MetroPlus meets five offbeat Madurai writers who believe their works are a contribution to the society.

Words of wisdom

Nicholas Francis, Social work professional turned HR mentor

For Nicholas, writing has been a passion since school days. But once his first poem got published in the college magazine, he seriously got into the business of writing short stories, poems, columns and essays in various media. His writings are based on real-life experiences, touching upon larger issues like social problems, personality issues, youth, development and management related problem areas. “Through my books I address practical obstacles in life. I target the youth and put across my points to them, which I have acquired through learning and experiences,” says Nicholas who has penned a self-help book ‘Quick start to a powerful personality’ -- a guide to rural youngsters on personality development. Nicholas has also done a Tamil expression of the same content called ‘Vetri mugam’. “My books are in simple language so that a lay reader from rural or semi-urban areas can understand easily. I keep the page count to less than a 100 to keep boredom away,” he says. Turned down by several publishers, Nicholas did not give up. He started his own publishing house – Francis Publications – that has published four books so far. Nicholas is currently, writing two books - a collection of short stories and a practical handbook for social workers.

For the love of writing

Ram Vignesh, Software engineer

This techie now working in Mysore, hails from Madurai. A voracious reader since a very young age, Ram Vignesh used to spend his free time in the school library. Moving to Chennai for higher studies, opened his eyes to thriving opportunities in the literary field and that’s how he wrote his first book -- ‘The Book’, a romance fiction, set in Chennai and Bangalore. “I had been conceiving the story for long and my real life experiences added to it,” says Ram. ‘The Book’ is the story of a writer on the verge of death due to a deadly disease, while he is in the course of writing his masterpiece. His manuscript goes missing and finally how he publishes the book forms the remaining story. It involves love, mystery and drama. “It’s a cup of romance with a spoon of suspense. Initially I planned the story as a short film but given the expenses of film making, I dropped the idea and reworked on it as a novel for a year.” “I write everyday,” says Ram, who has published a crime thriller too, ‘Delhi at dark’. Both the books were published by Leadstart publications. “I want to touch all genres in writing. I have lived in many cities and try to capture the essence of these cities in my stories,” says Ram, currently writing a sports drama.

A lot to talk about

J. John Sekar, Associate Professor, Department of English, The American College

With the prime objective of improving students’ ability to converse in English, J.John Sekar decided to write the book ‘Conversational Skills’. “The main aim of writing it is to help students translate whatever they learn from the book to their field of study,” he says. An expert in linguistics, John Sekar has made it easy for those who wish to learn the language. “Earlier, the college had introduced a specific pattern for learning English through literature. It did not work as students from other specialities found this arrangement absurd. The course was of no use to those enrolled in science subjects. In the changed global scenario, English is seen more as a skill than a subject,” he says.

The book, in a conversational form, is a self learning material dealing with the importance of conversation and the need for better communication. It talks about technical features of speaking in English, the idiomatic expressions in spoken English and how a native English speaker would converse in a given context. The book released on July 31 will be made available to all educational institutions and libraries.

Learning about poems

Mahendra Babu, Tamil teacher, Government School, Ilamanur

“I belong to the town of the Mahakavi. And that played an important role in shaping my interest in poetry,” says Mahendra Babu, a Government School Tamil teacher from Ettayapuram. Being an orator, a poet and writer in Tamil and given his love for the language, Mahendra has taken teaching to a new level and holds most of his classes under the tree. Love for nature prompted him to release an audio CD of 10 songs based on importance of trees, humane values and discipline. He penned all the songs and the music was composed by the school’s music teacher. Teachers from different government schools lent their voice to the songs. “It is an important educational tool and we have distributed the CD to many schools in and around Madurai where it is played in the morning assembly,” says Mahendra. “The songs have been written in colloquial language so that rural students can easily relate to and understand them. I plan to introduce more of such innovative learning material especially for Government school students.” The CD is priced at Rs. 100 and available at Keestu Ganam music shop.

Voice of the voiceless

Gopi Shankar, Student-cum-gender activist

“When I took up the issue of sexual minorities in Madurai, I invited criticism. People were ignorant of sexual orientations and genders,” says Gopi Shankar, who started a study-circle for LGBTQ people in the city called Srishti. From then on, Gopi has gathered and created a few literary references and sources for Genderqueer studies and recently launched a book on Gender in Tamil ‘Maraikapatta Pakkangal’. “It took me two years to compile. I saw the lack of writings on gender issues in Tamil and other vernacular languages and wanted to write myself,” says Gopi, whose book delves into the various Genderqueer references and characters from classical Tamil literature and interprets them. “It is wrong to see LGBTQ as a western concept. We have had Gender variants and sexual minorities in our history too. I have tried to give a pan-Indian colour to the issue. That way, the mainstream people will be able to relate more to it and support the cause better.” The book has been self-published by Gopi under the banner of Srishti and is priced at Rs. 400. It is available as print-on-demand on pothi.com.