This book marks a decade of a column that appears every Monday in The Hindu's Metro Plus, Madras edition. Madras Miscellany has, over that decade, created an awareness and a greater appreciation of the significant past of Madras and of the events and the people who over the years made Madras "the first city of modern India", a description of the City the writer of the column, S.Muthiah, never tires of reiterating. Over a 1500 or so items that appeared in the 514 columns published during Madras Miscellany's first decade appear in the book in three sections:'People', 'Places' and 'Potpourri', the last named being everything else that doesn't fit into the other two sections. And in them there develops a rather comprehensive story of Madras over its nearly 375 years of history.In sum, this is a book for anyone interested in the development of Madras and its considerable contribution to modern India.
Subbiah Muthiah MBE (13 April 1930 – 20 April 2019) was an Indian writer, journalist, cartographer, amateur historian and heritage activist known for his writings on the political and cultural history of Chennai city. He was the founder of the fortnightly newspaper Madras Musings and the principal organizer of the annual Madras Day celebrations. Muthiah was also the founder-President of the Madras Book Club.