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ஆதிரை
தமிழர் வரலாற்றின் மாபெரும் விடுதலைப் போராட்டக்களத்தில் இருந்த தாய்மார்கள், பிள்ளைகளின் வாழ்க்கைச் சித்திரம் இது. தமிழன்னையின் கண்ணீர்த் துளி.
சயந்தனின் ஆதிரை, ஓர் ஒற்றைக் குரலாக, ஒற்றை உண்மையை மட்டும் வாசகருக்குக் காட்டாமல், ஆசிரியரின் குரலுக்கு அப்பால் சென்றும் பல குரல்களை கேட்க முடிகின்ற, பிரதியில் கூற எத்தனிக்கும் உண்மையைத் தாண்டியும் மேலதிக உண்மையைப் பெறுவதற்கான வாசக சாத்தியங்களைக் கொண்டிருக்கின்ற ஒரு இலக்கியப் பிரதியாக வெளியாகியிருக்கின்றது. தன் இருப்பிற்காகப் போராடிக்கொண்டிருக்கும் தனித்துவிடப்பட்ட இனமொன்றின், கடை நிலை மாந்தர்களைப் பற்றியும், போராட்டத்தின் மேன்மைகள், கீழ்மைகள் யாவற்றையும் எழுத்தாளரின் அக, புற உணர்வுகளோடு அருமையாக வெளிப்படுத்தி நிற்கிறது இந்நாவல்.
மக்களின் அனுபவங்களை நேர்த்தியான கதைகளாகத் தொகுப்பதன் மூலம் நாவலுக்கான ஒரு வடிவம் நெய்யப்பட்டிருப்பினும்கூட, வாசகர்களே நிரப்புவதற்கான இடைவெளிகளும் உண்டு. நிறைய இடங்களில் அது வாசகர்களிடம் ’வேலை வாங்குகிறது’ நாவலின் தொடக்கத்தில் தனி அத்தியாயமாக வரும் லெட்சுமணன் என்ற பாத்திரத்திற்கு முடிவில் என்ன நடந்திருக்குமென்பதை, வாசகரே தன்னுடைய கற்பனையாலும், ஊகத்தினாலும் நிரப்பிக்கொள்ள வேண்டியிருக்கிறது. இறுதி அத்தியாயத்தில் மட்டுமே வருகின்ற ஆதிரையின் சொல்லப்படாத வாழ்வை, ஒரு தனி நாவலாகவே வாசகர்களால் கற்பனையில் சிருஷ்டித்துக்கொள்ளமுடியும். இவ்வாறான சாத்தியங்கள் நாவலோடு தனித்துவமான ஒரு நெருக்கத்தை வாசகர்களோடு ஏற்படுத்துகின்றன.
ஈழப்போர் என்ற தரிசனத்தை, அந்தப்போரின் நேரடி வீச்சுக்குள் வாழ்ந்த சாதாரண அடித்தட்டு மக்களின் பார்வையில் ஆய்வுக்கும் விவாதத்திற்கும் உட்படுத்தி எல்லாக்கோணத்திலிருந்தும் அணுகும் சுதந்திரத்தை ஆதிரை உருவாக்கி அளிக்கின்றது. வெறும் அனுபவங்களை எழுதிவிடாது, படைப்பாற்றல் மூலம், அனுபவங்களுக்கிடையிலான சங்கிலித் தொடரை சாதுரியமாக உருவாக்கி, இலக்கியப் பிரதிக்கான அழகியலை சயந்தன் படைத்திருக்கின்றார்.
ஈழப்போர் பற்றிய தர்க்கங்களை, விடைகாணவியலாத வினாக்களை ஆதிரையின் பாத்திரங்களைக்கொண்டு கேட்க வைப்பதன் மூலம் ஒற்றைப்படையான நகர்வைத் தவிர்த்து வாசகரை ஒவ்வொரு சந்தர்ப்பத்திலும் பல கோணங்களில் பார்க்கச் செய்கின்றது ஆதிரை.
சயந்தனின் ஆதிரை, ஓர் ஒற்றைக் குரலாக, ஒற்றை உண்மையை மட்டும் வாசகருக்குக் காட்டாமல், ஆசிரியரின் குரலுக்கு அப்பால் சென்றும் பல குரல்களை கேட்க முடிகின்ற, பிரதியில் கூற எத்தனிக்கும் உண்மையைத் தாண்டியும் மேலதிக உண்மையைப் பெறுவதற்கான வாசக சாத்தியங்களைக் கொண்டிருக்கின்ற ஒரு இலக்கியப் பிரதியாக வெளியாகியிருக்கின்றது. தன் இருப்பிற்காகப் போராடிக்கொண்டிருக்கும் தனித்துவிடப்பட்ட இனமொன்றின், கடை நிலை மாந்தர்களைப் பற்றியும், போராட்டத்தின் மேன்மைகள், கீழ்மைகள் யாவற்றையும் எழுத்தாளரின் அக, புற உணர்வுகளோடு அருமையாக வெளிப்படுத்தி நிற்கிறது இந்நாவல்.
மக்களின் அனுபவங்களை நேர்த்தியான கதைகளாகத் தொகுப்பதன் மூலம் நாவலுக்கான ஒரு வடிவம் நெய்யப்பட்டிருப்பினும்கூட, வாசகர்களே நிரப்புவதற்கான இடைவெளிகளும் உண்டு. நிறைய இடங்களில் அது வாசகர்களிடம் ’வேலை வாங்குகிறது’ நாவலின் தொடக்கத்தில் தனி அத்தியாயமாக வரும் லெட்சுமணன் என்ற பாத்திரத்திற்கு முடிவில் என்ன நடந்திருக்குமென்பதை, வாசகரே தன்னுடைய கற்பனையாலும், ஊகத்தினாலும் நிரப்பிக்கொள்ள வேண்டியிருக்கிறது. இறுதி அத்தியாயத்தில் மட்டுமே வருகின்ற ஆதிரையின் சொல்லப்படாத வாழ்வை, ஒரு தனி நாவலாகவே வாசகர்களால் கற்பனையில் சிருஷ்டித்துக்கொள்ளமுடியும். இவ்வாறான சாத்தியங்கள் நாவலோடு தனித்துவமான ஒரு நெருக்கத்தை வாசகர்களோடு ஏற்படுத்துகின்றன.
ஈழப்போர் என்ற தரிசனத்தை, அந்தப்போரின் நேரடி வீச்சுக்குள் வாழ்ந்த சாதாரண அடித்தட்டு மக்களின் பார்வையில் ஆய்வுக்கும் விவாதத்திற்கும் உட்படுத்தி எல்லாக்கோணத்திலிருந்தும் அணுகும் சுதந்திரத்தை ஆதிரை உருவாக்கி அளிக்கின்றது. வெறும் அனுபவங்களை எழுதிவிடாது, படைப்பாற்றல் மூலம், அனுபவங்களுக்கிடையிலான சங்கிலித் தொடரை சாதுரியமாக உருவாக்கி, இலக்கியப் பிரதிக்கான அழகியலை சயந்தன் படைத்திருக்கின்றார்.
ஈழப்போர் பற்றிய தர்க்கங்களை, விடைகாணவியலாத வினாக்களை ஆதிரையின் பாத்திரங்களைக்கொண்டு கேட்க வைப்பதன் மூலம் ஒற்றைப்படையான நகர்வைத் தவிர்த்து வாசகரை ஒவ்வொரு சந்தர்ப்பத்திலும் பல கோணங்களில் பார்க்கச் செய்கின்றது ஆதிரை.
664 pages, Hardcover
Published November 1, 2015
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April 15, 2019
ஆதிரை - The tale of cruel war and it's manifestations
The cost of war has increased manifold with the advent of modern weapons. Especially after the second world war, direct armed conflicts have reduced significantly but still gorilla wars which like cancer affect people for a very long time. Any war affects the lives of ordinary people beyond ways which we can understand. Generally, historical accounts of war tell about the number of dead or wounded, etc but it never tells the stories of people whose lives have been completely shattered and destroyed in any armed conflict. It is the work of literature to always tell us the enormous human cost of armed conflict. We have romantic notions about war but any war is large scale destruction of ordinary people lives. First time I read War and Peace I was struck by the fact that contrast to the romantic notions we share about war, wars are more about chance events, destruction, suffering and pain that we have no idea about.
Aadhirai captures the lives of people caught in the conflict between LTTE and the Srilankan army over a period of three decades from the late 1970s. The novel tells the story of three generations of multiple families who face constant threat and eviction from their lands during the various stages of the conflict. In a sense, the war is a continuing presence in the lives of these families. The villager's lives are characterized by multiple cycles when life seemingly returning to normalcy is again thrown out of gear due to the war.
Aadhirai starts in 1991 when Lakshmanan an LTTE rebel is caught by the Srilankan army and jailed. From there it goes back to 1977 where Lakshmanan as a boy is forced to flee with his father Singamalai from the hills. Singamalai belongs to lower caste background and he is working as a laborer in the tea plantations when he is forced to flee the hills due to the rioting against Tamils. Lakshmanan and his father move to Thanikaladi. There are two families, one of Aththaar and his wife Chandra, Athaar is an LTTE sympathizer and belongs to lower caste who had married Chandra belonging to Velala caste from Jaffna. Sangili who is a traditional hunter wants to keep the forest out of the armed conflict is Athaar's close friend. Sangili and his wife Meenakshi are another one of the central families. It is through the lives of these two families we get to know the effects of the conflict. Lakshmanan starts working with Athaar and stays with them as they are devoid of children they look upon him as their own son. Singamalai meanwhile lives with his daughter Valliyaal in the same village.
As the conflict unfolds we see the palpable tensions overwhelming the lives of the families. They are constantly debating and discussing the various events, Chandra and Sangili are wary of armed conflict. Athaar is sympathetic to the LTTE and there is a constant source of tension in the family.
The important achievement of the novel is the way it manages to captures the little details of the lives of these people. The chapters that show the killing of Natesan, Sangili brother by the army and how is left unable to help his brother owing to family circumstances and the agony of his mother not to support her granddaughters.
As we feel so close to the lives of the people the setbacks they suffer feel so painful and the loss so huge.
At one point the families are forced to vacate Thanikaladi as it becomes an army base and live elsewhere. Their lives seem to resume to normalcy as children grow up and get married and they have daughters themselves. But there are also youngsters constantly eloping the families to join the LTTE. Daughters grow up to be sometimes mothers, sometimes to become LTTE members. Parents are constantly in the look for them to know if they are alive. Even in the midst of the conflict lives are eventful, emotional, they have fights, love, setbacks, deaths.
After living in for some time the conflicts comes one last time to destroy their lives completely. There is an all-out offensive people are forced to flee village after village. Athaar and Chandra die on the same day in heavy shelling ending their lives on the same night. Vellaiyan, Rani who are sons and daughters of Sangili and Meenakshi are trying every bit to save their kids. Meenakshi dies in the bunkers in sleep as shelling increases the family buries her in a hurry and leave. Valliaal's daughter Vinodhini is now part of the LTTE and the family comes to know of her presence only at the end of the conflict when she is arrested by the Srilankan army never to be seen again.
Velliayan, son of Singamalai is married to Sindhu who is Valliaal's daughter. After serving in camps after the end of the war he starts working for a Dutch NGO in removing the landmines planted during the conflict. In an irony, he is working now to remove the landmines that he himself had planted during the conflict. As the final war unfolds how Sayanthan manages to capture the sheer scale of destruction and how people are doing whatever it takes to keep oneself alive is what makes this novel a classic. Even amidst the huge destruction, there is still a need to continue living and keep hope. One of the heroic characters in the novel is Malar who as an adult is cheated by someone, eventually, she joins LTTE after being brutally raped by the army. She becomes a fighter and loses her legs in conflict and becomes a medical practitioner. After the conflict Malar and Raani return to Thanikaladi to restart their lives.
At the end of the novel, you are left with a plethora of emotions and a supreme sense of emptiness. The living is made to feel guilty for the dead, you feel the characters themselves feeling that they have wronged by someone by being alive. It also makes you wonder what was achieved by this war, did anyone gain anything out of this conflict?
In a sense violent struggle sometimes loss the direction in which they are going and are very difficult to do a course correction. As the loss is so high there is no option of going back and to go for a compromise. I was reminded of many times over the novel of Gandhi who abhorred violence in his method. Non-violent movements take a long time to achieve changes but it is a method which achieves it using least destruction. It is to be seen how efficient it would have been in this context.
The cost of war has increased manifold with the advent of modern weapons. Especially after the second world war, direct armed conflicts have reduced significantly but still gorilla wars which like cancer affect people for a very long time. Any war affects the lives of ordinary people beyond ways which we can understand. Generally, historical accounts of war tell about the number of dead or wounded, etc but it never tells the stories of people whose lives have been completely shattered and destroyed in any armed conflict. It is the work of literature to always tell us the enormous human cost of armed conflict. We have romantic notions about war but any war is large scale destruction of ordinary people lives. First time I read War and Peace I was struck by the fact that contrast to the romantic notions we share about war, wars are more about chance events, destruction, suffering and pain that we have no idea about.
Aadhirai captures the lives of people caught in the conflict between LTTE and the Srilankan army over a period of three decades from the late 1970s. The novel tells the story of three generations of multiple families who face constant threat and eviction from their lands during the various stages of the conflict. In a sense, the war is a continuing presence in the lives of these families. The villager's lives are characterized by multiple cycles when life seemingly returning to normalcy is again thrown out of gear due to the war.
Aadhirai starts in 1991 when Lakshmanan an LTTE rebel is caught by the Srilankan army and jailed. From there it goes back to 1977 where Lakshmanan as a boy is forced to flee with his father Singamalai from the hills. Singamalai belongs to lower caste background and he is working as a laborer in the tea plantations when he is forced to flee the hills due to the rioting against Tamils. Lakshmanan and his father move to Thanikaladi. There are two families, one of Aththaar and his wife Chandra, Athaar is an LTTE sympathizer and belongs to lower caste who had married Chandra belonging to Velala caste from Jaffna. Sangili who is a traditional hunter wants to keep the forest out of the armed conflict is Athaar's close friend. Sangili and his wife Meenakshi are another one of the central families. It is through the lives of these two families we get to know the effects of the conflict. Lakshmanan starts working with Athaar and stays with them as they are devoid of children they look upon him as their own son. Singamalai meanwhile lives with his daughter Valliyaal in the same village.
As the conflict unfolds we see the palpable tensions overwhelming the lives of the families. They are constantly debating and discussing the various events, Chandra and Sangili are wary of armed conflict. Athaar is sympathetic to the LTTE and there is a constant source of tension in the family.
The important achievement of the novel is the way it manages to captures the little details of the lives of these people. The chapters that show the killing of Natesan, Sangili brother by the army and how is left unable to help his brother owing to family circumstances and the agony of his mother not to support her granddaughters.
As we feel so close to the lives of the people the setbacks they suffer feel so painful and the loss so huge.
At one point the families are forced to vacate Thanikaladi as it becomes an army base and live elsewhere. Their lives seem to resume to normalcy as children grow up and get married and they have daughters themselves. But there are also youngsters constantly eloping the families to join the LTTE. Daughters grow up to be sometimes mothers, sometimes to become LTTE members. Parents are constantly in the look for them to know if they are alive. Even in the midst of the conflict lives are eventful, emotional, they have fights, love, setbacks, deaths.
After living in for some time the conflicts comes one last time to destroy their lives completely. There is an all-out offensive people are forced to flee village after village. Athaar and Chandra die on the same day in heavy shelling ending their lives on the same night. Vellaiyan, Rani who are sons and daughters of Sangili and Meenakshi are trying every bit to save their kids. Meenakshi dies in the bunkers in sleep as shelling increases the family buries her in a hurry and leave. Valliaal's daughter Vinodhini is now part of the LTTE and the family comes to know of her presence only at the end of the conflict when she is arrested by the Srilankan army never to be seen again.
Velliayan, son of Singamalai is married to Sindhu who is Valliaal's daughter. After serving in camps after the end of the war he starts working for a Dutch NGO in removing the landmines planted during the conflict. In an irony, he is working now to remove the landmines that he himself had planted during the conflict. As the final war unfolds how Sayanthan manages to capture the sheer scale of destruction and how people are doing whatever it takes to keep oneself alive is what makes this novel a classic. Even amidst the huge destruction, there is still a need to continue living and keep hope. One of the heroic characters in the novel is Malar who as an adult is cheated by someone, eventually, she joins LTTE after being brutally raped by the army. She becomes a fighter and loses her legs in conflict and becomes a medical practitioner. After the conflict Malar and Raani return to Thanikaladi to restart their lives.
At the end of the novel, you are left with a plethora of emotions and a supreme sense of emptiness. The living is made to feel guilty for the dead, you feel the characters themselves feeling that they have wronged by someone by being alive. It also makes you wonder what was achieved by this war, did anyone gain anything out of this conflict?
In a sense violent struggle sometimes loss the direction in which they are going and are very difficult to do a course correction. As the loss is so high there is no option of going back and to go for a compromise. I was reminded of many times over the novel of Gandhi who abhorred violence in his method. Non-violent movements take a long time to achieve changes but it is a method which achieves it using least destruction. It is to be seen how efficient it would have been in this context.
July 7, 2016
முதல் பக்கத்தை வாசிச்ச போதே மிச்சத்தை வாசிக்க கூடாது எண்டு நினைச்சன். இருந்தாலும் வாசிக்காமலும் இருக்க முடியேல. இது "யாவும் கற்பனை" எண்டு ஒதுக்கவும் முடியேல.
என்னத்தை சொல்லுறது??? கோபமும், வெறுப்பும், இயலாமையும்தான் மிஞ்சிக் கிடக்கு.....
என்னத்தை சொல்லுறது??? கோபமும், வெறுப்பும், இயலாமையும்தான் மிஞ்சிக் கிடக்கு.....
March 29, 2016
Excellent.
July 3, 2020
வாழ்த்துக்கள் சயந்தன்! கதைய வாழ்தே எழுதி இருக்கிறியள்!
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