Poonachi Or the Story of A Black Goat - Perumal Murugan Translated By N. Kalyan Raman

A story of life and death and everything that breathes in between, though undeniably about a goat, Poonachi, by Perumal Murugan Translated by N. Kalyan Raman, with all her struggles and dreams, represents the innocence of the daughters of our country. 

 

Starting life as a foundling and going trough the orderal of being a miracle, Poonachi experiences both the promise and the structural violence embedded in the life of a female. As the goat grows, it's responsibilities increase as do the expectations of people and their behaviour is a direct reference to the mindset of rural India. The book has a lot of socio economic and political commentary; covers good/bad, sad/happy phases of life. She turns into a stone idol at the moment of her death, harking back to a hoary tradition in the folk culture of Tamil Nadu whereby the memory of an innocent girl destroyed by the random and ever-present violence of the world is worshipped as a diety.

 Some interesting learnings are: You can go beyond ideological differences and bind people together with love. When did the rich ever suffer any hardship? It's poor people who stand in queue and suffer, the writer basically being a poet, there is a poem on'queue' as well. On government there is an interesting conversation: "There's an old saying that the regime is deaf." "It's deaf only when we speak about our problems. When we talk about the regime, its ears are quite sharp." If it was in your nature to bow down, why would anyone shackle you? That's the difference between a sheep and a goat. Living amidst own community would give lasting security. The mouth that talks is the same as the one that eats. Yet, can we talk about anything and everything? or can we eat anything and everything? Everything happened by chance. If you called it wrong, then everything was wrong. Miracles and exhibitions were meant for when people were relaxing after a sumptuous meal. And some life related stories where, when Ponnachi wanted to stay with Porumi in the old ladies daughters house, the old woman with finality unable to bear the disappointment on her daughters face asked her to keep Porumi instead of Poonachi. 

Perumal Murugan who was a teacher, had stopped writing, when there was a threat and not of criticisam on one of his earlier books about a childless couple. He had given up writing, but then started again with poety, and then came this book on the weak and the powerless, documenting their pains and suffering.