The joys of vernacular

Latest edition of Wisden India Almanack edited by Suresh Menon, celebrates the manner in which cricket has cut across regional and linguistic boundaries.

April 05, 2015 06:51 pm | Updated April 08, 2015 05:03 pm IST

Suresh Menon

Suresh Menon

Nearly two decades ago, when Australian left-arm speedster Bruce Reid ran into bowl at Chennai’s M.A. Chidambaram Stadium, fondly called the Chepauk, a Tamil commentator quipped on radio: “Oru pencilukku kai kaal mulaithadhu pol ullar Reid.”

A rough translation would be ‘looks like a pencil has sprouted hands and legs when you see Reid’ but it doesn’t exactly capture the innate humour and subtlety evident in the Tamil line that so well described the gangly seamer’s frame.

It is a vignette that illustrates cricket’s beating heart in multiple languages. It is a truth that acclaimed sports writer and author Suresh Menon relishes with the same joy he reserves for his regular dish at Koshys - rotis and palak chicken.

“Cricket may originally be an Anglo-Saxon game and English might be its language but the game and the way it is related to by the players and fans have changed dramatically. Let’s accept that a cover drive by Michael Atherton is different from a cover drive from someone like a Shahid Afridi. There is a certain different sensibility and it shows in the way they play those shots,” Menon says.

The discussion about the vernacular polemics of the willow game, is not without reason as the latest edition of the Wisden India Almanack edited by Menon, celebrates the manner in which cricket has cut across regional and linguistic boundaries.

Yes, the regular staple of matches, both international and domestic is there in the tome but its distinguished gaze rests largely on cricket at its most rooted form –club games and the way the sport has embraced local languages.

Offering an insight into the various perspectives that goaded him to peek into the demographics of cricket, Menon says: “Karnataka won the Ranji Trophy and I would like to believe that the players would love to see and read the way their victory has been defined in the local Kannada dailies, there is a certain thrill associated with it. Because we tend to presume that English is still the currency of cricket, at times we don’t realise the good cricket literature that crops up in the regional languages. I got Gopal Hegde to write in the almanack because I know Gopal is a fine observer of the game and I have heard about the way he describes it in Kannada.”

But cricket isn’t just about nostalgia, romance, language and the wistful sigh. It is also about commerce, Twenty20 leagues and the foibles of everyday life.

Menon is quick to point out that he is equally aware of the game’s wheels within wheels: “Yes I am a romantic when it comes to sport but I am also a sports journalist interested in all its aspects, so be it the ICC or Mr. Srinivasan’s growth, I want everything to be chronicled in the almanac.”

But language shimmers again and as the waiter converses in Malayalam, Menon says: “When at times I have to give my analysis on Malayalam channels, I do realise that describing cricket and its finer points in the vernacular isn’t easy and hence my appreciation of those who do that in their regional languages is much more.” It does show in the almanack.

The writer has contributed a feature to the almanack.

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