Ottran - Ashokamitran

I have never read any of Ashokamitran's book before but i heard and read  a lot about his writings in many tamil blogs, so i decided to try a book by him.As i was browsing the books in the Singapore  Book Expo,this particular book with black cover got my attention, i bought the book and started reading the book in returning back to my home.I started to be with the author once i engaged myself fully in reading.Initially i thought this book is about a mole or a spy or something like espionage but its different kind of mole

This book , is it a travelogue or a memoir or a novel? i dont know .. for me everything together.I think this book is about Ashokamitran's experience at University of Iowa in the United States while attending an International Writing Programme during 1973-1974.All the characters are easily identifiable with the people whom we meet , the way he describes the characters of  the other writers  is really good.His uncanny ability to sense out the essence of people was very useful in writing this book.My father read his short story collections sometimes back and he told  me that Ashokamitran is good at extracting and observing things around him, thats true in this book.


I like the the character Bravo who wrote the entire novel theme and characters in the backside of the shirt and how he betrayed his wife back in home. The book was titled 'Mole' in english and was translated  by K.N Kalyan Raman, have to check this english translation.I have some more books of Ashokamitran back home, have to read those books , as i like his style of writing.