Venmurasu

Venmurasu

Venmurasu - Mudharkanal
Author	Jeyamohan
Original title	Venmurasu
Illustrator	Shanmugavel
Country	India
Language	Tamil
Genre	Indian Magic Realism or Puranic realism
Publisher	Natrinai Pathippagam Kizhakku Pathippagam
Publication date	2014
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages	25000 (expected)

Venmurasu (Tamil: வெண்முரசு Veṇmuracu) is a Tamil novel by writer Jeyamohan. A modern renarration of the Indian classical epic Mahabharatha, it is Jeyamohan's most ambitious work to date, with a scope and scale that seeks to match the grandness of the epic itself. Jeyamohan started writing the work in January 2014 and has announced plans to write it every day over ten years. The overall volume is expected to cross 25,000 pages.

Venmurasu is being written as a series of books, each one composed in a different style and genre. As of February 2017, twelve books have been published online and in print; the thirteenth is being serialized. The first eleven novels have been published as books in Collectors and paperback versions.

Jeyamohan had been an avid reader of the Mahabharatha, the quintessential epic of India. In his childhood he had been fascinated by the Kathakali renderings of Mahabharatha stories, their expressive portrayals of characters like Duryodhan and the angst-ridden life of Karna making a deep impression on him. Far from being a simple tale of 'good vs evil', Mahabharatha opened up for him as a true classic with multi-dimensional characters, drama, emotion, and a deep meditation on truth, philosophy, ideals, fate and the universe itself.

As he grew up and traveled the length and breadth of India, Jeyamohan saw and read the various adaptations of the Mahabharatha and its universal influence on the culture and language of India across all regions and languages. He delved deep into the work of Vyasa and followed the path of the epic as it was told and retold over the works of thousands of authors, singers and performers into the twentieth century. The epic grew with him and helped him chart the path of his life as a writer. The Bhagavad Gita had a deep influence on his worldview and he continued to explore its meanings under Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati.

In the late 1980s and 1990s, Jeyamohan wrote many short stories based on the Mahabharatha, including the highly praised "Thisaigalin Naduve" and "Padma Vyugam". He later wrote a series of essays on the Gita on his website. Jeyamohan also continued to build up on decades of personal research for his ongoing work on Asokavanam.