KALA KRISHNAN’S MURUGAN TRILOGY DELVES RIGHT INTO THE HEART OF WHAT IT IS ABOUT THIS GOD THAT’S SO COMPELLING, WHY HE ELICITS NOT JUST DEVOTION BUT ALSO LOVE. The great battle of Chendur has drawn to a close and Murugan has fulfilled his role as Mahasena. But it has left his beloved war bard Aambal enervated, her memories obliterated, her tongue stilled, unable to compose sentences, let alone verses. Will Aambal find her way to words again? The battle had also kept Murugan from Theivanai whose mere presence had tugged at his feet. Will he succeed in wooing her now? Kala Krishnan has been exploring the Murugan universe for years now, first in verse and now in prose. In this second volume of a planned trilogy, she expands the mythologies of the god. Kumara, Karthikeya, Kandhan, Velan, Mahasena: the god of Tamizh, the patron of the Great Assembly of poets in Madurai, friend and mentor to the hot-headed and fiercely loyal Aambal, known to all as ‘Murugan’s poet’. Exploring the stories of the women in the god’s life—his poet Aambal and his wife Theivanai—Book Two of the trilogy is resonant with the stories that were, as well as vividly original.

About the Book KALA KRISHNAN'S MURUGAN TRILOGY DELVES RIGHT INTO THE HEART OF WHAT IT IS ABOUT THIS GOD THAT'S SO COMPELLING, WHY HE ELICITS NOT JUST DEVOTION BUT ALSO LOVE. The great battle of Chendur has drawn to a close and Murugan has fulfilled his role as Mahasena. But it has left his beloved war bard Aambal enervated, her memories obliterated, her tongue stilled, unable to compose sentences, let alone verses. Will Aambal find her way to words again? The battle had also kept Murugan from Theivanai whose mere presence had tugged at his feet. Will he succeed in wooing her now? Kala Krishnan has been exploring the Murugan universe for years now, first in verse and now in prose. In this second volume of a planned trilogy, she expands the mythologies of the god. Kumara, Karthikeya, Kandhan, Velan, Mahasena: the god of Tamizh, the patron of the Great Assembly of poets in Madurai, friend and mentor to the hot-headed and fiercely loyal Aambal, known to all as 'Murugan's poet'. Exploring the stories of the women in the god's life-his poet Aambal and his wife Theivanai-Book Two of the trilogy is resonant with the stories that were, as well as vividly original. About the Author Kala Krishnan is the author of two books of poetry, He Is Honey, Salt and the Most Perfect Grammar (2016) and Offer Him All Things, Charred, Burned & Cindered (2018) and of Mahasena, Part One of the Murugan Trilogy. She lives in Bangalore with Paru, Gauri, Sathyavak and Totoro.

Murugan -- the younger son of Shiva and Parvathy, the younger brother of Ganesha -- is a tricky and temperamental god, but he is beloved of the poets. Fittingly then, Kala Krishnan Ramesh's contemporary bhakti poems in He Is Honey, Salt and the Most Perfect Grammar speak in the voices of many poets. We don't always know who they are, but as the poems unfold, one voice emerges above those of the rest. She is the god's favourite poet, a woman whose whole life revolves around him.

Hitherto, the academic study of Indian cinema has focused primarily on Bollywood, despite the fact that the Tamil film industry, based in southern India, has overtaken Bollywood in terms of annual output. This book examines critically the cultural and cinematic representations in Tamil cinema. It outlines its history and distinctive characteristics, and proceeds to consider a number of important themes such as gender, religion, class, caste, fandom, cinematic genre, the politics of identity and diaspora. Throughout, the book cogently links the analysis to wider social, political and cultural phenomena in Tamil and Indian society. Overall, it is an exciting and original contribution to an under-studied field, also facilitating a fresh consideration of the existing body of scholarship on Indian cinema.

Babaji dictated these three books to V.T. Neelakantan, who wrote them down verbatim.