Artistes dance to Marathi poems

The novel experiment of presenting Marathi poems through Indian classical dances left the audience in Vadodara spellbound. It proved to be hit among poetry lovers as the three-hour show at C C Mehta auditorium on Sunday evening. Artistes presented different hues of Marathi poetry to perfection.

Variety of poems right from childhood to romance and separation were picked up for the event named Kavya-Painjan (ankle bells). "It was a success not only in terms of audience's appreciation, but also in the manner that Marathi poems and literature reach people. In fact, all dancers were educated in English medium schools and understood the language less," said Sandip Chitre, who conceptualised the event.

Full report here Times of India 

Balancing rhyme, metre

Senior corporate executive Arun Kumar, sayshe finds joy in capturing impressions in verse. His book of poems Plain Truths has just been published

Writing poetry comes to him as easily as computing accounts or balancing spreadsheets. Welcome to the verse-filled world of Arun Kumar, an entrepreneur and senior corporate executive and now a published poet. Arun's first compilation of 40 poems in English titled Plain Truths has just been brought out by Current Books, with a painting by none other than Anjolie Ela Menon as the cover.

“I was drawn to poetry right from a young age; right from the time I was a student at Lawrence School, Lovedale [near Ooty]. The credit for inculcating my interest in poetry – and literature in general – goes to the late W.J. McMahon, our fabulous English teacher at school, and to my father, B. Madhavan Nair, too,” recalls Arun.

Enjoyable endeavour
“I enjoy the idea, the economy of poetry that allows me to express a lot in as few words as possible and leave a lot unsaid. In fact, I remember jotting down verses whenever I felt like it all throughout school and even during my college years, studying physics at University College here in my native Thiruvananthapuram. It's something that I still enjoy doing. That's not to say that writing poetry is cathartic. I find poetry a fun, enjoyable way to capture an impression in verse,” adds Arun. The Silicon Valley, California-based poet sat down for a chat with Metro Plus, at his parent's house in Kowdiar while on a recent visit to the city.

Full report here Hindu

Regaining the lost glory of poetic play

If you were a Telugu teacher in the good old days, you were singing in the class room. Well, it wasn’t  exactly singing in the strict sense of the word, but one would tunefully recite the poems from the text. A Telugu teacher who could not ‘sing’ a poem was considered a blot on the fraternity. But then, those were the old days where the Telugu pundit was a pundit in the real sense of the word, knowing both his ancient literary texts and the basics of music.

Nowadays, this singing has almost completely gone out of the curriculum. Not only because the contemporary teacher cannot sing poems, but also because the syllabus has become more modern with blank verse, short story and essays occupying quite a significant. But there is one place where the Telugu poem is still sung and enjoyed both by the singer and the listener. That is the Padya Natakam in Telugu. Telugus are extremely proud of this poetic heritage. Padya Natakam, which we claim as a unique genre not to be seen in other languages, has its origin from the late 19th century. In a play of not less than 3 to 4 hours, there are just a few dialogues in between and a series of singing poetry. All the major dialogues are in poetic form; the characters burst out singing as in opera; these actors need to be proficient in literature, music apart from the four Abhinayas. They need to concentrate at one and the same time on emoting, speaking, singing and gesturing.

All this makes it a unique performing art. Starting from Vemuri Gaggayya, Peesapati, Raghuramaiah, Sthanam Narasimha Rao (to name a very few) to the present day Gummadi Gopalakrishna there have been a number of excellent artistes. The duo who made this poetic play a household name are Tirupati Venkata Kavulu. Their poetic play based on Mahabharata, and especially the scene where Arjuna and Duryodhana visit Krishna to ask for his boons, and the famous scene in which Lord Krishna visits Duryodhana’s court to make an ‘amicable’ settlement between Pandavas and Kauravas are known as classics in this genre. In fact, there is hardly any Telugu person alive who does not know at least one poem from this text, written in the beginning of the 20th century.

Full report here New Indian Express