A befitting honour

A befitting honour
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Highlights

On the 94th birth anniversary of famous Telugu writer Munipalle Raju, who left us one year back, his family members in an ennobling gesture resolved to establish Munipalle Raju Sahitya Puraskara Samithi

On the 94th birth anniversary of famous Telugu writer Munipalle Raju, who left us one year back, his family members in an ennobling gesture resolved to establish Munipalle Raju Sahitya Puraskara Samithi. And decided to declare annual awards in perpetuating the legacy and in honour of Munipalle Raju, a distinguished writer. He as part of his duties on the administrative side of the Army, worked at different places of India, and right from very early days had amassed knowledge and firsthand experience about the vibrancy of India.

His characters are polyglots, and a mini-India reflects in his stories, and in other writings. Raju was a quintessential Indian, and his moorings with the world literature always remained extensively beneficial. He left behind dozens of stories, memoirs, some scripts made into films, etc. A Sahitya Akademi Award -winner, he pointed out about the magical realism, as a writer’s tool was existent in Indian epics as well and cited many instances. Although the moderns held this little suspect, his attitude as a writer was rich and included many myths as tools of the writer. Holding humanity above other barriers, his stories reflect the saga of goodwill so common among the millions.
The first edition of this award by the Munipalle Raju Sahitya Puraskara Samithi is being conferred on Rama Teertha, a bi-lingual poet, writer, translator, critic, researcher, columnist, editor, and an orator.

The award will be bestowed upon Rama Teertha on March 16 at Visakhapatnam Public Library, Visakhapatnam.

With four poetry anthologies, much of bi-lingual works regularly published in media, and a translator for All India Radio, Sahitya Akademi, etc, Rama Teertha specialises in comparative studies of literature, and different periods of literary history in both East and West. In Telugu literature, he had thrown light on never before aspects like the number of kissing scenes in Gurajada’s Kanyasulkam, Urdu/Hindustani words in the play. Influences of world literature on Gurajada, so on and so forth. His efforts brought into light the English speech of Kandukuri Veeresalingam. Gurajada’s stories and Sri Sri’s ‘Mahaprasthanam’ English translation had extended the reach and scope of these stellar works. He translated into Telugu/English more than a hundred poets. TS Eliot, Alexander Blok, Guillaume Apollinaire, Tagore, Kazi Nazrul Islam were writers to name a few whose works he had brought into Telugu.

His work on Nirbhaya Jyothi makes him the first poet to pen a long poem on the subject. He also became the first poet to record a poetic tribute to great Telugu play ‘Kanyasulkam’, and he also produced a sequel ‘Jendaa Pai Gurajaada’, which was received well and enacted during the 125th anniversary of the. His music album ‘Noorella Janaganamana – Janasvaranjali’ on the centennial of Janaganamana, and Satabadi Sri Sri on the centennial of Sri Sri scored well with the lovers of literature.

Researching into the important aspects of literature and culture, he wrote a number of articles, finding out inspiration works to important Telugu pieces, and unearthed works so far remained out of anthologies in the works of writers like Sri Sri.

Possessing skills to blend technological advancement with the merits of literature, he developed many presentations on the works of Bhasa, Gurajada, Sri Sri, Chaso, Saleem, Arudra Hiroshima, etc.

He is currently engaged in highlighting and focusing on the Telugu literary history of the 20th century. Rama Teertha is a busy man of letters, and this award is yet another endorsement of the quality and incessant quest with which the writer in him is loaded. Munipalle Raju held Rama Teertha, as a carrier of the beacon and now their family members and Sulochana Devi conferring the award on him is a befitting honour.

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