Women writers had been censored from time immemorial within the family, the community, the State and finally the Censor Board, said founder member of Asmita and feminist writer Vasanth Kannabiran here on Monday.
After releasing an anthology of Telugu short stories titled “Beyond the Backyard” that were translated into English and published by the Central Sahitya Akademi, Ms. Vasanth Kannabira said writers should always erase the lines drawn to separate the public-private domains. These lines were unfairly drawn for the different genders.
On Volga’s book “Sveccha” (Freedom) and the anthology of Telugu poems translated into Telugu entitled “Neeli Meghalu”, Ms. Vasanth Kannabiran said they had challenged attempts to stifle the voices of women writers.
On the various challenges of translating works from one Indian language to another, she said English had become a bridge.
Akademi general Council member Naveen welcomed the gathering.
Noted feminist writer Volga who presided over the function said the Telugu literary works had been translated only on a small scale into Kannada and Tamil. Even that was also coming down because the number of persons proficient in both the languages was falling. Ms. Volga said the Central Sahitya Akademi had never organised book release functions but this was done mainly due to the perseverance of Telugu writer P. Satyavati.
Ms. Volga said the anthology had 29 short stories from a wide range of genres. Talking about the book, Professor Suneetha Rani said the Central Sahitya Akademi should rethink its policy of not having book release programmes.
Excellent books like this collection written by women writers should be promoted through such functions or discussion lest it should disappear without anyone knowing about it.
Editor of the book CLL Jayaprada spoke at length on the effort in selecting the stories and getting them translated.
The other two editors, P Satyavati and V Pratima, and ANU professor Ch. Swaroop a Rani spoke about the stories in the book.
