I who have lost
My way and beg now at stranger's doors to
Receive love, at least in small exchange?
My Grandmother's House: Kamala Das
The quoted lines would evoke nostalgic feelings in readers' minds that cannot be expressed in any other way. The poet Kamala Das (Surayya) has spread the fragrance of Neermathalam and the hidden emotions of a female mind to an international level through her confessional writings. It is difficult to see any other Indian poet who found herself amid controversies at all times for her truthful writings.
India's foremost poetess Kamala Das born on March 31, 1934 at Punnayurkulam in the Malabar area of Kerala. She born in the great Kerala literary household Nalapattu, as the daughter of V.M.Nair and well-known Malayalam poetess Balamaniyamma. She acquainted with the great writers in Malayalam literature at a tender age and had enough exposure due to her stay at Calcutta and Kerala. The young Kamala read the Malayalam translation of Victor Hugo's Les Miserables by Nalapattu Narayanamenon at a tender age of eight. This ancestral house and the love of her grandmother influenced the young 'Amy' to grow into the Malayalam writer Madhavikutty as well as English poet Kamala Das.
Kamala Das never initiated into professional writing till her marriage. She married Madhava Das at the tender age of fourteen. Madhava Das was much elder to her and kept a father role to both Kamala and her children. When Kama das wanted to initiate writing, her husband supported her decision. There she started to write about her nostalgic feelings and hidden feelings.
Kamala Das' first poetry collection Summer in Calcutta promised the rise of a revolutionary woman poet in India. Her writings mainly reflected woman's longing for love and her restrictions in the society. Her stories and poems were greatly misunderstood and criticized by a section of Indian critics. Her poems like An Introduction, The Descendants, Alphabet of Lust and Only The Soul Knows How To Sing were open voices of restricted women in an orthodox society. Her autobiography My Story, published in 1976 put her on the centre of controversies. When this confessional work has been translated to more than 15 languages, Inadian critics accused for spreading the idea of unmarital relationships.
Kamala Das took a controversial step in 1999, as she converted from Hinduism to Islam in 1999. The poet who always wrote about Lord Krishna and imagined to be his Radha suddenly started to address Allah. Her statement "I converted my Krishna to Islam" evoked much opposition from conservative Hindus in Kerala. However she was bold in her decisions and continues her life according to Muslim beliefs. She recently left her native Kerala to settle her life in Pune with youngest son Jayaurya.
Kamala Das was short listed for Nobel Prize for literature in 1984 along with Marguerite Yourcenar, Doris Lessing, and Nadine Gordimer. Apart from that she received many awards for her literary contributions like Asian Poetry Prize, Kent Award for English Writing from Asian Countries, Asan World Prize, Sahitya Academy Award and Kerala Sahitya Academy Award etc. Her readers are anticipating more works from the pen of this gifted writer.
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Tags: kamala das surayya or keralas own madhavikutty.
