As a diehard member of the reading-over-anything-else community, I cannot claim any neutrality in the manner that I watched the first part of "Ponniyin Selvan". It is not unusual for a filmmaker to let an author down. Even if the filmmaker is of the calibre of Mani Ratnam. So even as I watched the film, I kept hearing this voice in my head saying that the book(s) must be so much better.
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| 10th November, 2022 |
As indeed, they were. Here I was, reading a relatively recent translation into English of Kalki's Tamil original. A fantastic fictionalized take on the life and times of the Chola movers and shakers of the 9th-10th century including that of Arulmozhi Varman or Rajaraja I, the king of kings. In 2024, I could sense the buzz that each part of the serialized story must have generated in the years immediately post Indian independence. While English was the only way I could partake of this new (to me) universe of impulsive kings, intelligent princesses and sorceress fisherwomen under the spell of the sea and the comet, there too rose another voice. The Tamil original must be so much better.
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