The Score Magazine - Archive February 2009 issue! | Page 29

Your dad kills too!
lettered
T
he Pulp Fiction World is murky and dangerous
for women; at every corner lurks temptation and
disaster. At any moment she could be abducted to
be used sexually and killed or she could fall into
the hands of her uncle who leers lasciviously at her and her
fortune. Her entire presence is distilled to two facts; at all
times her honour could be decimated and she could be led
astray never to be mentioned in polite circles or she could
lead a quiet virtuous life and no matter her status, deliverance
would come in the form of a rich, educated, and sensitive
man and all her previous cares would be forgotten.
If that sounds like a subversive kind of chick lit, meet the other
woman in Pulp fiction, an archetype herself but modelled on
whom exactly? She is spunky, knows Karate, can defend her
honour, and if necessary, hatch plans to escape from the lair of
the evil scientist. She wears t shirts with sexy aphorisms that
are too tight, is aware of her erotically charged relationship
with her male colleague and hides it with matter of fact
diversions or bullies him into looking at her as a sexual object
through coquettish jealousy.
If all this sounds complicated and overwrought, you must
excuse my feminist professors for teaching me to read
meaning into the patriarchal writing. Let’s take a step back
and look at it again. You might as well strike out the first two
paragraphs (but please don’t coz I crafted them meticulously
and will get back to them in a bit) because these women are
only marginal figures in pulp fiction, serving only to drive the
action forward which will be take over by the men.
Ahh, the men! While the women are sexual objects, there to
arouse one into thinking and action with names that slip out
like semi-orgiastic exclamations Asha, Leela, Pushpa, Kamini,
and Kanchana, the men are their antithesis. Devanathan,
Shankar Lal, Narendran, and Sasivaran; thinking individuals
with thick moustaches and hard skulls, capable of keeping
their cool even when a gun is pointed at them, especially if
a gun is pointed at them, these are the men for whom its
written.
The Sabapathy, Velupillai, and Ravis of the world buy these
magazines and fantasise about the Kaminis and Kanchanas
of the seedy underworld who run to them with heaving
bosoms seeking their brawn and brain to rescue them from
the clutches of evil and in return give them the promise of
eternal devotion and undying love or just an unforgettable
night of passion!
The Blaft Anthology of Tamil Pulp Fiction has excellent
translations from a select authors and a marvellous translator’s
note which I urge you to read. If it seems like my delicate
sensibilities are wounded by these portrayals, you could not
be further from the truth! Full of energy and suspense, these
are page turners that offer you value for money.
Sometimes you also find social messages woven in; this
authorial angst is quickly masked in the action of seedy
underworld men but these flashes of conscience (as I’d like
to term them for my own slotting purposes) are topical.
Most of us may not know Rajesh Kumar, Indra Soundararajan,
Pattukottai Prabhakar (on an aside, whatta name!), but we
Sunandha Ragunathan
do know the 80s movies. The spate of detective movies that
came out was astounding and for the longest time, I assumed
our Kollywood had been “inspired” by the film noir genre.
Maybe their inspiration was a little closer to home! The evil
politician rapes any woman he comes across; the virginal
sister of the hero is abducted on her way to typing class (why
this obsession with typing classes? Was that the mark of a girl
with a useful mind who didn’t want to waste her intelligence
making kaara kolambu for her in-laws? Was the rhythmic click
clacking of typing such a charged atmosphere that it became
synonymous with buxom youth and hidden desires?) and the
hero is hired by her brother or happens to be her brother.
While he was the carefree youth cavorting with the rich girl
in Woodlands Drive-in or in Ooty singing melodious duets in
the first half, he’s called upon by Dharma itself (in the form
of the hand-wringing mother) to fight the good fight during
the second half and boy does he! Single handedly he busts
a prostitution racket or reforms the villain who had some
mountain cave he hid in, or sometimes, just for our viewing
pleasure, there were crocodiles thrashing in a glass tank in a
Technicolor basement of an abandoned bungalow!
Sounds familiar? Before we knew heroes who flicked
cigarettes, every Tamil family was familiar with these worldly
wise heroes and damsels in distress from their steady Pulp
fiction diet. Mention Pattukottai Prabhakar (bear with me
while I fixate on this name) and if you happen to be in a room
with individuals over a certain age (*cough cough* older
people), they immediately rattle off Resakee, Tamilvanan,
Pushpa Thangadurai and Ramanichandran as though you’re
playing some weird Antakshari with them.
Published in weeklies such as Kalkandu, Dhinamani Kadhir,
Anandha Vikatan, Kumudham and Kalaimagal, these titillating
tales of crime and punishment were condensed lectures on
modern day morality. Then there were other publications;
super novel, ungal junior, and today crime, these were not
freely distributed among members of the family. The writers
were the same; the subject was the same but the language
presumably was less constrained because they needn’t fear
corrupting the minds of young girls from good Tamil families.
These ten rupee novels may have been mid-morning escapes
for many but in them lie nuggets of the era they were written
in. The reader can glean what the common man was feeling
and thinking. These “pulp” reads are a treasure trove for a
mind keen on understanding the sociological issues of an
earlier era.
It is more accurate than History and certainly more fun and
racy!