The passing of yesteryear writer 'Mullapudi Venkataramana' got me thinking on how less I know about Telugu literature. I haven't yet read any of his works or that of any big writer. Nothing from Sri Sri, Bharago, Chalam, or anyone. Don't even know the names of writers from the pre-independence era. What do we know about the language? How many of us know about the literary history of our language.
I've always thought the following things about the different south Indian states. Karnataka has the Carnatic music as its speciality, Kerala has Kalaripayattu, Tamil has the basic dravida culture running through their veins. What do we have?
We have arts. Lalitha Kalalu. Of all the peope I know only us Telugus have given so much importance to arts and literature. Developing a language for comunication is itself an incredible task. Developing poems and songs structures is all together an incredible task. Imagine how much work has gone into developing the syntax and grammar of a language. And how incredible it is that people have written poems in a language. Writting a poem itself takes a lot of creativity but also having contests in it is just too wonderful.
If you rewind to the times of 'Sri Krishna Devaraya' when people had poetry competitions and when only the last phrase of a poem was given and a poet was asked to complete as a proper poem that was the best time for Telugu literature. If those were the standards of Telugu hundreds of years ago then its current status would be incredible. But the truth is quite different, isn't it? I had to write this in English 'coz not many of us can read telugu anymore or atleast at normal speed. English is the need of the day. Its what we need to survive but Telugu is what we are. Speaking in Telugu in your daily life is not enough. READ IT, LEARN IT and be a proper Telugu fella. If we don't know our language who else will?
Note: Most importantly don't listen to the lyrics of the new Telugu songs if you want to get a hold on Telugu literature 'coz there are no good lyricists left(Sitaram Sastri doesnt write much anymore). We are stuck with chandra bose's awesomely dumb "Soku maada సోమాజిగూడ".
