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Literary events, competitions to mark Thunchan Festival

TIRUR: A series of literary events to be held from February 2 to 6 at Thunchanparambu here will mark this year’s Thunchan Festival.

The festivities will coincide with the Vaikom Mohammed Basheer centenary celebrations.

The festival will be organised jointly by the Thunchan Memorial Trust, the Kendra Sahitya Akademi and the South Zone Cultural Centre, Thanjavoor.

A national seminar on ‘Reality and narration’ and a South Indian poets’ meet will be the chief attractions of the festival.

Ronald Asher, who translated Vaikom Mohammed Basheer’s works into English, will inaugurate the five-day festivities on Saturday.

Author M.T. Vasudevan Nair will preside over the function.

Poet Akkitham will release M.N. Karassery’s book, ‘Basheer — Life and Works,’ on the occasion.

Orator-critic Sukumar Azhikode will deliver the Basheer Centenary Lecture. Writer C.R. Parameswaran will deliver the Thunchan Memorial Lecture on ‘Autonomy of the letters’.

Competitions in poetry and quiz will be organised on Saturday afternoon for college students at Thunchanparambu.

Writer V. Sukumaran, critic V.C. Haris, and documentary maker M.A. Rahman will present papers at a session on ‘Basheer the man, Basheer the writer,’ which will mark the beginning of the national seminar on ‘Reality and narration: the Indian context.’

Kathakali maestro Kalamandalam Ramankutty Nair will inaugurate the Thunchan Arts Festival on Saturday evening.

Screening of M.A. Rahman’s documentary ‘Basheer the man’ will follow the inaugural.

Meenakshi Sreenivasan from Chennai will stage a Bharatanatyam performance.

The programmes on Sunday will begin with a procession with the iron stylus of the poet saint Ezhuthachan.

Assamese writer Karabi Deka Hazarika, Hindi writer Geetanjali Shree, Kannada writer Vivek Shanbhag and Telugu writer C. Vijayasree will present papers at a session on ‘Narrating the nation.’

Celebrated Telugu translator Gangisetty Lakshmi Narayana will deliver the Samvatsar Lecture on ‘An approach to comparative Dravidian literature’ on Sunday afternoon.

Writers M. Mukundan, Sethu, Punathil Kunhabdulla, U.A. Khader, P. Vatsala, Sarah Joseph, Perumpadavam Sreedharan, Mundoor Sethumadhavan, Sathrughnan and P.R. Nathan will take part in an interaction with readers on the occasion.

On Monday, writers such as N. Prabhakaran, Akbar Kakkattil, Gracy, Sihabuddeen Poithumkadavu, P.K. Parakkadavu, T.N. Prakash, N.P. Hafiz Mohammed, C.V. Balakrishnan, U.K. Kumaran, Asokan Charuvil, V.R. Sudheesh, Ashtamurthi, K. Aravindakshan, and Ambikasudhan Mangadu will take part in an interaction.

A musical programme by Mapilapattu artiste V.M. Kutty and party will be the chief attraction on Monday evening.

Poet K.G. Sankara Pillai will inaugurate the South Indian Poets’ Meet on Tuesday morning.

Tamil poet Sumati alias Thamizhachi, Kannada writer H.S. Venkatesha Murthy, Konkani writer Nayana Adarkar and Telugu writer Sujatha Patwari are among those who will present papers on ‘My writing, my times.’

Seeta Sasidharan and party from Payyannur will present a Bharatanatyam performance on Tuesday evening. The programme will conclude on Wednesday.

M.T. Vasudevan Nair will give away prizes to winners of various competitions held as part of the festival.

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