A celebratory vibe, rather than one of mourning, pervaded the Manaveeyam Veedhi on Sunday evening, as friends, ‘shishyas’, acquaintances and admirers of poet-dramatist Kavalam Narayana Panicker got together for a memorial event. Interspersed with wistful recollections by those associated with him were renditions of his poetry, with those gathered around tapping and nodding along to the catchy rhythm inherent in those lines.
The get-together happened at a corner of Manaveeyam Veedhi where last year around the same time Kavalam had come to celebrate the 40th anniversary of his landmark play ‘Avanavan Kadamba.’ The memorial event was organised by the Manaveeyam Theruvorakoottam and the members of Sopanam.
Writer George Onakkoor said that Kavalam was an artiste who imbibed the folk songs of this land. “There is no other poet or lyricist who had so much sense of rhythm. I still remember the day when ‘Avanavan Kadamba’ was first staged at the Attakulangara school here.”
Poet P. Narayanakkurap, who has had a long association with Kavalam’s ‘Sopanam kalari,’ said he would rather not speak about the man as it would go on till eternity. He rendered a poem called Kavalam pattu , which he had written as a tribute to Kavalam.
Songs of heart
Dancer Methil Devika said that she was yet to come to terms with the end of what she called an era from her life, during which she performed on stage many of his works. “His lines were not just indigenous. They were songs of the blood, and of the heart. How else could people across the world draw the same emotions from those lines? I don’t know whether there would be any other artiste who has diversified so much into so many different art forms,” she said.
Dramatist Prasanth Narayanan reminisced how he was once asked by Kavalam to unlearn Kathakali and later to decode the same art form to unearth a modern theatre. Film-maker Lenin Rajendran reminisced how Kavalam had written the lyrics for his debut film Venal .
Kavalam’s ‘shishyas’ from Sopanam kalari rendered some of his most popular lines from G. Aravindan’s film Kummatti — Maanathe macholam and Karukara Karmukil .
