Love Stands Alone: Selections from Tamil Sangam Poetry

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Composed at the turn of the Common Era, the ancient poems translated from classical Tamil in Love Stands Alone are breathtaking in their directness, subtle in their nuances and astonishingly contemporary in tone. The poems fall under two broad themes: akam, the interior and puram, the exterior. The akam poems are concerned with love in all its varied situations: clandestine and illicit; conjugal happiness and infidelity; separation and union. The puram poems encompass all other aspects of worldly life. They talk of wars and battlefields, the valour of warriors, the munificence of kings and chieftains, and the wisdom of bards. These timeless, marvellous poems succeed in engaging today’s readers with their acute rendering of the secular life of an ancient people. Unlike earlier translations that have relied on medieval commentaries, M.L. Thangappa’s English translation is based on an original interpretation of the classics. This is the result of a lifetime’s immersion in teaching and translating classical Tamil poetry. Theintroduction by A.R. Venkatachalapathy situates classical Tamil poetry in its historical and cultural setting and evaluates its contribution to world literature.

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M.L. Thangappa taught Tamil for over twenty-five years in the various colleges of the Puducherry government until his retirement in 1994. He has published a number of books of poetry and essays in Tamil and has translated from Tamil to English Sangam poetry, the songs of Ramalingam, Subramania Bharati and Bharatidasan. He has been awarded the Bharatidasan Award (1991) and the Sirpi Literary Award (2007) for his lifetime achievement in poetry.