Socialist Janata (Democratic) party leader and United Democratic Front (UDF) candidate in the Palakkad Lok Sabha constituency M.P. Veerendrakumar paid homage to the late writer O.V. Vijayan at a function at Thassarak village (the famed setting of Vijayan’s novel Khasakinte Ithihasam [Legend of Khasak], published in 1969) to commemorate the author on his ninth death anniversary on March 30.
The seedling store house (Nhattupura) at Thassarak where O.V. Vijayan lived for some time and from where he got the raw materials and prototypes of the characters in the novel was busy with local people, the second generation of Thassarak characters.
Mr. Veerendrakumar, as he entered the Nhattupura, which is now a memorial to O.V. Vijayan, relived fond memories of his association with the writer. He recalled that the ‘Legend of Khasak’ was a novel in which only rustic men and women lived with their “homely joys and destinies of obscure”.
It was a novel that upheld the infinite possibility of creativity spurned out of simple rural characters. From the most common men and women from the most remote lives, he created a saga (Ithihas).
Mr..Veerendrakumar said the visit had nothing to do with his election campaign.
Mr. Veerendrakumar was received by P.K. Narayanan, secretary of the O.V. Vijayan Smaraka Samithy, and others at the memorial.
