Pala Narayanan Nair

Sri. Pala Narayanan nair is a renowned poet of Kerala who has passed 75 years in his
poetic career. He is Kerala’s owned poet in the sense that he loves Kerala, its picturesque
landscape and its people. He started writing poetry at a very tender age along with
Vyloppally and Changampuzha. A prolific writer who has written \more that 5000 poems,
his poetry is marked by simplicity of subject matter, beauty of diction and a very high
aesthetic sense. As a critic has recently said, he has not been walking with the time but
ahead of the times. What more, he is still going strong, warbling his melodies on the
subjects dear to his heart.
Sri.Narayanan Nair was born on 11th December 1911 as the son of Keeppallil
Sankaran Nair and Puliannoor Puthoor Parvathy Amma at Palai. He had his firs lessons
under his owned father. He published his first poem ( Aa Nizhal ) in 1928. Afterwards he
joined the St: Thomas School at Palai and passed his School final exam. In 1935. The
same year found the publication of his Anthologies of poems ( Pookkkal ). Right from the
very beginning of his life, he has to work and help his father, as the financial position of
the family was far from sound. In an attempt to eke out a precarious existence, he worked
as a accountant in the sister institution of the Palai Central Bank besides offering private
tutu ion to students.
To make the matters worse, his father died quite unexpectedly in 1932 and
the responsibility of looking after the whole family fell on his tender shoulders. In 1937
he joined S.M.V.S.H. School as a teacher, but gave up it up during the Second World War.
He left the Army in 1947 and joined the Publication Division of the erstwhile Travancore
University. He got his B.A Degree in 1954; he got his Post Graduate Degree in
Malayalam and stood first in the University.

Next year ( in 19570 the Kerala Sahitya Academy was constituted and Sri. Palai
was appointed as the first Secretary of the Academy. He continued in office for more than
2 years at the end of which he resumed his work in various capacities in the Publication
department of the Kerala University. He retired fron\mt he service in 1967 as the Head of
Publicatiion Department. Subsequently he joined Alphonsa College, Pala as Professor of
Malayalam and worked for there for 5 years ( from 1967 – 1972). For the next 6 years, he
was actively associated with Nair Service Society in establishing their new Arts and
Science College at Kottiyam ( Kollam dist.).Since 1972 he has been living a quiet retired
life at his residence in T.V.Puram, in Kottayam dist., never missing a chance to converse
with Muses even this advanced age.

He got married to Smt.Subhadrakuty Amma in 1947 and they are blessed with
four children – two daughters and two sons.

He has published about 43 works in all. Some of these were published before India has
obtained freedom and others after getting independence. Some of his pre –independence
anthologies are – Pookkal, Adima, Nirdhanan, Padakkalam, Bhasparangam, Anthya pooja
, Olangal,Kairali Murali, Ragalapam, Manusyan, Malanad etc..
 His post – Independence works include Keralam Valarunnu( in 8 volumes),
Paalazhy,Sundarakadam, Amarajyothi, Pournami, Meghasancharam, VilakkuKoluthu,
Soorya Gayathri, Samara mukhathu, Ananthapuri, Shravanageetham, Amruthavarshini,
etc..

Awards won

Sri. Pala is not one of those writers who go after awards and the resultant publicity. In
fact he is publicity –shy. Yet, recognition in the form of prestigious awards came
after him though belatedly. Some of the noteworthy awards won by him are lised
below