- This event is over. However, time travel possible through our Audio & Video! See upcoming events
197. A Man for All Seasons (with Gowri Ramnarayan, S Theodore Baskaran, Akhila Ramnarayan & Aishwarya Vidya Raghunath)
The Life and Times of Kalki Krishnamurthy
Speakers
Today, Kalki R Krishnamurthy (1899-1954) is best known for his historical fiction—Sivakamiyin Sapatham, Ponniyin Selvan and Parthiban Kanavu—recreating the glorious eras of the Pallavas and the Cholas. The mighty conquests and magnificent art and culture of these two kingly dynasties are brought to bear on contemporary Tamil self-fashioning. In a comprehensive biography of the iconic writer, Sunda (the nom-de-plume of MRM Sundaram, writer and known for his stint in the Tamil service of BBC) shows how, for Kalki, writing was an act of protest as India’s part of freedom movement, assert India’s spiritual/cultural values, and commit to Gandhian ideologies.
Not only does it reveal a writer’s central pre-occupations, the biography is a panoramic chronicle of the era in which Kalki lived.
In sum, the biography turns the story of an individual into the saga of a nation struggling to individuate itself, the journey of a writer as he records its transformations, of a dreamer who believes that writing can charge the mind, change the world.
This episode of BIC Talks is an extract from a BIC Venue event that took place in March 2022 which discussed the English translation of the Tamil biography by Dr. Gowri Ramnarayan who was in conversation with S Theodore Baskaran accompanied by readings by Akhila Ramnarayan and music by Aishwarya Vidya Raghunath.
Subscribe to the BIC Talks Podcast on your favourite podcast app!
BIC Talks is available everywhere, including iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Castbox, Overcast, and Stitcher.
Speakers
S Theodore Baskaran
S.Theodore Baskaran’s The Message Bearers (1981) is considered a pioneering work in the area of popular culture and politics in South India. His book The Eye of the Serpent (1997) won the Swarna Kamal award from the president of India. A well-known writer in Tamil, he has six books, on wildlife and on cinema. He was awarded Iyal Virudhu for Life Time Achievement in Tamil writing by Canada Literary Garden in Toronto in 2015. He retired as Chief Postmaster General of Tamil Nadu.
Gowri Ramnarayan
Gowri Ramnarayan
Playwright, theatre director, journalist (formerly Deputy Editor, The Hindu, now freelance writer and translator), Dr Gowri Ramnarayan’s work is a rare amalgam of aesthetics and scholarship. As a musician, she was vocal accompanist to the legendary musician MS Subbulakshmi for 16 years.
As inhouse playwright and Artistic Director, JustUs Repertory, Dr Ramnarayan uses modern techniques to evolve theatre performances steeped in Indian culture – always in a global context. Her multi-genre texts with music, dance and the visual arts, explore the weight of historical, political and literary pasts, to represent the complexities of modern life. Her plays have been staged in major Indian cities and national festivals, and toured the US, UK and South Asia.
Her Dark Horse, with bilingual poet Arun Kolatkar for protagonist, won two national awards, while Night’s End was selected for dramatized reading by Swedish actors at a playwrights’ conference in Stockholm (2013). Night’s End was also commissioned for a week’s run at Soho Theatre, London (2017). She received the Nataka Choodamani Award for excellence in theatre from Sri Krishna Gana Sabha, Chennai.
Dr Ramnarayan has authored children’s books (Abu’s World, Abu’s World Again) and a biography of MS Subbulakshmi (MS & Radha), translated two plays by Marathi playwright Vijay Tendulkar (OUP), and the Tamil short stories of Kalki Krishnamurthy (Penguin). Dark Horse & Other Plays anthologises 6 of her original plays in English.
She served as Fipresci Jury member at international film festivals in Europe. She is Chairperson, Rukmini Devi Arundale Trust, Senior Associate Editor, Sruti magazine, member, Regional Advisory Committee, ICCR, and Adjunct Faculty, Asian College of Journalism, Chennai.
Dr Ramnarayan lives in Chennai with husband Ramnarayan, first class cricketer, journalist and writer. Daughter Akhila Ramnarayan is actor, musician and Divisional Chair, Literature & the Arts, Krea University. Son Abhinav is a business journalist with Reuters, London.
Akhila Ramnarayan
Akhila Ramnarayan is Divisional Chair, Literature & the Arts, Associate Professor of Practice, and Curator, VENI, The Ideas Place, at Krea University. She is a writer, scholar, theatre actor, and rock/Carnatic vocalist with a PhD in postcolonial studies from The Ohio State University (2006). She has worked at Pramati Technologies, Chennai (2013-2018), the Asian College of Journalism, Chennai (2011-2014), and University of Dayton, Ohio (2006-2011).
Dr.Ramnarayan’s research interests include literatures and performing arts of the global south, metacognition and learning in higher education and the arts, translation studies, and writing studies. She is currently working on a multi-genre rock music album consisting of songs she has written and composed on life in the anthropocene to be released in 2021.
A key member of Chennai’s globally touring theatre company JustUs Repertory and founder member of performing arts institute Sahrdaya Foundation, Dr Ramnarayan has toured with and acted in JustUs Repertory plays such as the internationally recognised Night’s End (2012) and Water Lilies (2008), and worked on several Sahrdaya Foundation productions including the first ever stage adaptation of Don Quixote in Bharatanatyam and Carnatic music idioms, which she scripted in 2015. She has received national recognition for theatre (acting) as the 2013-2014 awardee of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Ustad Bismillah Khan Yuva Puraskar.
Aishwarya Vidya Raghunath
An A-graded artiste of the All India Radio and Doordarshan, Aishwarya has the honour of being the disciple of musical stalwarts – Sangita Kalacharya (Late) Smt Seethalakshmi Venkatesan, Padma Bhushan Sri P S Narayanaswamy and Sangeetha Kala Sagaram Smt Vegavahini Vijayaraghavan, thus being moulded into the Semmangudi bani and the Veena Dhanammal bani. Aishwarya was awarded the Government of India scholarship (Ministry of Culture) between the years 2008-2010.
Her first performance was at the age of 13 and there was no looking back. Some of her noteworthy performances include those at The Madras Music Academy, Shanmukhananda Sabha (Mumbai), The Cleveland Tyagaraja Utsavam (USA), Narada Gana Sabha (Chennai), Krishna Gana Sabha (Chennai), Bharati Kala Manram (Toronto), The Senbaga Vinayaka Temple (Singapore), The Bangalore Gayana Samaja, to name a few. Aishwarya has presented Carnatic Music to a variety of audiences, including many national and international academic forums.
To her credit, she has had her concerts recorded and released by Rajalakshmi Audio and Charsur. Aishwarya has also had the distinction of accompanying her guru, Smt Seethalakshmi Venkatesan for the AIR National Programme in 2012.
She has had numerous write-ups, reviews and articles in the country’s leading newspapers and magazines, namely, The Hindu, The Deccan Herald, Know Your Star, Sruti, Femina, Dinamalar and Rajasthan Patrika. By virtue of her penchant for writing, Aishwarya has also written articles and contributed to different magazines.
Academically, Aishwarya is a Biotech Engineer. A merit scholar and among the toppers throughout her engineering course, she worked as an Executive at Biocon, and is now a full-time music professional.
Aishwarya is also a talented artist; she is proficient in oil painting, acrylic painting, water colours and charcoal drawings. In April 2017, Aishwarya’s art was recognized by Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath through the exhibition, Akanksha. She was among 50 working women chosen from different walks of life with considerable interest in art & painting.
Aishwarya is an ardent traveller. Her natural talent for art has since blossomed into a passion for photography. And the gamut of her photography encompasses her interests in art, travel, music, nature and wildlife.
