By PREM SOURI KISHORE
Awarded the prestigious Padma Shri in 2015, by the Government of India, George Hart, professor of Tamil Language at the University of California, Berkeley , is distinguished for establishing Tamil as a classical language and for his translations of Sangam Literature His devotion, commitment, scholarship and...
Awarded the prestigious Padma Shri in 2015, by the Government of India, George Hart, professor of Tamil Language at the University of California, Berkeley , is distinguished for establishing Tamil as a classical language and for his translations of Sangam Literature His devotion, commitment, scholarship and...
focus directing awareness of the richness, history and diversity of the Indian language Tamil and his historical translations make him a worthy recipient of the award. He has played a crucial role in opening doors to a culture , creating a new vocabulary and recognizing to the world that Tamil is a classical language.
Q: What piqued your interest in Tamil?
I went to Harvard and majored in chemistry and physics but in school I studied Latin and Russian and became interested in languages .In third year college I had a roommate who was interested in Buddhism and so I started learning Sanskrit. I was fascinated and switched to Sanskrit in Indian studies.I was taught by an amazing scholar. I spent the proverbial 12 years of Sanskrit study to get a foot hold in the language. I had studied German , so I learned that in India there was another language that was not European .Another language in India which had a lot of literature, Tamil .I went through a primer on my own, did not know the pronounciation. Then I went in the summer to Wisconsin to study Tamil -quite fortuitious taught by one of the greatest scholars A.K. Ramunajam. At that time I met my wife Kausalya who was Tamilian. I continued to study the old poems together with A.K. Ramanujam -quite an experience .Did research for a thesis and spent a year in Chennai and made a point to study with people who did not understand English. How can you learn a language otherwise? I had a Tamil vidwan who worked with me on a bunch of old Sangam Literature. The oldest form of literature. I started translating while continuing to learn Sanskrit.
I worked with a Sanskrit pundit for a year who did not know English. This was important as it gave me focus and discipline. My wife after a while understood everything I said in Sanskrit.
I returned to the US with a lot of index cards of Tamil and Sanskrit Literature and wrote my thesis to show that they both shared a lot of conventions and probably did not borrow from each other. Some of the conventions are common like in ‘Meghadoota’ where lovers are separated during monsoons. Lot of customs are the same in Tamil or Telugu literature.
A colleague Narayan Rao did a lot of work in Telugu literature of 2000 years ago. We found commonalities. Old conservative culture spread across Deccan into Maharashtra .This may be the result of cross cultural marriages, often between cousins.
Q: What is Sangam Literature? How did the anthologies come about?
Scholars differ on the exact origin of Sangam Literature. The word Sangam is not from the Tamil language, it is derived from the Sanskrit word Samgha which means academy and comes from the Buddhist and Jain sanghas that existed between the 6th and 8th centuries BCE.
The Sangam period is the period in the history of ancient Southern India spanning 7-10 generations from 300 BCE. It is a collection of mostly 2,400 secular poems composed by 450 Tamil poets both men and women from various classes of society . Kings, scholars, teachers, artisans, farmers, noblemen, learned men, doctors, even farmers. Some of the poems are anonymous .It is one of the main sources used for documenting the early history of the ancient Tamil land. The poems are the main source of the Chola Chera and Pandava eras.
The poets and authors gathered regularly and expounded on the events, rulers and daily life . It started our as an oral tradition and continued for several centuries. Later texts and anthologies were composed and commentaries written around the 13th or 14 th centuries. The Sangam period entertained literary academies, but disappeared with the advent of Jainism and Buddhism and rediscovered in the 19th century.
Q: The Tamil language it is said had become a powerful and elegant medium of literary expression with social life coded with elaborate conventions.What were the themes?
All poets had patrons. As for themes, most praised the king’s virtues as the king was close to God. You also come to face to face with tragedies, women suffering, nature ,moods, situations, the politics of the time, clothing, jewelry, battles, warriors, trade, friendships, kindnesses, courtesans, passion, betrayal, the love of man and woman.For instance, ‘Akananuru’ was written by 142 poets and includes around 400 poems while ‘Purananuru’ has 400 poems written by men and women and among them were was the famous female poet Avvaiyar who wrote 33 poems .They range from 4- 40 lines .Most poems praise the kings belonging to 3 great dynasties the Chera, Chola and Pandya.
Q: The themes appear to be dramatic , vivid and rich with various issues of life and historical incidents. Is war a common theme in Tamil Literature?
Book of War and Wisdom-Akananeru a rich collection’s 400 pages long . Many of the writings are in praise of royalty, as poets were trying to get them support. A French Institiute in Pondicherry has just published the anthology.
Interestingly enough the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka used these poems where war is glorified, and they used that as part of their propaganda and culture.
Sangam poems are so varied detailed, elaborate and an extraordinary body of work. Of course Telugu literature too is powerful but when you try to evaluate , a lot of it is in the eye of the beholder. It is difficult to generalize. Nobody knows enough of all the languages to compare them.
Q: What was the length of these poems?
Some poems run hundreds of lines, some are short, just 3-4 lines
Q: How much of Sanskrit influence was there in early Tamil poems?
You may find Sanskrit words in the early poems and later no Sanskrit words at all. Elegant Tamil is less Sanskritised unlike Telugu and the other languages.
Nature, evenings, spring season, monsoons, clouds, separation can be found in epic poetry. Time and seasons reflect the emotions of humans as seen in the epic poetry of Kalidas a (10 th century CE) as well as the 6TH century Tamil ‘Silapadhikaram.’
Tamil literature does not have the Upanishads and Sanskrit does not have the ‘Tirukural.’
Q: When did Sangam literature disappear?
Probably between the first and 3rd century CE since the Jains and Buddhists became active and Sanskrit became the more intellelctual language of South East Asia.Telugu developed at this time and was very much affected by Sanskrit.
But then you get ‘Manimekala’ which is more Sanskritised .Because it is older Sanskrit keeps its identity so strong .Tamil is perhaps entirely independent in its first beginnigns to be entirely independendent of Sanskrit influences, yet the name Sangam is retained.
Q: Did poets travel?
Bards traveled from king to king and place to place to make money and then when the poets came along, they imitiated the bards and pretended they were like them. Whether they traveled is not clear.
Q: How did Tamil language develop?
It is one of the many Dravidian languages. Language keeps changing .Groups move and produce daughter languages.Meanwhile scholars are beating their heads trying to prove the Indus Valley spoke Dravidian languages.There were at least 9 Dravidian languages and they divided again.We have no concrete evidence.
Q: Is there much interest in research today ?
They are Tamils who research diligently and put their findings on the internet Sri Lankan Tamils have done really good work .They take great pride in the language. In this age of technology most people aim for a career in medicine or computer or engineering but hopefully that will change.
Q: What piqued your interest in Tamil?
I went to Harvard and majored in chemistry and physics but in school I studied Latin and Russian and became interested in languages .In third year college I had a roommate who was interested in Buddhism and so I started learning Sanskrit. I was fascinated and switched to Sanskrit in Indian studies.I was taught by an amazing scholar. I spent the proverbial 12 years of Sanskrit study to get a foot hold in the language. I had studied German , so I learned that in India there was another language that was not European .Another language in India which had a lot of literature, Tamil .I went through a primer on my own, did not know the pronounciation. Then I went in the summer to Wisconsin to study Tamil -quite fortuitious taught by one of the greatest scholars A.K. Ramunajam. At that time I met my wife Kausalya who was Tamilian. I continued to study the old poems together with A.K. Ramanujam -quite an experience .Did research for a thesis and spent a year in Chennai and made a point to study with people who did not understand English. How can you learn a language otherwise? I had a Tamil vidwan who worked with me on a bunch of old Sangam Literature. The oldest form of literature. I started translating while continuing to learn Sanskrit.
I worked with a Sanskrit pundit for a year who did not know English. This was important as it gave me focus and discipline. My wife after a while understood everything I said in Sanskrit.
I returned to the US with a lot of index cards of Tamil and Sanskrit Literature and wrote my thesis to show that they both shared a lot of conventions and probably did not borrow from each other. Some of the conventions are common like in ‘Meghadoota’ where lovers are separated during monsoons. Lot of customs are the same in Tamil or Telugu literature.
A colleague Narayan Rao did a lot of work in Telugu literature of 2000 years ago. We found commonalities. Old conservative culture spread across Deccan into Maharashtra .This may be the result of cross cultural marriages, often between cousins.
Q: What is Sangam Literature? How did the anthologies come about?
Scholars differ on the exact origin of Sangam Literature. The word Sangam is not from the Tamil language, it is derived from the Sanskrit word Samgha which means academy and comes from the Buddhist and Jain sanghas that existed between the 6th and 8th centuries BCE.
The Sangam period is the period in the history of ancient Southern India spanning 7-10 generations from 300 BCE. It is a collection of mostly 2,400 secular poems composed by 450 Tamil poets both men and women from various classes of society . Kings, scholars, teachers, artisans, farmers, noblemen, learned men, doctors, even farmers. Some of the poems are anonymous .It is one of the main sources used for documenting the early history of the ancient Tamil land. The poems are the main source of the Chola Chera and Pandava eras.
The poets and authors gathered regularly and expounded on the events, rulers and daily life . It started our as an oral tradition and continued for several centuries. Later texts and anthologies were composed and commentaries written around the 13th or 14 th centuries. The Sangam period entertained literary academies, but disappeared with the advent of Jainism and Buddhism and rediscovered in the 19th century.
Q: The Tamil language it is said had become a powerful and elegant medium of literary expression with social life coded with elaborate conventions.What were the themes?
All poets had patrons. As for themes, most praised the king’s virtues as the king was close to God. You also come to face to face with tragedies, women suffering, nature ,moods, situations, the politics of the time, clothing, jewelry, battles, warriors, trade, friendships, kindnesses, courtesans, passion, betrayal, the love of man and woman.For instance, ‘Akananuru’ was written by 142 poets and includes around 400 poems while ‘Purananuru’ has 400 poems written by men and women and among them were was the famous female poet Avvaiyar who wrote 33 poems .They range from 4- 40 lines .Most poems praise the kings belonging to 3 great dynasties the Chera, Chola and Pandya.
Q: The themes appear to be dramatic , vivid and rich with various issues of life and historical incidents. Is war a common theme in Tamil Literature?
Book of War and Wisdom-Akananeru a rich collection’s 400 pages long . Many of the writings are in praise of royalty, as poets were trying to get them support. A French Institiute in Pondicherry has just published the anthology.
Interestingly enough the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka used these poems where war is glorified, and they used that as part of their propaganda and culture.
Sangam poems are so varied detailed, elaborate and an extraordinary body of work. Of course Telugu literature too is powerful but when you try to evaluate , a lot of it is in the eye of the beholder. It is difficult to generalize. Nobody knows enough of all the languages to compare them.
Q: What was the length of these poems?
Some poems run hundreds of lines, some are short, just 3-4 lines
Q: How much of Sanskrit influence was there in early Tamil poems?
You may find Sanskrit words in the early poems and later no Sanskrit words at all. Elegant Tamil is less Sanskritised unlike Telugu and the other languages.
Nature, evenings, spring season, monsoons, clouds, separation can be found in epic poetry. Time and seasons reflect the emotions of humans as seen in the epic poetry of Kalidas a (10 th century CE) as well as the 6TH century Tamil ‘Silapadhikaram.’
Tamil literature does not have the Upanishads and Sanskrit does not have the ‘Tirukural.’
Q: When did Sangam literature disappear?
Probably between the first and 3rd century CE since the Jains and Buddhists became active and Sanskrit became the more intellelctual language of South East Asia.Telugu developed at this time and was very much affected by Sanskrit.
But then you get ‘Manimekala’ which is more Sanskritised .Because it is older Sanskrit keeps its identity so strong .Tamil is perhaps entirely independent in its first beginnigns to be entirely independendent of Sanskrit influences, yet the name Sangam is retained.
Q: Did poets travel?
Bards traveled from king to king and place to place to make money and then when the poets came along, they imitiated the bards and pretended they were like them. Whether they traveled is not clear.
Q: How did Tamil language develop?
It is one of the many Dravidian languages. Language keeps changing .Groups move and produce daughter languages.Meanwhile scholars are beating their heads trying to prove the Indus Valley spoke Dravidian languages.There were at least 9 Dravidian languages and they divided again.We have no concrete evidence.
Q: Is there much interest in research today ?
They are Tamils who research diligently and put their findings on the internet Sri Lankan Tamils have done really good work .They take great pride in the language. In this age of technology most people aim for a career in medicine or computer or engineering but hopefully that will change.
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