu film industry, Akkineni Nageswara Rao, turned writer with his book, Manasulo Maata which was unveiled at a function at Ravindra Bharati on Monday evening. The book will provide an insight into ANR’s movies, roles, incidents in his career and also about his awards. The book was inaugurated by famous writer C Narayana Reddy. Others who graced the occasion included C Madhusudan Rao, station director, Doordarshan, Vijayababu, editor, Andhra Prabha and Raavi Kondal Rao, actor and writer.
ANR was his humble self as he declared on stage that he was not a great writer. “I have tried to share some information and incidents about my roles on why I accepted some and rejected others,” he said.
ANR said that all the years of working with various writers in his films seemed to have inspired him and some of their talent had rubbed off on him. “During my busy days as an actor, I decided to take a vacation for a month with my family and go to a hill station. Since I was completely free during the time, I used to write small articles and penned my memories. I even wrote a few stories for Andhra Patrika,” he stated.
Before the book release function got underway, the audience, which mainly consisted of senior citizens, was treated to some of Akkineni’s old melodies.
C Narayana Reddy was all praise for the actor and commented, “ANR did not even study till Class IV but it is amazing the way he picked up languages.” Citing a few examples, he said, “For the Tamil version of the movie Devadas, he did his own dubbing and for that he worked hard. When we see the film, it can be noticed that he spoke Tamil fluently. In another incident, ANR was to receive an award from the US Government. Some people criticised him asking how he could receive it without following English. After coming back from that awards ceremony, he spoke English at an event for 15 minutes.”
The other guests present praised ANR’s philosophical views. The book has about 270 pages and is priced at Rs 350.
rahul.d@expressbuzz.com