Prof. R. Balachandra, Northeastern University, gave a talk on Kannada Language and Literature on 13 December 2008 as part of the series ‘ Languages and Literature of India’ offered by Harvard University’s Department of Sanskrit and Indian studies Outreach Program. The talk served as a broad sweeping introduction covering script, grammar, and literature.

Kannada, a Dravidian language, is one of the seventeen official languages of India and is spoken by over 32 million people. Only Sanskrit and Tamil are older than Kannada. It is the official language of Karnataka state (south India) and is the 27th largest spoken language in the world.

The alphabet and script of Kannada are derived from the Brahmi script. The Kannada alphabet has two more vowels than Sanskrit or other North Indian languages – short ‘e’ and short ‘o.’ It also has its own set of numerals.

Kannada has three genders – masculine, feminine and neuter. All male names and men are masculine, all females and feminine names are feminine and the rest are all neuter. It has two numbers – singular and plural. It has seven cases as in Sanskrit. The case endings correspond to the gender and number of the noun. The word order in a sentence, unlike English, is Subject, Predicate and Verb (similar to German). Prof. Balachandra pointed out several examples of prose and poetry to show the large number of Sanskrit words that have become part of the vocabulary of formal  (i.e., non-colloquial) Kannada.

Kannada Literature

Stone edicts from as early as the fifth century show some edicts written in a combination of Kannada letters and Sanskrit letters. The earliest literary work in Kannada is a work of poetry from around the end of the ninth century – Kavi Raja Maarga (Poet’s Royal Road) by Vijaya.

An early golden age of Kannada literature was the 10th century. One of the greatest poets of Kannada, Pampa, lived during this period. He wrote Samastha Bharatha (Complete Bharatha), in which he makes Arjuna as the hero of the epic. Another work of his called Adi Purana, is the story of the Adi Tirthankara, a Jain saint. These works were all written in the Champu style, which is a mixture of prose and poetry.

In the next hundred years, a number of secular works appeared – a dictionary, a book on poetics, a mathematical treatise, books on medicine and veterinary science, erotica and astrology.

The next couple of hundred years, called the medieval period, saw the emergence of Veerashaiva literature, called Vachana Sahitya. The two chief proponets were Basavanna and Akka Mahadevi. They composed large numbers of devotional poems, called vachanas. A mark of these poems, which continue to be very popular, is that they all refer to their god in the last line of the poem.

The next stage in the development of Kannada literature is the emergence of Dasa Sahitya – literature of the servants (God’s). The most famous proponent of this type of literature was Purandara Dasa. He is said to have composed over 20,000 krithis (musical pieces). He also set them to Ragas, and laid the foundation for Carnatik music, the classical music of south India. The other poet of this genre is Kanaka Dasa. In addition to composing many krithis, he also wrote many aphorisms. Another  compiler of pithy aphorism was known as Sarvajna – the all knowing. Neither his real name nor his actual time period is known. He wrote over 20,000 aphorisms which are popular even today.

The modern period, starting from around 1800, saw the influence of western and English thought on Kannada literature. There were translations from Shakespeare, and from works in other Indian languages such as Bengali and Marathi. Missionaries and westerners produced a number of reference books – dictionary by Rev. Kittel, grammar by Coldwell and a history of Kannada literature by Rice.

The 20c is known as Navodaya (the new rising) and saw the arrival of a number of influential poets including Bendre, Puttappa (Kuvempu), Srikantiah, Adiga, Karanth, Rajaratnam, and Govinda Pai .  Kailasam was one of the foremost playwrights who wrote about the social issues of that time using a mixture of Kannada and English in his dialogues. Girish Karnad has been very influential in writing a number of historical plays – Yayati and Tughlaq, for example. A number of progressive novelists - Karanth, Kattimani, Krishna Rao, Subba Rao, Anantha Murthy, and more recently S.L. Byrappa.  Prominent women novelists include Triveni and Indira.

Kannada continues to be a lively language with many young and progressive writers on the scene. Kannada writers have been in the forefront of literary accomplishments – there have been seven Jnana Peeth Awardees, the most number for any language in India.

Prof. Balachandra rendered several pieces in the language to illustrate the talk and give the audience a flavor of the aural aspects of the language. The talk was well received by the audience which participated in a question and answer session.

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