Tamil lyricist, poet and novelist Kannadasan

Tamil lyricist, poet and novelist Kannadasan etched his place in the history of Tamil Nadu with the prolific work he did in his over four-decade career.

Besides several honours to his name, including a Sahitya Akademi award, Kannadasan also dabbled in politics.

Born as Muttaiah on 24 June 1927, in Sirukoodalpatti village of Tamil Nadu’s Sivaganga district, Kannadasan was the eighth child in his family.

As part of the Chettinad region’s established practice of giving away one’s children to a childless couple, Muttaiah was given to Palaniappa Chettiar and Sigappi Aachi. The foster parents renamed him Narayanan.

Although he had to drop out of school in the eighth grade, Narayanan was always inclined towards reading and writing. His dream was to publish stories in widely distributed magazines. At the age of 16, he left for Chennai chasing that dream.

In 1949, Kannadasan started out as a lyricist with the film Kanniyin Kaadhali. He never looked back, and eventually wrote more than 5,000 songs and 4,000 poems, apart from several essays and novels.

The song ‘Mayakama Thayakama’ from Sumaithaangi (1962), one of his big hits, was illustrative of the philosophical kind of writing he believed in.

After decades of success, Kannadasan stopped writing songs himself and got his assistants to pen the lyrics as he dictated them. Prominent directors, like S.P. Muthuraman, Panchu Arunachalam, among others, worked as his assistants early in their careers.