[Pic : vikatan]

S. Ramakrishnan’s Kathaavilaasam may not be as sensational as his previous series, Thunnaiezhuthu, that he wrote for Vikatan. But Kathaavilaasam is important. For Ramakrishnan tries to throw to throw light on the great but not-so-well-known tamil writers, every week after week. This effort is infact very noble than Thunnaiezhuthu or any of his previous works.

Ramakrishnan first starts off with a true-life experience(there is little fiction involved here) and then draws a parallel between his experience and a writer’s story. All this being fine, the information about the writer gets shortened to a caricature and a paragraph. A much aspiring column would be to detail the writer’s work and dissect them very closely. I do understand by writing too much about the writer and his stories, Ramakrishnan may not able to sustain an audience for this weekly column. The majority of the readers are philistines and are not very anxious to know about a writer as much as they aspire to know about Namitha’s love affairs. It’s a pity state-of-affairs here with the tamil magazines.

Last week, Aathavan featured in Kathaavilaasam. Aathavan known for his path breaking Enn Peyar Ramseshan, writes just about the urban youth’s mind. At times he provokes you, makes you laugh at yourself and also feel upset about the ‘real’ you. If Mani Ratnam made movies about the upper middle class, Aathavan, much before him[in 1970s] made stories for/on them. I recently read his Kaakitha Malargal offlate and fell in love with his writings. Aathavan died in a river floods when he went to Sriungeri alongwith his friend. If only he had lived longer to cross the millenium, I am sure he must have made stories that would reflect us like mirrors. He is probably one of the three tamil writers whom I wanted to bring back alive. The first two being Bharati and Kalki.

This week, the writer in Kathaavilaasam is Ashokamithran.