In the 13 years since AK Ramanujan died under anesthesia in Chicago in 1993, much of his unpublished writing has trickled down to a waiting readership posthumously. A stray article shows up in a book of essays or as an Introduction, previously scattered writings are pulled together and a volume of collected essays is published and so on. Ramanujan’s death was untimely for many reasons, not least because he left much undone and was clearly in the prime of his writing, scholarly as well as creative. Details of Ramanujan’s public life are known well enough. A leading Indian poet who wrote in English and Kannada as well as a pathbreaking scholar and translator, he taught at the University of Chicago for the best part of thirty years. There, he tutored and mentored graduate students and younger scholars, many of whom are creating new directions in the study of South Asian literatures in universities all over the world. Ramanujan’s legacy is assured through his students, but it is always a thrill to hear again, the voice of the master, however mediated.
August 2006, volume 30, No 8