Novelist and academic Perumal Murugan’s Tamil novel ‘Madhorubhagan’, which was in the middle of a storm last week after its English rendering, ‘One Part Woman’ was sought to be banned, will be read at a Kochi Biennale session on Saturday.
Following protests by right wing groups, Mr. Murugan was forced to declare on his Facebook wall that the ‘writer’ [in him] was dead and that he had stopped writing. He also made clear his willingness to buy back all unsold copies of his old works. On Saturday at 12 noon, Malayalam writers led by N.S. Madhavan, author of the famed short story ‘Thiruthu’ (correction), will read from the English rendering of Mr. Murugan’s work at the Aspinwall Pavilion.
Set in ancient Tiruchengode in Tamil Nadu, Mr. Murugan’s native town, ‘Madhorubhagan’ has an episode based on an ancient local temple ritual in which childless women are consummated by men other than their husbands for conception.
