One of the most influential and revolutionary writers of Tamil fiction Pudumaipithan

Tamil language writer late C. Viruthachalam. He was one of the most influential and revolutionary writers of Tamil fiction. His works were characterised by social satire, progressive thinking and outspoken criticism of accepted conventions. Contemporary writers and critics found it difficult to accept his views and his works were received with extreme hostility.

His career as a writer began in 1933 with an essay “Gulabjaan Kaadhal” (Love for Gulab jamun). Pudumaippithan’s active writing period was less than 15 years (1934–46) in which he wrote nearly 100 short stories, an equal number of essays on a variety of subjects, 15 poems, a few plays and scores of book reviews. His writings gave him a reputation as a maverick. The subjects he wrote on and the characters he chose to portray were completely new to Tamil fiction. He felt that Tamil literature had been crippled by unspoken conventions and openly criticized those who adhered to them. In one of his essays he expressed his displeasure as: “We have been having a notion that there are certain things that can be said and certain things that cannot be said in (Tamil) literature; and we have lived with that philosophy. But that is not the truth. For nearly two hundred years we have lived a life of parasites. We don’t even dare to see issues straight on the face and that is why we have been providing excuses for ourselves. If literature can give birth to the malicious Ravana, blood sheds and sinful allegories, why can’t it give a place to the poor prostitute? The society doesn’t rust because of that. Moreover, there is no way to preserve an antique that has already rusted.”

Pudhumaipithan was the first Tamil writer to successfully use a dialect of Tamil other than that of Chennai or Tanjore. Most of his characters spoke the Tirunelveli dialect. His stories were set either in Madras or in Tirunelveli, the two places where he spent considerable portions of his life. His writing style had a mixture of colloquial and classical words. Gentle satire even while handling complicated and serious situations was his hallmark. He used harsh language while arguing with his literary opponents like Kalki Krishnamoorthy.

He was also a prolific translator of literary works from other languages into Tamil. He translated around 50 short stories. Pudumaipithan wrote about fifteen poems in total. His first published poem was Thiru Angila arasanga thondaradipodi azhwar vaibhavam, which appeared in 1934.^[ Most of his poems were written as letters to his friend T. M. Chidambara Ragunathan in the form of Venpas. The fifteen poems were published posthumously in 1954. Like his short stories, his poems are full of wit and satire. The most famous of his poems is the abusive limerick Moonavarunasalamae written in review of a book on Tamil prose, which failed to mention the Manikodi movement.