One Part Woman, the English translation of Perumal Murugan’s Madorubhagan, translated by Aniruddhan Vasudevan, Penguin Books. Photo Credit: Kalachavadu
New Delhi: Tamil writer Perumal Murugan recently took to social media to announce his ‘death’. He said that the writer part of him has died and only the teacher in him will live on.
On his Facebook page the much loved author wrote:
Perumal Murugan, the writer is dead. He is not God, so he is not going to resurrect. He does not believe in reincarnation either.
Various organisations, caste outfits in his home town Thiruchengodu, around 410 km from here, protested against his novel ‘Madorubhagan’, whose story revolves around the problems faced by a childless peasant couple and the woman’s attempt to get pregnant following a tradition of consensual sex with a stranger. He was forced to withdraw the book and unconditionally apologise for it.
The author posted about his right to freedom of expression and said in the Facebook post that he now wants to withdraw all his previous books and compensate the publishers for their loss.
In his post he thanked his friends, students and publishers for standing by him so far. But, he has urged that he should not be invited to any literary event from now on.
Many imminent personalities have criticised the Tamil Nadu government for failing to protect the ‘Freedom of Expression’ of the author.
Murugan is a Tamil professor at the Government Arts College in Namakkal and written four novels, three collections of short stories and three anthologies of poetry.
(Agencies)
