No takers for Tamil literature, note experts

One of the country’s bestselling authors, Chetan Bhagat, recently brought out his murder mystery The Girl in Room 105 in Tamil, keen to please his fan base through vernacular languages as well. While Chetan hopes to woo an untapped set of readers in their mother tongue, several authors who have spent decades in penning Tamil literature find themselves writing for a tiny section of readers — with their size diminishing over time. Ahead of the World Book Day on April 23, which is marked by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) to promote reading and publishing, authors, bookstores and readers speak to DT Next on the gradually diminishing community of Tamil book readers, particularly among the young.

Popular Tamil poet and writer Manushyaputhiran, who has been writing for about three decades, finds that reading habits among the youth, in general, are receding over time. “The advent of social media has resulted in a very scattered focus among the youth, who are only reading headlines of articles, and instead prefer to view videos and a lot of visual content. Over the years, I have noticed that the buyers of books have gone down by about 50 per cent, posing a huge challenge to the publishing industry,” the 51-year-old author laments.

Those picking up Tamil literature, who remain of a miniscule size among the youth, are looking largely for political books, Manushyaputhiran says. “Tamil youth have always played an active role in socio-political movements. Those youngsters who still read Tamil literature often read Periyar and BR Ambedkar. Compared to English, Tamil authors are struggling to find their readers. Reading clubs and encouraging reading habit in schools can help preserve the vernacular language books,” he remarks.

City-based Panuval Bookstore in Thiruvanmiyur, which offers a huge array of titles in Tamil, finds readers picking up those books which had some controversy surrounding them. “There are many Tamil poetry books releasing, but have very few takers. Political books, particularly those which are in the news for any controversy, find a lot of buyers. With not many authors in the current times being as popular as late writer Sujatha Rangarajan, buyers are lesser,” says the store manager Ramkumar.

An avid reader and the host of a book reading club, Chennai Readers Meetup, Martin Devadason, however, finds that while people are not averse to reading books in Tamil, finding books they can connect with in the language is hard. “One cannot easily find books on subjects like management or engineering, which makes most readers pick titles in English. Relevance to the current day is often missing in Tamil writings,” says Martin, who works in the automotive industry.

For 25-year-old author Krishna Trilok, the author of Notes of a Dream: The Authorised Biography of A.R. Rahman, there is a gap existing between the content in vernacular texts and the millennial generation. “In the age of Netflix, young people are looking for globalised subjects, and on the other hand, Tamil literature with its rustic settings, may not be as appealing as sci-fi books in English. Tamil reading ability of many young readers remains at a very basic level, since they would have opted for it as second or third language in schools,” he adds.