PVPF 2024

Interview with Dr T Sumathy aka Thamizhachi Thangapandian, author of The Throb of Silence

The Throb of Silence’ celebrates the beauty and resilience of Tamil culture
on Apr 17, 2023

Dr T Sumathy aka Thamizhachi Thangapandian is a Tamil writer, English Professor and a Member of Parliament. She has nineteen publications including collections of poetry, essays and interviews to her credit.

Frontlist: Your poetry collection represents the seamless continuity of human kinship with other living and non-living beings. What motivated you to express it through poetry?

Thamizhachi: I come from a village down south, which is called Mallanginaru, a Karisal land with arid, black soil, and the summer season prevails most of the year, with hot, scorching summers. Basically, everybody’s life is interconnected with others. It's a community life, exchanging your woes, joys, sorrows, everything with each other, and it's an agrarian community. Getting connected with other fellow human beings as well as household animals and the flora and fauna was part of my childhood. That is how I grew up. I always imbibed this quality of getting connected with the universe—not merely with fellow human beings but also with each and every atom of the universe. As a village girl, I grew up that way, and when I wanted to express my inner pangs, sufferings, hopes, fears, and dreams, I chose poetry as my vehicle of expression, and it's actually challenging. It's very compelling that this connection of my own self with the universe, especially my humane connection with my Karisal womenfolk, who are interconnected with each other through our cuisine, our culture, our indigenous habits, the arts, music, and deities. I wanted all these to be connected and then express it through poetry. Deeply connected with my roots, and the soil in which I grew up has motivated me to express it in some forms of art or writing, and I chose poetry as my vehicle.

Frontlist: "The Throb of Silence" celebrates the beauty and resilience of Tamil culture. How can poetry and literature help promote cultural awareness and understanding?

Thamizhachi: Thank you for the observation that ‘The Throb of Silence’ celebrates the beauty and resilience of Tamil culture. Rather than phrasing it broadly as Tamil culture, I would like to narrow it down by saying that it actually portrays the beauty and resilience of my specific region in Tamil Nadu. Well, it comes under the broad canvas of Tamil culture, but still, I talk about an indigenous, native culture pertaining to my region, the Karisal region. Karisal is the black soil, and every region has its own dialect, culture, and classification of lands, seasons, and crops. In fact, Tamil culture is the only one that has this legacy of ‘thinai, or segregation of lands: kurinji, mullai, marutam, neital, and palai. And each classification of this land has its own natives, termed according to their life style, not in the varnaashrama sense. You have to be very careful with that. For example, in kurunji, kurunji is the land of mountains, with a landscape of mountains in and around the mountain area. Agricultural is their major occupation, there will always be a deity, a bird, an animal, and a flower which are particular to that area. In Tamil culture we have this proud legacy of living a life based on five classifications of lands. That is what I mean by the Thinai. It means the principle of dividing lands according to the seasons, crops, and cultural habits of people. So that way, it comes under the broad umbrella of Tamil culture. But mine is specifically black soil, which we call karisal, and our land is paalai (dry, arid black soil), and we have our own dialectical way to express our language. It is actually different from other parts of Tamil Nadu. Like we have the Coimbatore dialect,the Chennai dialect, and the northern part of Tamil Nadu has its own dialect. So when I express my feelings in poetry about my life out there, about my experiences that I have gathered, it is actually a lens through which other people can see a slice of my life. That way, my poems are in a way an ambassador for transporting a foreign reader or a reader from some other place to my native place: getting to understand my dialect, getting to understand my crops, my seasons, and the way of life to which my people were acclimatised. There is scanty rain, and hardship is the word that my Karisal women carry on their shoulders, but still they face their lives with a huge smile on their faces. In spite of their hard ships, they face life brazenly, and my poems are huge messengers of it.

Frontlist: You often invoke the persona of Vanapechi, your ancestral deity, and spirit, in your poetry. What is the significance of this deity in your work, and how did it inspire your writing?

Thamizhachi: Vanapechi is an ancestral, indigenous deity of mine. And the myth goes that Pechi actually means a mad woman, a woman who doesn't want to be controlled by anybody or believe in any fetters. Just a mad woman or a nymph of the forest, ‘vanam’ is forest. A woman without any shackles, representing the rugged, raw sensibility of a southern regional rural woman! The deity dwells in the forest, and the myth goes that there should not be any shelter above her head, and there need not to be any concrete building to save her because she is the epitome of a free spirit. She doesn't want to entangle herself in any fetters, metaphorically any fetters or tangles of society. Just a free spirit of the forest who meanders and wanders in the forest and lives a life according to her whims and fancies. She will always be accompanied by 7, or as we call it in Tamil, kanimar, the seven virgin deities - indigenous ones. We call it 7 ‘kannimardeivam’, kanni means a virgin. All these are women deities. There must have been some stories. These female deities didn't jump from heaven and are getting worshipped.

They must have been part of the village families, and they must have made some sacrifices or had some sob stories behind their history. That's how they came to be. Pechi must have been brave woman who must have sacrificed her life, probably for the sake of that particular village, people, when they met with some danger. This woman must have saved them. That’s how all our gods will be; they will be either on the borders of her village as guardian angels or in the midst of the forest. Helping strangers, helping the villages find their way, and always being a wonderful companion to them. That's how all our deities are, especially the ancestral indigenous deities. This Pechi is a woman, a mad woman who doesn't adhere to any norms that society has actually imposed a women. And what is the job of a woman just wandering in a forest at night or during the day? Actually, home is a place for which a woman is meant to be inside, but Pechi is entirely a different free spirit who just has her life the way she wants, amidst forests. A fearless spirit, but at the same time very empathetic and sensitive to the sufferings of fellow human beings, especially women. So that way, I always see Pechi as my alter ego. Whatever I could not probably achieve in this practical world, I always imagine that I can achieve through Pechi. And Pechi is my spokesperson; Pechi is the carrier of my dreams; and Pechi is the symbol of the woman I want to be. A woman who cannot be deciphered by worldly standards and a woman who neither adheres to such cliched norms set by society. Nor is she a very cold woman who is not empathetic. She is an empathetic, sensitive woman, in fact, sensuous also. She would like to enjoy a drink, meat, and cigars and cigarettes. She also likes to dance and sing as a free spirit. That's how the deity is. So I always look up to her as my alter ego. Sometimes she will be a very gentle feminine being who sings melodies, and sometimes you can see her like a fierce woman who roars like a lioness in the forest. In brief, you can't just frame Pechi within a particular image. This is how she will be. She's very unpredictable. She's vulnerable as well as very strong, so she's perfect as well as imperfect in many senses of the word in flesh and blood. The main thing that I get to connect with her is that she's a free spirit of the forest who serves as a guardian angel to the strangers as well as the residents of that particular particular area, or as a companion to all the women out there. So my poems talk about the plight of women and ask questions about the do’s and don’ts. Cliched, out staged concepts, societal conditions set by this age-old patriarchal society. Through her, I express the untold stories of my womenfolk, the taboos they want to undo, demystifying those cultural burdens which they are forced to carry on for centuries! And through Pechi, I would question all these, and Pechi is there as a rebel, as a free spirit, as a madwoman. She is the voice of my soul, my partner in crime, my chum, and my pillar of strength! She is me, and I am Pechi.

Frontlist: In your opinion, how does modern society mutilate our heritage, and what can we do to preserve it?

Thamizhachi: Well, modern society cuts through the rawness of the native culture. The tribal or native wisdom of our heritage, the core spirit of our heritage, has been destroyed in the name of technology, In the name of inhumane attitudes. We are all islands in this modern society, and everybody shuts their door nowadays. We shut our eyes, only glued to our mobile phones, not even aware of what's happening just a few yards away. We are islands cut off from each other. We don't even know who our neighbour is, and even if we did, we wouldn't bother to know a little extra about them. But that's not the case in the villages. I don't mean to say that only in the village our heritage lies, but with all the sense of humility, I would like to point out that our heritage and our indigenous culture still throb in their full manifestation with a beautiful epitomised spirit in our raw villages, in our philistine spirits. Technology, which is the need of the hour in a way, is a boon for humanity as well a beast against it. It's a double-edged sword. If we use it properly, it enhances our lives. But the other way around, it is always the devil who will keep you as a slave of Satan. There are so many ways to name a few - Your indigenous art forms are getting replaced by electronic and musical systems, other forms of art are replacing them. The indigenous artisans are being replaced by machines. I can go on listing, but to put it in a nutshell, the way we handle our everyday routine is thoroughly gulfed by technology. Modernity mutilates our heritage a lot. India, especially Tamil Nadu, is known for its organic, healthy cuisine and various art forms, including the myriad expressions in their paintings, cave paintings, and what not. But everything, in this digital world, is getting encashed, and the touch of artificiality is there. So in that way, I feel we have paid a heavy price. Modernity makes our lives, especially the lives of women, much easier. There is no doubt about that. Women need not be inside the kitchen like we used to be 40 (forty) or 50 (fifty) years ago sure. It liberates us, But how far you can enjoy its advantages without having the guilt of having lost the precious core of your indegenous of your culture, of your native legacy, is a question to be pondered.

And also, what do we do to preserve it? It is up to every individual to preserve our heritage in their own way, in their own humble way. For that, you have to really understand what heritage is. A famous critic T.S. Eliot once said மரபின் அச்சிலேதான், புதுமையின் சக்கரம், சுழல்கின்றது (It is on the axis of tradition that the wheel of innovation revolves.) That is, modernity actually gets its drive from the cracks of tradition. Tradition is a word with which you actually need to be very, very careful when you use it. In the name of tradition, women suffer a lot. In the name of culture, we suffer a lot. Everything has been put on our shoulders, on our hands, and on our eyes, blinding ourselves and making everything a burden on us in the name of culture and tradition. So those are words that need to be carefully used. So modernity—the wheel of modernity—takes its drive from the linchpin of tradition. But when you find tradition as a blindfold path, it is your duty or it is your urge to cut yourself from that and make or tread untrodden paths and make a new trial for yourself. That is why we call the modern age and the postmodern age the ages of trailblazers. So many innovations, so many discoveries. Specially making lives easier and always having a scientific temper attached to that. So, I use the term ‘culture’ - I mean our native, indigenous one not the one imposed on us by Mannor Vedhas. We have to understand that our indigenous culture is entirely different from the main Narrative - the Narrative as portrayed in scriptures. For example, that every state in India has its own, unique culture. So you can't just club all those into one tagline, under one umbrella, as a uniform one. We are united as one nation, but we are very different, and pluralism is the keyword. So that way, each culture needs to be preserved and celebrated in its own way, by its own people, in their writing, in their art forms, and probably even in their everyday lives by being sensitive to their mother Earth. By being sensitive to their environment, the way we handle water, the way we handle this planet itself, that particular terrain itself, how we celebrate our tribal deities ritual’s, our plants and trees, everything is part of preserving culture and artists express this anxiety as well as duty to preserve culture through their art forms, and for a writer, I choose my art form as poetry.

Frontlist: Your work reflects the rich heritage of your village. How important is it for us to connect with our cultural roots, and how can we do so in a world that is becoming increasingly urbanized?

Thamizhachi: Yes, the world getting urbanised too quickly actually rings an alarm bell and pushes our antenna up. Urbanisation has its own advantages in terms of getting a better life in your profession, moving forward, and enjoying all the pleasures of life, because every individuals choice of pleasure differs from another person's. My main concern is my roots in my village and my roots in my language. I would have gotten international acclaim by writing in English. But why do I choose to write my poems in my mother tongue, Tamil, and that too in the dialect of the black soil? It is my own choice. I would even say it's a political choice. Kenya writer Ngugu Wa Thiang’O (கூகி வா தியாங்கோ) declared that he would not write anymore in English but would instead return to his indigenous language. Having written in English for so many years, when he declared that he would return to his native language. It's a political statement. He means that he has to preserve his indigenous literary tradition by expressing his creative juices in his mother tongue. So in that sense, I would say that poetry is a medium for which language is the main raw material. So my dialectical language is very unique.

In its own way, it is actually untranslatable. Even poetry itself is untranslatable, and that's the beauty of it. So long as it is untranslatable, I would never pledge my decision to write in my native Tamil dialect to attain international accolades or acclaim in English. That doesn't mean anything to me. Preserving my cultural roots, for which I need to make a conscious decision to express my creativity only in my mother tongue because that is the way I get deeply connected since my root is my language, which is the dialectical language of my black soil. So I would never pledge that to get international fame. I may write critical essays or reviews in English. In fact, I myself am a translator, and I would love to translate my poems into as many languages as possible. And I have always declared that translation is not personal work for pleasure, even if you do it for it, but it is a social commitment and responsibility. Exchange of cultures—introducing your culture to some other native person of some other native culture—is a social responsibility. Transporting a foreign reader to the world of your own rich literature is a duty I really enjoy, not merely as a job or probably for pleasure. I always feel that it's a beautiful commitment that I would like to always undertake. So that is a different line on its own. But preserving my cultural roots and linguistic legacy, I always feel that it is important for us, especially in this post-colonial era when we want to write our history against the empire, rewriting our own history and the histories that were forgotten. It's a must that we always get connected to our cultural roots, and that's how we can keep our core, throbbing with the real spirit of the soil.

Frontlist: Do you think that the book's translator, K S Subramanian, did justice in deciphering the essence of your poetry and conveying it to the readers?

Thamizhachi: K.S., as we respectfully address him, is an ace translator who has translated very important works of Tamil into English, especially the works of renowned Tamil writer Jayakanthan, as well as short stories published by Katha Publications in English. I have known him for many years and have huge respect for his works. And K.S. himself liked my poems, chose some 50 (fifty) or 60 (sixty) poems on his own, rang me up, and told me, "Sumathy, I am going to translate some of the poems that I really like."

The first poem that he translated was ‘Manjanati Tree'. The manjanati tree is a tree that grows specially in my Karisal area. A tree that is closer to my heart, a tree under which I grew up right from a schoolgirl to a teenager, a mother and a career woman! That tree is very dear to me as my friend, as my companion, as my bosom friend. He liked that poetry in Tamil, so he translated it, and that's how the journey began, and He has done his best. My poetry is a little difficult to translate. Most of the idioms & Phrases the dialects are very specific and have a cultural context to my soil and area. So we need to use a lot of glossaries for that, and he has also done it. He has put his best foot forward and I thank him for that.

And there can never be a perfect 100% translation. It was George Steiner who stated that ashes can never be a translation of fire, and they aren't. I would like to quote Susan Basnett also. She was the one who rightfully stated that it is not like translating literature from one country to another or one art form or any form of art from one country to another. Actually, the translation process is concerned with the culture. Culture is the word, not merely your literary works or your art forms through translator. Actually, you are taking your culture to different parts of the world. Apart from the translator’s knowledge of the source and the target language, he should also be familiar with the nuances of that culture. He/She should know the pulse of the culture, because it's not a question of the genres of literature getting translated or the different art forms getting translated. It is actually about culture. We are being transported to a different culture, and so the translator should have the urge to know the pulse of those people. That way, you can never expect my poems to be totally perfectly translated, but K.S. has done his best to do so. I am thankful to him.