File photo of SLBHYRAPs with Chandrashekar Kambara and Pradhan Gurudutt. , Photo credit: sriram ma
What distinguishes SL Bhyrapa from his contemporaries was his loyalty to the form of the novel over six decades as a writer. He was also known for conducting intensive research before writing his novels.
However, many of his works, even though he is bestsellers, also became controversial for what his critics called the “conservative view” and “Hindutva’s attitudes” that interfered, evoke the intense debate and opposition to the progressive parts of society.
Widely read and translate
From his first novel Bheemakaya in 1958 to his 25th and the latest novel Uttarakanda in 2017, then announced his retirement, Bhyrapa remained one of the most popular novelists in Cannada. Each of his novels saw several editions and the first novel he wrote when he was 27, is still reprinted. All his novels have been translated into several Indian languages except English. He had devoted readers across the country.
His novels Vamsavriksha, Grukabhang and Parva, Mahabharata’s narratives are considered a classic of Kannad’s literature. In 2010 he won the Saraswati Samman Award for his novel Mandra. In 2023, Padma received Bhushan.
Narration
Bhyrappa re -connected two epics, Mahabharata (Parva) and Ramayana (Uttarakanda) and reconstructed them in the Social Realism regime by means of a stream of storytelling.
In the essay he wrote about Parva’s research, he writes Bhyrappa about his travels in North India and visits places where Mahabharata’s events are to take place, including the Kunukshetra War.
His latest novel Uttarakand, told from the Situ point of view, was well accepted by progressive and was a kind of departure from his earlier novels that faced criticism that he rarely wrote well -overwritten female characters. His earlier novel Kaval (2010) received especially criticism for what many called “anti-feminist”.
Bhyrappa often experimented with entities that were not much explored in Cannada. For example, while Yaana was a sci -fi novel, set in space, Anchu is a psychological novel, and Mandra was on music. Saarth and Avarana were controversial history.
Conservative outlook
While Bhyrappa remained popular, many critics at the progressive school claimed that his novels had a conservative view that was often in collision with various Kannada movements – Navya, Bandaya and Dalit – who dominated the second half of the 20th century. His fictitious works ran in parallel with these movements.
Bhyrappa once characterized his fiction as “Shuddha Sahitya” (pure literature), claiming that many of his contemporaries who identified with literary movements “wrote with the agenda”.
This has seen an intense pushback from other writers who claimed that even the novels of Bhyrappy were dealt with by the agenda – Hindutvy rights – and captivated conservative attitudes.
Some of his novels, especially Avaran, have caused a huge controversy for depicting Muslim rulers and transformation. The novel even had a footnotes referring to historical sources on which he claimed that the novel was written. However, he was criticized for the “selective communal reading” of history.
In his later years, Bhyrapa was an enthusiastic supporter of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. In his condolence report Mr. Modi described Bhyrappa as a writer “who aroused our conscience and touched the Indian soul”.
Published – September 2025 01:08 IS
