Meet Indian born, Sri-Lankan poet Sharanya Manivannan today, as she reads from her book Witchcraft and believes her time in the country is an exile of sorts

She claims to have begun writing poems at the age of seven, and also wrote half a novel about a girl on a magical adventure at the same age.

Sharanya Manivannan's own little magical adventure however did not stop there.

Born in India and raised in Sri Lanka, she has both Sri Lankan and Indian roots and now lives in Chennai where she released her book of poems Witchcraft in 2008.



The poet, writer comes to town for a reading of her works for Toto Funds the Arts, an award for young talent in the fields of music, photography and creative writing in memory of Angirus 'Toto' Vellani, a poet, musician and budding film critic who lost his life at the age of 20.

Known for her bold language and content in her writing, and brazen conduct in public interfaces Manivannan confesses she always fantasized about being a writer.

"The funny thing is, although I started with poetry, and actually went somewhere with it, I always thought I was a fiction writer who sometimes dabbled in poetry.
u00a0
The truth is really the reverse, though. I'm definitely a poet at heart, who sometimes likes to stretch out in a story," she says.

Sharanya who was selected as one of the finalists for the fifth edition of Toto Funds the Arts is glad about not having had to cut her teeth in this field in the country.
u00a0
"I have not yet found in India the sense of community that nourished me when I was first coming out of the shadows in my teens in another country," she says talking about the lack of support to young emerging writers in the country.
u00a0
"Sometimes I shudder to think of what might have been if I'd tried to be a writer here instead, at that age. I rarely see that generosity of spirit here," she adds.

u00a0Her upbringing, she admits has a huge role to play in her writing and the shift to the country has brought about considerable change in her expression. "There's been something deeply limiting, and grounding in a negative way, about being in India again, and not quite belonging here either. It's a different sort of exile.
u00a0
One I cannot explain as unequivocally, because I am a citizen, and this is technically my home," she says trying to elucidate the change in the nature of her work. "My poetry has changed considerably in the three years since I moved to Chennai.

Prior to this, I was living in Kuala Lumpur, which enjoys a dynamic artistic subculture, in which I was completely immersed. So, much of my first book, Witchcraft, was written for the voice, because there was always some reading or another to take a poem to.
u00a0
Here, that energy and that synergy hardly exist. My work has necessarily become more insular in some ways. It's quieter, and probably carries less joie de vivre. But I've found trajectories that work well with poems of this nature," she adds.

In the pipeline now are two manuscripts she tells us, a cynical one about life in Chennai, and a more emotionally textured one called Bulletproof Offering, which takes as its principal archetypes Sita, who is in exile in paradise, and Lucifer, who was exiled from paradise.

She will be reading a few never heard of pieces and also some familiar ones from her book Witchcraft this evening.
u00a0
At Crossword, Residency Road
On September 7, 7 pm
Call 2558 2411

Witchcraft, collection of poems published by Bullfighter Books.
Extract from the poem Witchery.
Women with blood glistening in the partings of their hair, they come to me in dreams.
Don't cross my path.
If you see me in the street, don't look me in the eye.
Don't get in my way.
I am the propinquity of heart to darkness. I am umbilical discord.
I am the haemorrhage of memory uncoiling the night in you.