T. Ramakrishna Pillai

“ LORD TENNYSON
SEETA AND RAMA—A TALE OF THE INDIAN FAMINE
THE STORY OF PRINCE DÉSING
THE STORY OF RUDRA
THE STORY OF THE ROYAL HUNTRESS
CHANDRA—A TALE OF THE FIELD OF TELLIKÓTA
THE KORATHY'S LULLABY
LORD TENNYSON.
A poet of my native land has said—
The life the good and virtuous lead on earth
Is like the black-eyed maiden of the East,
Who paints the lids to look more bright and fair.
The eyes may smart and water, but withal
She loves to please them that behold her face. ”

“ Madras should indulge some measure of pride in having turned out a University graduate who can write the English language better than most Englishmen. Ramakrishna's "Life in an Indian Village" is a charming account of Dravidian homes and customs. It is the work of a young man who has profited by Western enlightenment, and yet feels a kindly glow in his heart for all that belongs to the humblest folk in his native land. ”

“ First pity for the youth, then love for him
Mysterious came to her, until at last
The flick'ring flame shone sudden in her breast.
"This stranger I must wed, for him I love,
I know not how; that pleasant face is like
The face of him I dearly loved; I see
Appearing ev'ry day upon that face,
As if by magic wrought, those beauties that
Were seated on dead Rama's face." ”

“ TALES OF IND
AND OTHER POEMS BY T. RAMAKRISHNA 1896
TO
THE MEMORY OF
MY DEAR DAUGHTER
KAMALA.
The star that rose to cheer our humble life,
And make a little heaven of our home,
Shall rise again—yes, surely rise again
To give us everlasting joy divine. ”

“ Simplicity has a powerful charm of its own; and we recommend the book to all whose heart can still be touched by inartificial descriptions of idyllic, gently flowing, country life. He who does not assume the tone of "India, what can it teach us?" but cares to profit by teaching, will learn a great deal even from these simple village tales.—Asiatic Quarterly Review (London) .
What more England can do for India is admirably and tersely set forth in the Introduction, which, with Mr. Ramakrishna's pleasant description of Indian village life, deserves to be widely read.—Mr. ”

“ Sir M.E. Grant Duff has written an Introduction, in which he suggests how the simple villagers can be benefited by their European neighbours.—Morning Post (London) .
The book itself is excellent, and gives a sketch of Indian village society from inside. It is possible, however, that the ordinary English reader will prefer to take his view of "the black men" from Mr. Kipling rather than from a representative of the natives themselves. If he wishes to have a native view of native life he will find it in this work.—Athenaeum (London) .
India is always fertile in surprises for English readers. ”

“ Judging by the comments that have appeared in the English papers, it is just the kind of book the public at home wants, not too statistical to be readable, and not too ambitious in design to be trustworthy, but just a simple, picturesque account of the particular part of India which the author really knows.—London Correspondent of the Englishman (Calcutta) .
The great virtue of Mr. Ramakrishna's writing is the absence of pretence and fustian. Space is not wasted on ambitious and worthless descriptions of scenery, or on vague disquisitions of a sentimental character. ”

“ They are tales of India, descriptive of Indian scenery, and marked by many traits both of custom and of feeling that are characteristic of India.... These tales—tales of woman's constancy and woman's heroism—are pleasing in themselves; and the language in which they are told is simple, imaginative, and marked by a well-sustained melody. The tales are dedicated to Lord Tennyson by "His Lordship's ardent admirer in the Far East"; and certainly they move in the atmosphere of the Tennysonian idyll.—Madras Christian College Magazine. ”

“ It is a truthfully written account of native life in one of those 55,000 villages which dot the great district—a tract much larger than the British Isles—the daily existence of whose peaceful, and not altogether unhappy, population it is intended to illustrate; and it can be dipped into, or read through, with equal satisfaction and advantage,—Daily Telegraph (London) .
"Life in an Indian Village" is an amusing and clear portrayal of the manners and customs of the inhabitants of a village in the Madras Presidency. ”

“ The author of this book deserves our thanks and congratulations. Himself a highly educated native of the Madras Presidency, he has drawn a series of pictures of the village life of Southern India.... The occupations, the recreations, the religion, the distribution of labour, the recurrence of feast and festival, with much more, are all told in amusing style and with such graphic power as to leave a vivid impression upon the reader's mind.—Bookseller (London) . ”

“ Everywhere he is simple, straightforward, and effective.... Writing in excellent English, and in unexceptionable style, he tells plainly and simply what he has to say, and is the more successful because he is less ambitious.... It is to be hoped that Mr. Ramakrishna's interesting sketches of Southern Indian village life will obtain a wide circulation in England. He is to be congratulated on having produced a work of no little merit and originality.—Madras Mail.
To doubters of the good results of Western education in this Presidency, better proof could hardly be given than is provided. ”

“ His sympathy is beautiful, because it is devoid of any pretence or forced pathos. His language is choice, yet simply constructed. There is real literary flavour about this work, which has just been published by Fisher Unwin. When will the Punjab give us a young man who can feel and think and write like this?—Civil and Military Gazette (Lahore) .
Mr. T. Ramakrishna, a graduate of the Madras University, may be congratulated on the success which seems likely to attend the publication of his well-written little book on "Indian Village Life." ”

“ Ramakrishna,—a literary gentleman belonging to Madras, who has written a charming book called "Life in an Indian Village."—Professor Eric Robertson in Macmillan's series of Orient Readers.
I can name more than a dozen Indian authors whose works can fairly rank with some of the best productions of Englishmen. The well-known author of "Maxima and Minima," viz., the late Professor Ramachundra, was considered by no other than De Morgan, the famous mathematician, as an original genius of a remarkable order. ”

“ Books about India by intelligent travellers have their uses, and books by Europeans who have lived for years in the country and studied the people are still more valuable, but it is only a native of India who can really show us Indian life as it is. ”

“ Grant Duff lately said—there is 'an indefinite amount of beauty and charm in everyday life' in Southern India."—Madras Mail.
SEETA AND RAMA:—A very pretty and pathetic, though simple little story, told in the true poetic vein, and possesses a deep melancholy interest.... They are simple tales, told in English verse, which is characterised by a purity and a simplicity that are very noteworthy in an Indian writer, and which show considerable acquaintance of the English language, especially of Tennyson's writings. ”

“ They will be found to be very readable, sometimes amusing, always interesting and instructive. Any one who reads this book with intelligence and care will be able to form for himself a very accurate picture of a Madras village, and to understand the composition of the village community, which is the basis of the whole framework of Indian social life.—Scotsman (Edinburgh) . ”

“ A celebrated Cambridge Mathematician once told me that he set a problem for the Mathematical Tripos, basing it upon Ramachundra's "Maxima and Minima," and with the exception of a few that headed the list, none were able to solve the problem. In the late Toru Dutt, a young Bengali native Christian lady, some of the leading literary men of England found a poet of no mean powers. Mr. Edmund Gosse writes as follows in the preface to her poems that have been published by an English firm: "It is difficult to estimate what we have lost in the premature death of Toru Dutt. ”

“ SEETA AND RAMA:—The story is pretty, though simple. In parts, moreover, the author, who is anonymous, displays the true spirit of poetry, which he (or she) will do well to cultivate.... The tributes of respect for the heroism, purity, and constancy of women which are found in Mr. Ramakrishna's poems are in accordance with the teaching of the Mahabarata, as well as the spirit of the Laureate's verse. Added to this very engaging feature of his work, there is a power of description that is very remarkable in a man to whom English is not his mother tongue. ”

“ Nearly all that has been learned about it has been learned by the labour of Europeans, and yet natives trained to European methods of research have facilities of kinds for prosecuting research which we have not.... I had a great deal to say on that subject, and on many other cognate ones in an address which I delivered in my capacity of Chancellor of the University of Madras, shortly before I left the country, but I do not know that it has had much effect since, though an excellent little book by Mr. Ramakrishna on the village life of South India is a step in the right direction. ”

“ The Korathy is the tattooer of the Indian village, who offers her services for a small fee. Hindu females are very fond of having their bodies tattooed. The Korathy first makes a sketch of the figure of a scorpion or a serpent on the part of the body offered to her for tattooing, then takes a number of sharp needles, dips them in some liquid preparation which she has ready, and pricks the flesh most mercilessly. ”

“ T. Fisher Unwin, "Life in an Indian Village," is a sample of the kind of book relating to our Eastern Empire that we should like to see multiplied. It is the production of a scholarly native, T. Ramakrishna, B.A., who writes excellent idiomatic English without the slightest tendency to Johnsonian eloquence.—Christian Leader (Glasgow) . ”

“ Throughout, the book is most finely written in rhyme, and the learned author has minted at the forge of Tennyson, to whom the book is most dutifully dedicated, the sentiments of Oliver Goldsmith, Parnell, and Byron.—Hindu.
We must congratulate Mr. Ramakrishna on the success which has attended his, no doubt, pleasing labours. He is the first Hindu graduate, so far as we know, who has come before the public as a poet, and well does he deserve every encouragement.—Madras Standard. ”

“ Literature has no honours which need have been beyond the grasp of a girl who, at the age of twenty-one, and in languages separated from her own by so deep a chasm, had produced so much of lasting worth.... When the history of the literature of our country comes to be written, there is sure to be a page in it dedicated to this fragile exotic blossom of song." Dr. Bandarkar of Bombay is considered to be one of the best Orientalists of the day. A number of Bengali gentlemen have earned a lasting fame by literary productions in English, among whom I may mention the Rev. ”

“ Sir M.E. Grant Duff, G.C.S.I.
It is not often that natives succeed so well as you have done in English versification.—H.H. Kérala Varma, C.S.I.
Krishnapore irresistibly reminds us of Auburn, the fortunes of Seeta are in many respects not unlike those of Evangeline, and some forms of expression seem to be coined in the mint of Tennyson.... These tales possess peculiar interest as first-fruits in poetic literature of that amalgamation of Eastern and Western thought that is going on before us at the present day in this country. ”

“ His purpose to disclose; and as at times
Clouds hover over us and darken all
The sky for days, and still no rain descends—
But suddenly when least expected comes—
So she to whom her husband's parting lay
In words saw it burst in reality.
He said, "Dear Rati! well thou knowest how
I fondly wish to trade in distant realms.
The time has come for me to part from thee.
This morn a little ship was sighted here,
And she is riding yonder on the sea.
And ere the setting sun sinks down to rest
Into the western waves the little bark
Now destined to take me will leave the port ”

“ We know something of those among its peoples which have given us trouble; but here is a "dim population" of which many Englishmen will scarcely have heard the name—the Dravidians of the Madras Presidency, and we learn with something like astonishment that they number more than the inhabitants of England. ”

“ The village which Mr. Ramakrishna describes for us is one of more than fifty thousand, averaging about five hundred inhabitants apiece. The first thing that strikes us in his account is its highly organised condition. It is a self-sufficing little commonwealth, in which a quite surprising variety of professions or occupations are represented.—Pall Mall Gazette (London) .
We welcome this little book as a much truer picture of Indian life than many more ambitious works.—St. ”

“ And you will be the fairest of the fair.
My work is done; rejoice, for you will be
The fairest of your sisters in the land.
Rejoice for evermore, among them you
Will shine as doth the moon among the stars.
TALES OF IND, BY T. RAMAKRISHNA, B.A.
With an Introduction by the Hon. the Rev. W. MILLER, M.A., LL.D., C.I.E., and dedicated, by permission, to the late Lord Tennyson, Poet Laureate.
OPINIONS.
They are interesting and remarkable.—Lord Tennyson. ”

“ What we need in Europe is to have the reality, the actual working of these Indian institutions which we have so often mentioned brought home to us, and probably such a writer as yourself may do this better than a European could do.—The Right Hon. ”