A big thanks to ace filmmaker Mani Ratnam for announcing to direct the movie version of the Tamil literary classic by Kalki, "Ponniyin Selvan". Regardless of how the movie ends up, one certain outcome of the movie is that another bunch of people will be pushed away from reading literature- this time with a far greater impact on potential readers than previous book-to-movie adaptations in Tamil, mainly because of the sheer quality, volume, and significance it has with older generations, especially Tamil literature aficionados. When I realized this outcome, I, who have for the majority of my life stayed as far as I could from reading books, decided I have to complete the entire novel before I see it on film because once the movie releases, my lazy self will go watch the movie and consider having read the book. Not this time. Not again.
Six weeks later, I completed the final page of the fifth and final book of what is nothing short of an extraordinary piece of literature. Set in 969 CE, the story begins with Vallavaraiyan Vandhiyathevan, a soldier and confidante of Aditya Karikalan, the crown prince of the erstwhile Chola empire, where the former embarks a journey of delivering an important message on behalf of Karikalan to his father, King Sudara Cholan. He also simultaneously does the job of a spy and gathers privileged information regarding a possible conspiracy against the current lineage of the Chola dynasty which is about to go through a tragic period of time indicated by certain constellations. Vandhiyathevan's curiosity only grows with the story which puts him to many a spot of bother along with new opportunities to get deeper into the issue which he invariably takes. His curiosity finds him numerous enemies, many more friends, and a beautiful, yet, mellowed romance in the most odd circumstances.
Instead of giving the entire plot, the intention behind this blogpost is to look back at the things one could learn from the novel and to list out out some major selling-points to readers of this post (if any) as to why I highly recommend reading this book.
ASSIMILATION OF RELIGION INTO THE CORE
The book paints an excellent picture of how religion and bhakti existed in historic traditional Tamil society. The Chola empire, which was inherently Shaivite, is described to have made a society revolving around the major Shiva/Shakta temples, and many references are made by various characters among the royalty about how 'good governance' has a lot do with a flourishing temple culture and the more the temples are built, the more advanced the society is. But the religiosity and devotion among the people is not just seen through administrative means but also the small dialogues among commoners and during personal conversations where every emotion and exclamation is coupled with a divine comparison of various Dharmic gods and textual/historic references such as instances of Ramayana and Mahabharata.
One can't discuss the religious aspect of Ponniyin Selvan without talking about Azhwarkadiyan aka Thirumalai Nambi, a Vaishnava spy and right-hand man of Mukyamantri Aniruddha Brahmarayar, who becomes a friend of Vandhiyathevan and accompanies him on his various journeys across Tamil Desam which includes parts of Sri Lanka. This Azhwarkadiyan, in a predominantly Shaiva dominated land, never hesitates in parading his Vaishnava affiliation even if it gets to physical fights in unlikely circumstances. Azhwarkadiyan's character may be used by some to compare with today's religious radicalists, but I would never make that comparison because predominantly the disagreements were theological and neither Vaishnavism nor Shaivism in the form exhibited by Azhwarkadiyan and similar devotees posed a threat to the existence of the other. The first book even had a scene containing the famous theological debate where two opposing ideologues fight it out through debate and the loser who gets convinced by the other ideology willingly converts to it as well.
Another striking usage of religion in the book is in the form of its contemporary enemy- secularism. The titular character, Arulmozhi Varman, although being a Shaivite, praises Buddhism and promises to expand Buddhist thought and institutions throughout the Chola empire and beyond. Kundavai and the 'godmother' of the Chola empire, Sembiyan Mahadevi, although staunch Shaivites (especially the latter), wholeheartedly celebrate Krishna Janmashtami and constantly mention how subscribing to one view or theology should not necessarily mean opposing the other, and that applies even more towards the ruling class. The story also makes you understand that a region, an empire, or a nation will have its characteristic core values and ideologies which it will predominantly look to promote, where secularism can only be another important virtue, but definitely not the core.
CINEMATIC BUT NOT CINEMA
One must understand that this story wasn't written as a singular book but a weekly series of chapters in a magazine, that took years to end. So, the author had to entertain the readers with every chapter but also elongate the story seamlessly to keep the series going. I have not been the most voracious of readers and am not one who is accustomed with various literary devices, but from my limited viewing of cinema, I was able to see a lot of cinematic screenplay devices used in the book which made the packaging all the more interesting.
The story at every phase across the five books would contain at least 4 parallel plots assigning 3-5 chapters per plot and abruptly shifting to the next one. Almost all of these parallel plots will have its own flashbacks, flashforwards, and cutaways as a result of the packaging of each weekly episode. Generally as build-up right before or right after an extremely dramatic event one would notice Kalki breaking the fourth wall in the narration addressing the reader directly and also incorporating dream situations for characters to visually tease the reader.
I also remember noticing the usage of the 'Roshomon effect' to describe a crucial plot point through the lens of various characters. At what anyone would call the most important and dramatic scene of the story, Kalki, in order to keep a crucial fact of the scene a mystery, he would actually create a literary technique resembling a montage to confuse the reader and before the reader notices, an unthinkable incident would occur completely baffling the reader as to what exactly happened and how did he manage to pull off that scene without letting the reader keep track of what exactly is happening in the scene. Basically, the writing and usage of words was so excellent that one would require absolutely no effort screenplay-wise or maybe even direction-wise to make this into a movie or a series as it has been written in exactly that form.
HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, CIVICS
Yes, Ponniyin Selvan is a great book to teach social studies with the only issue being that the former is actually interesting. Although it is presented as fiction, Kalki throughout the book, provides various accounts on the historical accuracy of the plots and characters to justify the events that occur, also mentioning the parts which are fictitious. There are elaborate explanations of the revival of the Chola empire by Vijayalaya Chola along with various references made on Pandya, Pallava empires, even extending to references about Chalukya, Rashtrakuta, Gupta, and Maurya empires, for ostensibly two reasons, one, for better detailing which puts us right where the story is happening, and two, the acknowledgement of Bharata and Bharatiya culture always being a common root among the various kingdoms and cultures that prevailed across this land over history, despite the geographical lines drawn to make a nation-state.
Even though the book is a historical thriller of sorts, it is actually an adventure story with a few thrilling moments which are lead by long and extremely eventful journeys across towns and cities South India and Sri Lanka. The names of locations such as Kodikkarai, Nagaippattinam, Kudandhai, Kodumbaalur, Thanjai, Kanchi, and so many more keep on resonating in our thoughts thanks to the story taking us back and forth across numerous locations such as these making it important for us to keep track of the significance of those locations at least with the context of the story.
The book also gives us a detailed understanding of administration in that period through the infrastructure of temples, palaces, and other important institutions, along with elaborate accounts on the various positions held by leaders as a part of the administration led by Emperor Sundara Chola. How the royalty must govern and treat the public, and what is the people's say regarding important matters of the empire, are questions that are often brought out in the story and I have to say, people sort of did have some kind of rights.
CONCLUSION
The title of the post is referencing a running line used by Vandhiyathevan who often lies to get out of jams. The title is very apt to describe the story because there are numerous parts of the story which are parallelly created by Kalki which have very little historical basis, yet, extremely imaginative. All I would say is that, try to make an effort reading the first 30 chapters of the 297-chapter epic, and I am sure that by the time you decide to read the 31st chapter, you would have actually finished the entire book just like that. It is a book which does slow down at times, and its Tamil sometimes is very hard to comprehend. But you have to realise, if you don't read this before you watch the movie, there's a high chance you are never reading what is regarded as the greatest piece of modern Tamil literature.
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