The first volume includes two of the major writings of the reputed scholar Maa. Rajamanickanar, Sanga Ilakkiya Varalaaru (History of Sangam literature) and Pattu-p-paattu Aaraaicchi (‘Ten Songs': A Critique). Known for his prolific writings on Tamil literature, Tamil Nadu and Tamil culture, Rajamanickanar was particularly concerned with the historical nuances of the ancient Tamil Classics.
In the past, it used to be said that if “chronology is the eye of history, Tamil literary history has to remain blind forever.” If distinguished historians such as P.T. Srinivasa Iyengar, K.A.N. Sastry, T.R. Sesha Iyengar, V.R.R. Dikshitar, L.D. Swamikannu Pillai, and S.K. Iyengar blazed a trail with their path-breaking research, the Tamil scholars Mayilai Seeni Venkatasami, M. Raghava Iyengar, and R. Raghava Iyengar continued the exploratory venture.
Tribute
Following in their footsteps, Rajamanickanar acquired wide scholarship in Tamil literature and history and wrote numerous essays on the Sangam works, with emphasis on the probable dates of their composition. It is a tribute to his painstaking effort that, for his work on the history of Sangam literature, he consulted sources as varied as Otto Jespersen's Mankind, Nation and Individual , Thurston's Castes and Tribes of Southern India , S.K. Chatterji's Origin and Development of the Bengali Language , Sircar's Successors of the Satavahanas and a number of articles by Fr. Heras. His research is thorough, analysis penetrating, evaluation objective, and exposition lucid. Most of his observations on the ancientness of Tamil and on the dates of Tolkappiyam , Narrinai , Kuruntokai , Purananuru , Akananuru and Tirukkural have been acknowledged to be based on authentic facts and objective criteria.
Rajamanickanar's critical treatise on Pattu-p-paattu dwells at length on the bewildering range of subjects and things that are described in detail or mentioned in passing in the group of ten poems written about 2000 years ago. For instance, small towns and cities; chieftains and kings; poets and their patrons; customs and habits; houses and household articles; religions and sects; sports and games; plants and creepers; and birds and animals. In fact, his essays attempt to reconstruct the literary, social, and political history of Tamil Nadu of the distant past.
The second volume under review consists of 16 essays by Sanjeevi on the various Sangam poets and poems, and a number of catalogues. Using the extant poems of Kapilar, Avvaiyar, Saattanaar, Piciraantaiyaar, and Pandiyan Nedunchezhiyan, the author is able to provide cogent accounts of the happenings revolving around the half-historical, half-legendary personages like Paari, Atiyamaan, Kumanan, and Kopperunchozhan.
When some of the pieces from the akam anthologies are retold in a modern setting, their poetic and dramatic qualities delight the reader, and the relevance of their message today is driven home. One realises how these characters have become archetypes of friendship, generosity, and magnanimity etched in the memory of the Tamil community.
In the thoughtfully prepared catalogues, the Sangam poets, numbering 473, are categorised under as many as 68 heads! Containing as they do a wealth of details gathered from countless primary and secondary sources, they could serve as ready-reckoners for those who want to know how these poets got their names, from which town and region they hailed, how many women poets figured in the literary academy, how many articles, books and theses have been written upon these poets and their patrons, and so on.
Together, the two volumes provide a historical account of, and a critical introduction to, the Sangam poems which have now won international recognition as the first great secular body of poetry written in India and unsurpassed in world literature. Knowledgeable western critics have praised them as lyrics that are elegant, truthful, and more sober and less rhetorical than those of Greek lyricist Pindar who, to them, is the benchmark for comparison.
But, more recently, a couple of critics have made some weird observations about the nature and chronology of these ancient classics. For instance, Herman Tieken argues — departing from the established positions of scholars like Kamil Zvelebil, A. K. Ramanujan, R.E. Asher and George Hart — that Sangam literature cannot be placed earlier than the end of the 8{+t}{+h} or the beginning of the 9{+t}{+h} century and that the scenes in Purananuru are purely fictional. The material presented in these volumes after extensive research by Rajamanickanar and Sanjeevi should enable students of Tamil literature to get the right perspective, not getting misled by such ill-founded and skewed theories. And the Tamil literary community owes a deep debt of gratitude to the two savants for their great service.
