Speakers
Can humans give away their gods in marriage? Can a crime investigation reveal the limits of human knowledge?
Writing in Tamil, Jeyamohan’s stories swing between the past and present, where everyone’s destiny is entangled with forces beyond their comprehension. Two of his books were recently published in English: One Million Footsteps, translated by Suchitra Ramachandran, investigates what drives humans irresistibly towards transgression; The Daughter of Kumari, translated by Iswarya V, reveals the personal, historical and mythical bonds between humans and their gods.
But fiction is only as impactful as the truth it carries. And not every truth can survive the journey across languages.
In this session, author and translators sit together to discuss where these stories come from and what it takes to carry them across culture and context. They will take audience questions after the discussion. Jeyamohan will then be signing books.
Speakers
Jeyamohan
Jeyamohan is a preeminent writer in modern Tamil literature. His works of fiction examine fundamental human questions while being rooted in the spiritual, cultural and literary traditions of India. Venmurasu, his reimagination of the epic Mahabharata over a novel-series of twenty-six parts, is considered one of the longest literary works in the world. His other major works include the novels Vishnupuram, Kottravai, Pin Thodarum Nizhalin Kural, Kaadu, Ezhaam Ulagam (The Abyss) and the iconic short story collection, Aram (Stories of the True). He is the founder of several important cultural initiatives in Tamil, including a literary organization called the Vishnupuram Literary Circle, an encyclopedia of Tamil culture, Tamil Wiki, and an institute that offers courses in philosophy, cultural and religious studies called Nityavanam.
Suchitra Ramachandran
Suchitra writes fiction in Tamil and translates between Tamil and English. Her work has appeared in journals including Asymptote, Usawa, South Parade and Narrative Magazine. She won the Asymptote Close Approximations Prize for Fiction Translation in 2017. Oli (January, 2020), a collection of short stories, marked her debut as a writer in Tamil. The Abyss, a translation of Tamil writer Jeyamohan’s novel Ezhaam Ulagam, her first full-length translated work was published by Juggernaut Books in 2023 and was shortlisted for the ALTA First Translation Prize in 2024.
Iswarya V
Iswarya is a freelance translator and critic based in Bengaluru. She teaches English Literature at the Department of Liberal Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India. She has written essays on Tamil film culture for popular publications as part of her social media campaign Calling Out Stalking. She was a South Asia Speaks Fellow for Translation in 2024, working under the mentorship of Arunava Sinha. Her first book-length translation of a memoir by Perumal Murugan, Students Etched in Memory, was published by Penguin Random House India in 2024. Her own critical essays and her translations of Jeyamohan’s political essays have previously appeared in the Frontline magazine.
You might also like
