This slim volume is a collection of Neela Padmanabhan’s writings. The range of his writings is wide. The themes he covers are immensely diverse. He casts the net wide and captures the essence of wisdom gleaned by him during the last fifty years of literary experience. He had suffered privations quietly, held his head high even when friends turned to enemies when they could not stand his success both in his profession and also with the pen. Some of them cast doubts on his commitment to his job as an engineer, scoffed at him saying his heart was not in his profession, but in literature. They sniped, "He gets the best of both worlds. He gets his salary; and he spends all the time spinning words, making more money." As if money matters to the creative mind! The essays reflect the sensitivity of a spirit that carries the Cross. There is deep anguish in his heart. This anguish helps him strike out in defence of the man on the street, to advocate high moral values that alone shall make man realize his true worth. These essays are thought provoking. They sparkle. They have a rare sheen. Read them and vibe with one of the leading living stars of modern Tamil Literature.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Neela Padmanabhan
Neela Padmanabhan is a leading figure in the arena of Tamil Literature. An engineer by profession, a humanist by instinct, he has straddled the scene like a Colossus, producing novels, short stories and poems and critical essays that have found warm reception from the readers. He wrested from the Tamil spoken in the districts of former Madras Presidency and hence considered to be hybrid. From then on, he never looked back. His pen responded to the outpouring of a pained heart lacerated by a million wounds, troubled by a trillion aches, not necessarily his own, but of society at large. If these are not the ideal spirit of great literature, what else is! Neela has a spiritual bend of mind. His quest for the eternal and the permanent finds expression in his writings. His writing is of the people, but not for all the people. It is for the discerning, for those who are ready to crack the hard shell to get the real essence of wisdom inlaid. Awards and honours, he had reaped in abundance. He was on the Tamil Advisory Panel of the Central Sahitya Akademi where his work left a deep imprint. At 65, he stands at the height of his power. His thin frame and pinched face, with a flowing beard, set with burning eyes, gives him the image of a karmayogi.
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