If the poet A K Ramanujan introduced the classical Tamil literature of the Sangam Age (before the 2nd century A.D.) to the western world with his contemporary English translations, the Tamils themselves would have remained ignorant of it, but for the untiring efforts of one man who went from home to home collecting ancient manuscripts during the late 19th century and early 20th century. It was U V Swaminatha Iyer who devoted himself to this self-imposed task of unearthing the manuscripts of ancient Tamil works. Apart from retrieving three of the five great Tamil epics, Aimperumkappiyangal, Jeevaka Chintamani, Manimekalai and Silappadhikaram, he introduced to the world the set of ten poems of the Sangam Age known as Pattu Paattu. Of the other set of eight, known as Ettu Thokai, he embellished five. What many academic bodies did for the Renaissance in western Europe, Swaminatha Iyer single-handedly did for the enrichment of Tamil.
Born to humble and pious parents, Venkatasubbaiar and Saraswathi, on the 19th of February 1855 at Surya Moolai, a village in Tanjavur district in Tamil Nadu, Swaminathan grew up listening to religious discourses by his father on the Kamba Ramayana, Mahabharata and the like. His grandfather who taught him the Tamil alphabet also made him learn prayers and psalms. Swaminathan’s father, a reservoir of wisdom and spiritual thoughts, learnt music from the great composer Ghanam Krishnaiyar, a relative. Though Swaminathan had quite a talent for music, his passion for Tamil literature overshadowed his interest in music. He had his first taste of Tamil poetry, when he became a student of an impoverished but dedicated teacher, Ariyilur Satakopa Iyengar.
Young ‘Sama’, as he was called, learnt from many. Krishna Vadyar, a good Tamil scholar, taught him
several minor Tamil classics and the well-known Tirukkural by Tiruvalluvar, as well as arithmetic. He also learnt from Muttu Velayuda Pandaram, Chidambaram Pillai, Kasturi Iyengar, Vriddhachala Reddiar and a host of others. To Swaminatha Iyer’s parents, his education came before everything else and they were ever willing to make sacrifices towards this end, even moving from village to village, as and when they found a new Tamil teacher for him.
The major breakthrough in Swaminatha Iyer’s Tamil odyssey came about when, with his father’s help, he sought out and was accepted by Maha Vidwan Meenakshi Sundaram Pillai (1815-1876), the poet laureate of the Tiruvavaduturai Adheenam or Mutt, a Saivite religious institution steeped in Tamil literature. Pillai was a celebrated teacher of his period, and in time Sama became his star pupil.
Meenakshi Sundaram Pillai frequently visited the Adheenam. Whenever Swaminathan accompanied his master there, the young student would be asked to recite from the classics in front of the huge gathering at the Mutt and every time, he did the master proud. Tales of the young man’s abilities soon reached the ears of Tyagaraja Chettiar, the Head of the Tamil Department at the Government College, Kumbakonam, who was happy to secure his appointment as his successor, in February 1880.
Iyer’s meeting with a Salem Ramaswami Mudaliar in 1886 was a momentous occasion, as subsequent events proved. Mudaliar who came to Kumbakonam as the District Munsiff, had some palm leaf manuscripts with him and wanted Iyer to help him decipher them. These manuscripts turned out to be treasures of ancient Tamil literature. Iyer’s life mission started with the study and examination of Tiruttaka Devar’s Jeevaka Chintamani which he helped publish as a book in 1887. Soon followed a series of publications—Pattu Paattu in 1889, Silappadhikaram in 1892, Pura Nanooru in 1893, Manimekalai in 1899, and many more great works of the ancient past. His works were probably the first of their kind in this part of the world to provide footnotes, bibliographies, glossaries, indices etc., comparable to western standards.
Swaminatha Iyer wrote hundreds of poems, quite moving in their devotional quality. The biography “Meenakshi Sundaram Pillai Thamizh” that he wrote of his master, ran to 800 pages. Iyer also brought out an anthology of his poetical works. His autobiography “En Charitiram” (my story) tells us the story of his birth, and his evolution as an industrious scholar of great attainments and gifts
nurtured by great Tamil scholars of his time. It also tells us how he became a devoted student of Meenakshi Sundaram Pillai and how he mastered Tamil with unflagging zeal, undivided attention, and unparalleled master worship.
In 1903, Iyer joined the Presidency College, Madras, to head the Tamil department there, for the next 16 years until his retirement in 1919. Later he served as Principal of Sri Meenakshi College, Chidambaram, for three years. In 1906, the Government of India conferred on him the title of Mahamahopadhyaya (the greatest of great teachers). In 1925, the Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham honoured him with the title Dakshinathya Kalanidhi. The University of Madras conferred a doctorate on him in 1932. The writer Kalki Krishnamurthy called him “Tamizh Thaatha”, an affectionate title that was to stay.
As a teacher, Iyer won the respect of pupils with his profound scholarship. His method of teaching was marked by sweetness and clarity that attracted all. He taught a full cross section of humanity including zamindars, heads of mutts, Tamil teachers, research scholars, editors, poets and politicians. A devout person, Iyer recited the Tevaram (hymns sung in praise of Lord Siva) without fail, before starting the day’s work. Each of the introductions he wrote in his many publications started off with a Tevaram hymn or an extract from Tiruvachakam, another collection of hymns.
A standing monument to ‘Tamizh Thatha’s’ memory is the Dr U V Swaminatha Iyer library at Tiruvanmiyur, Chennai, which has a wonderful collection of Tamil books and palm leaf manuscripts. A fitting tribute to Swaminatha Iyer’s outstanding contribution to Tamil literature is the English translation in abridged form of his autobiography by his student and well known Tamil scholar-journalist K V Jagannathan. In his introduction to the book KVJ said: “Two gifted souls have made the most outstanding contribution to the enriching of the Tamil language in the course of the last one hundred years: one of them, is noted for his scholarship, his capacity for research, his editorial skill and his integrity, and the other for his poetic talent, his patriotism and his fine sensibility—the former being Mahamahopadhyaya Dakshinathya Kalanidhi Doctor U V Swaminatha Iyer, and the latter that peerless prince among poets, Subramanya Bharati.”