Tamil: A Biography

suprb

The title of the book is deceptive. It made me buy the book. I am sure there are other Tamils like me who made this wrong choice.The reader is made to believe that the author is a great Tamil scholar due to the title. I researched and found out that he is not a Tamil scholar. The book does not do justice to the Tamil language. The author has put together this book using just secondary sources. Many parts of the book see Tamil through the eyes of people who consider Sanskrit to be superior to Tamil. Appalling is the fact that he says there is no evidence to support the idea that ancient Tamil ever existed in some pure state, isolated from Sanskrit or north Indian culture. He has named the chapters Pallavi, Anupallavi, Ragamalika, and Caranam. What have these words got to do with Tamil?He has mentioned that the name of the sage ‘Agasthiya’ is derived from Akathi tree, which is totally absurd. Both Tamil and Indo-Aryan traditions mention about Akatthiyar who led Velir kings and their families to the Tamil country. The word has no Indo-European roots. ‘Akam’ is the Tamil root, which means ‘inner, inside’. ‘Akathi’ means ‘the one inside the house’ or ‘lord of the house’ as attested by the epigraphist and Indologist Iravatham Mahadevan through his research papers.The author attacks the Tamil greeting ‘nalama’ and justifies the Sanskrit greeting ‘saukkiyama’. His attack on a mundane matter reveals his intent in writing this book.Also, this book does not have references to great Sangam Tamil scholars like Po. Ve. Somasundaranar, Avvai Duraisamy, who reveal well the greatness of the language.

Good

A book of deep erudition written with a light touch and much elegance

Very good

To understand the past

More of research on Tamil poetry than history of Tamil.

nice book

WOW. This is quite a feat for any scholar.

Excellent read

Author has not done enough research nor a very objective analysis of facts. May be he is influenced by the research assistants from India who helped him in this work.

Well researched book. Brings out the real history of Tamils that they were the Mohanjadaro and Harrapa civilization.

Excellent book, sympathetic to Tamil as Tamil speakers see it without losing objectivity . A must for anyone to understand the complexities of Tamil and the attitude of Tamil speakers to the language. The author has devoted a number of pages to Manipravalam , a language writing style in which Sanskrit words my be in varying degrees incorporated in Tamil texts , usually in Grantham lipi. This part is much needed. I also resonate with the author's view that for the last 100 years, there is an overemphasis on Sangam classics as the most important part of Tamil literary heritage , while many creative literature of the 12th to 19th centuries are neglected as if they don't exist or don't deserve appreciation. This has led to lopsided in Tamil literary and much else appreciation by Tamils. It is high time Tamil literary consciousness takes it's head buried in the sands of 'Golden age of Sangam tamil' to the present and future