After bArathi and puthumaippiththan, thi. jAnakirAman and dha. jeyakAn^than are two of the greatest thamizh writers. In any critical evaluation and history of thamizh literature, both have earned a pride of place among the makers of modern thamizh literature (MMTL). I wish to define as Modern Thamizh Literature(MTL), the thamizh literature after bArathi, bArathidhAsan and puthumaippiththan. This is purely a matter of operational convenience for the task I plan to undertake. It is not based on any literary/historical criterion. I propose to post a series of articles on jeyakAn^than and his opus. I invite others to post similar articles on the output of other 'greats' of MMTL. Without presuming to prescribe for others, I wish to suggest ki. rAjan^ArayaNan, vaNNan^ilavan, n^A. pichchamUrthy, n^ANYchiln^Adan, pirapaNYchan, vallikkaNNan, sun^dhara rAmasAmi, rAjam kirushNan, se. yOgan^Athan, thOppil mugammadhu mIrAn, em. vi. veNGkatarAm, nIla. padhman^Aban, pattukkOttai kaliyANasun^dharam, pazhamalay, pUmaNi, thi. jAnakirAman as possible candidates as MMTL for others to write and post on SCT. Of course, one could also post on any other writer ( I am thinking of writers like makAkavi, sEran and dAniyal - all of them Izham writers) who would easily fit in the above company. In my opinion, the prime criterion should be the ability of the author's works to stand the test of time. Mere prpaganda for some cause of the day should be excluded, IMHO. I will begin by indicating the general scheme which I intend to follow. I will use the letter-scheme shown in the next para to refer to the publishers of jeyakAn^than's works. In my next posting I will provide a BIBLIOGRAPHY of jeyakAn^than's works to which I have access. This Bibliography will first provide the TITLE, Date of Publication (MONTH/YEAR), PUBLISHER, and categorization of the work: A for Explicitly Autobiographical Works, B for Biographical works, E for Collection of essays, N for Novels/Novelettes, and S for collection of Short Stories. I will use the following abbreviations to refer to the publishers.
A: Asian Book Company B: bArathi pathippakam C: Christian Literature Society K: kalpanA monthly (\bt mAdha idhazh \et) L: kalaiNYan pathippakam M: mOthi pirasuram N: maNiyan monthly ( \bt mAdha idhazh \et) U: Urvasi monthly (\bt mAdha idhaxh \et) V: vAnathi pathippakam. Where NO publisher is indicated, mInAtchi puththaka ^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^ nilaiyam of mElakkOburaththeru, madhurai are the publishers. ^^^^^^^^