Global Krishna

Stories for children

Preface by the author

Global Krishna, my first book in English, is essentially a translation of my Tamil travel story book for children titled “Kannan Ula”. Both the books are published simultaneously.

The inspiration for these books is the enthusiasm shown by my grand-children when I tell them stories, including those of Krishna. I have written two other children’s books in Tamil, consisting of songs. The songs from one of them has been recorded and published as an audio CD.

In the Tamil version of Global Krishna, I have written a poem as the end-piece for each of the stories.

There are thirty stories, symbolically similar to the Thiruppavai (the divine songs celebrating Lord Vishnu) of Andal. I have attempted the same in English as psalms on Krishna. But basically being translations of Tamil poetry, some of these may not quite sound the same to the English reader!

Being a Tamil writer, I am an infant in the world of English literature – I hope my readers will understand and appreciate my attempts, more for the content than the language.

I cherish the opinions and advice given by my daughter, son, and wife while writing this book. Professor V. Renganathan (visiting faculty Loyola College, Chennai) scrutinized my psalms and guided me. My thanks are due to him.

When I approached the esteemed writer and literary critic Ms. Prema Nandakumar for a foreword, she readily agreed. My respectful thanks to her.

I wish to thank my friend and artist Suba – apart from creating the cover paintings, he has created the pictures for all the stories with a wonderful imagination..

Thanks to Stanley Vijaya Kumar for handling all the software aspects of this publication, getting the digital version of the book ready for production.

Thanks are also due to Palani of Mullai Pathipagam for bringing out the book successfully in time.

Let us all join the children in this global tour along with Krishna!

Chennai – 28

1 Sep 2008, Siddarthan