Mangalore, April 16: “Naanu Mattu Ganesha”, a collection of short stories written by Vasanthkumar Perla, Programme Director, All India Radio, Mangalore, was released by B.A. Viveka Rai, writer and guest professor in the Chair of Indology in Wurzburg University, Germany, here on Sunday.
Prof. Rai said the stories written by Mr. Perla about three decades ago when the author was 19 or 20 years old gave a peep into the society of that time though one may tend to consider them dry. Today's generation could, through the poverty of people depicted in the stories, figure out how their parents have struggled hard to provide education to them. A story was like an old photograph, a frozen moment – in this case giving snapshot of how the writer saw the society in that era.
The stories also showed the feudalism of men on the one hand and contentment of people in spite of poverty all around, he said adding, “the contentment of poverty is no longer to be seen.” He regretted that people these days were after money particularly in the coastal region. He was inclined to thinking that poverty made people broadminded. The characters in the stories bore this out. Richness brought with it a sense of disinterest about others, he observed.
He stated that the author would not have depicted the society like he did in this set of stories were he to write the same stories now.
Both the writer and society would have undergone many layers of change, he pointed out. He appreciated that the author had shunned the shyness about publishing the stories written in young age as is the case with many other writers. Somehow people did not talk about their love and first works of literature.
Writer Satyanarayana Mallipatna said Mr. Perla had kept himself active in literary circles and had effectively tried to spread literature to many homes, particularly when he was serving in Hassan. He always attempted to go to the roots of the words and cultural aspects.
Humourist and mock poet N. Ramanath said Mr. Perla had used some of the rare words in his stories and thereby he had brought them into circulation and enriched the language. He gave the example of the “Kannikombare” which meant master bedroom. One did not know that there was a Kannada word for master bedroom.
The book has been published by Bangalore-based Srinivasa Pusthaka Prakashana, and the function was organised by Bhoomigeetha.
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