Subramania Bharati (1882-1921) stands as one of the rare Renaissance spirits of modern Indian literature - at once a poet, lifelong journalist, polemicist and rebel. Writing in Tamil yet thinking beyond all linguistic and provincial boundaries, he forged a voice that exceeded both geography and the limits of the historical moment. When the colonial state sought to silence him, Bharati chose exile, spending nearly a decade in Pondicherry, then under the French. He also wrote several of his ...