“Sit down and document your lives,” transgender poet Vijayaraja Mallika told queer persons, in a session titled ‘Beyond the Binary: Queer representation in literature’ with gay writer Vasudhendra and writer Urvashi Bhutalia.
Ms. Mallika and Mr. Vasudhendra said it was their duty as literary persons to contribute appropriate terms to the regional vocabulary to denote ideas associated with queer persons and their lives. They said queer writing was mostly autobiographical in the initial phases but could include other topics and premises in the long run.
Writer Benyamin said the Arab world had accepted his novel Adujeevitham, but it was Malayalis in West Asia who had unleashed a campaign against it. Speaking at a session on the forthcoming movie based on the book at the Kerala Literature Festival in Kozhikode on Saturday, he said it was the Malayalam version of the book that was banned in West Asia, while the Arabic version was largely accepted. Blessy, the director of the movie, said he had kept the essence of the novel as it is in the movie that was to be released in April 2024.
In a session on the ‘History of the Indian Constitution’, Minister P. Rajeeve said the Indian citizen’s political aim should be to protect the constitution. Mathew Kuzhalnadan, MLA, DYFI State president V. Vasif, and BJP leader M.T. Ramesh took part in a session on ‘Media control over politics in the new era’. While Mr. Ramesh maintained that every aspect of life was controlled by the media, Mr. Kuzhalnadan said the media was influencing the modern way of life rather than controlling it. However, Mr. Vasif said the media was being controlled by politics.
