Telugu literature

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 Telugu literature is the body of works written in the Telugu language. It consists of
poems, short stories, novels, plays, and song lyrics, among others. While there is
some indication that Telugu literature dates at least to the middle of the first
millennium, the first extant works are from the 11th century when
the Mahabharata was first translated to Telugu from Sanskrit by Nannaya. The
language experienced a golden age under the patronage of the Vijayanagara king-
poet Krishnadevaraya.

Contents

 1Sources
 2Subject matter
 3Forms
o 3.1Dwipada
o 3.2Padam
o 3.3Chatu
o 3.4Shatakamu
 4Poetics
 5History
o 5.1Early writers
 5.1.1The Pre-Nannayya Period (before 1020 AD)
5.1.2Malliya Rechana (940 CE)[15][16][17]

 5.1.3The Age of the Puranas (1020–1400 CE)
 5.1.4Nannaya Bhattarakudu or Adi Kavi (1022–1063 AD)
 5.1.5Tikkanna Somayaji (1205–1288 AD)
 5.1.6Errapragada
 5.1.7Baddena Bhupala (1220-1280AD)
o 5.2The Prabandha Period (1400–1600 AD)
 5.2.1Srinatha
 5.2.2Vemana
 5.2.3Bammera Potanaamatya
 5.2.4Annamacharya
 5.2.5Tallapaka Tirumalamma
 5.2.6Allasani Peddana
 5.2.7Dhurjati
 5.2.8Krishnadevaraya
 5.2.9Tenali Ramakrishna
o 5.3The post-Prabandha Period (1600-1850)
 5.3.1Kshetrayya
 5.3.2Kancherla Gopanna
 5.3.3Venkamamba
 5.3.4Tyagaraja
 5.3.5Paravastu Chinnayasuri
o 5.4Modern Period
 5.4.1Modern Telugu Poetry
 5.4.2Kandukuri Veeresalingam
 5.4.3Mangalampalli Balamurali Krishna
 5.4.4Aatreya
 5.4.5Tripuraneni Ramaswamy
 6Political Movements
o 6.1Paryavaran Kavitodyamam
 7Popular authors and works
 8Modern platforms
 9Awards
 10See also
 11External links
 12References

Sources[edit]
There are various sources available for information on early Telugu writers. Among
these are the prologues to their poems, which followed the Sanskrit model by
customarily giving a brief description of the writer, a history of the king to whom the
book is dedicated, and a chronological list of the books he published. In addition,
historical information is available from inscriptions that can be correlated with the
poems; there are several grammars, treatises, and anthologies that provide
illustrative stanzas; and there is also information available from the lives of the poets
and the traditions that they followed. [1]

Subject matter[edit]
Early Telugu literature is predominantly religious in subject matter. Poets and
scholars drew most of their material from, and spent most of their time translating
epics, such as the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the Bhagavata and the Puranas, all
of which are considered to be storehouses of Indian culture. [2]
From the sixteenth century onwards, rarely known episodes from the Puranas would
form the basis for the tradition of Telugu-language kavya. Literary works are drawn
from episodes of the Puranas under the name Akhyana or Khanda became popular
along with depictions of the fortune of a single hero under the title of Charitra, Vijaya,
Vilasa and Abhyudaya. Such titles are examples of what would become the most
common subject matter of poetry.[2]
In the eighteenth-century, marriages of heroes under the title Parinaya, Kalyana and
Vivāha became popular.[2]
Religious literature consisted of biographies of the founders of religion, their
teachings (Sara) as well as commentaries (bhashya).[2]
Traditional Hindu knowledge systems such as astrology, law, grammar, ballets,
moral aphorisms, and devotional psalms to deities within the Hindu pantheon are
characteristics of more popular works of Telugu literature. [2]

Forms[edit]
The various forms of literature found in Telugu are:

 Prabandham: Stories in verse form with a tight metrical structure and they
have three forms mentioned below.
o Prakhyātam: Famous story.
o Utpadyam: Purely fictional story.
o Misramam: Mixed story.
 Champu: Mixture of prose and poetry.
 Kāvyam: Poem which usually begins with a short prayer called a Prarthana,
containing initial auspicious letter "Sri" which invokes the blessings of the God.
[3]
 The occasion and circumstances under which the work is undertaken is next
stated.[3]
o Padya kāvyam: Metrical poetry.
o Gadya kāvyam: Prose poetry.
o Khanda kāvyam: Short poems
 Kavita: Poetry
 Śatakam (anthology): Satakam is a literary piece of art. The name derives
from Śata, which means a hundred in Sanskrit. Satakam comprises a hundred
poems. Hence, a Satakam is a volume (book) of hundred poems. Satakams are
usually devotional, philosophical or convey morals.
 DaŚaka (anthology): Dasakam or Dashakam comprises ten poems.
 Avadhānam: Avadhanam involves the partial improvisation of poems using
specific themes, metres, forms, or words.[4]
 Navala: Navala is a written, fictional, prose narrative normally longer than a
short story.
 Katha : Style of religious storytelling.
 Nātakam: Drama.
 Naneelu:Epigrams.
Ashtadiggajas have written in all three of the Prabandham genres during
the Prabandha yugam.[5]
Telugu literature uses a unique expression in verse called Champu, which
mixes prose and poetry. Although it is the dominant literary form, there are
exceptions: for example, Tikkana composed Uttara Ramayana entirely in verse.[6]
As Champu Kavyas and Prabandhas were beyond the comprehension of masses,
new devices for the dissemination of knowledge among the people were developed
in the form of the Dvipada and Sataka styles. Dvipada means two feet (couplet) and
Sataka means hundred (a cento of verses).[7] (Popular satakas: Sarveshvara sataka,
Kalahastishvara sataka, Dasarathi Sataka)
There are some Satakas which are divided into ten groups of ten verses
called Dasaka which is adopted from Prakrit.[8]
Avadhanam is a literary performance popular from the very ancient days in Sanskrit
and more so in Telugu and Kannada languages. [4] It requires a good memory and
tests a person's capability of performing multiple tasks simultaneously. [4] All the tasks
are memory intensive and demand an in-depth knowledge of literature, and prosody.
The number of Prucchakas can be 8 (Ashtavadhanam) or 100 (Sataavadhaanam) or
even 1000 (Sahasravadhanam). A person who has successfully performed
Ashtavadhanam is called as Ashtavadhani, a Satavadhanam is called a Satavadhani
and Sahasraavadhaanam is called Sahasravadhani. [4]
Dwipada[edit]
A dwipada is a couplet with a specific rhyme scheme.[9][10] A stanza contains two short
lines, each with less than fifteen characters. Longer poems, composed of
many dwipada, can be composed with a "highly musical" effect. [9] Much of the extant
corpus in this form was written using the common language of the time. The form's
musicality and accessibility made the form a natural fit for spreading religious
messages. Palkurki Somanatha was the first to write in this form in the 12th or 13th
century.[9] His works Basava Puranam and Panditaradhya Charitra were "immensely
singable" devotional works to Shiva as Basaveshwara.[9] Influenced
by Shaivaite poets' use of dwipada, a Vaishnavite poet wrote the Ranganadha
Ramayana, a version of the Ramayana that became incredibly popular for its
singability, vernacular diction, and stories not found in Valmiki's version.[9] The form
reached its apex with Palnati Vira Charitra, popularly ascribed to the 14th century
poet Srinatha.[9] By the end of the Prabandha era, the three most important Sanskrit
poems had been translated into Telugu in dwipada: the Mahabharata by Thimmaya,
the Ramayana by Ranganadha, and the Bhagavatam by Tekumalla Ranga Sai.[9] The
form declined after the dwipada works of the early 17th century king-
poet Raghunatha Nayak of Tanjore. Dwipada's accessibility has sometimes meant it
was not a prestigious form of Telugu poetry. In the 19th century, scholar Charles
Philip Brown noted "the learned despise couplets because the poems thus written
are in a flowing easy style which uneducated persons read with enjoyment." [10] Only a
few writers today use it out of lingering respect its history. [9]
Padam[edit]
Padams are lyric poems usually meant to be sung, with an opening line or lines
called a pallavi, followed by three caranam verses, each of which is followed by
the pallavi refrain.[11] The padam is thus "a highly integrated, internally resonant
syntactic and thematic unit."[11] Annamacharya, the most famous composer of
Telugu padams, is said to have composed a padam a day for the god of
the Tirupati temple, Venkateshwara. His poems, of which 13,000 survive on copper
plates stored in the temple vaults, deal with the "infinite varieties and nuances of the
god’s love life" and "his sense of himself as an agonized, turbulent human being in
relation to the god he worships". [11]
Chatu[edit]
Chatus (meaning "charming utterance") are remembered poems passed on by
recitation.[12] In premodern South India, literate people recited chatus to each other as
a social pastime.[12] Most of these poems have memorable stories that go along with
them that explain and contextualize them. They have passed through a lively oral
tradition for hundreds of years, and been anthologized since the 19th century by
scholars like Veturi Prabhakara Sastri.[12] Many chatus are attributed
to Srinatha, Tenali Ramalingadu, and other famous poets. These attributions, most
of which are unverifiable, serve to make both mythologize these poets and judge
their relative merit. Once made legends, they're free to interact anachronistically
in chatus. Poets from different eras meet, exchange poems, and critique each other.
[12]
 In sum, chatus, "moving from gnomic advice to metalinguistic criticism, through the
domains of desire, social commentary, the articulation of cultural values, and critical
taste, these interlocking stanzas embody an entire education, an expressive vision of
life and poetry."[12]