M. N. Subbamma

M. N. Subbamma Biography

M. N. Subbamma, better known as Vani was a famous writer belonging to Kannada literature. She was a fictional writer best known for her novels, and three of her works have been adapted to Kannada silver screen - Shubhamangala, Eradu Kanasu and Hosa Belaku. She is one of the early established female Kannada novelists and so are her nieces - Triveni and Aryamba Pattabhi too, whose father B. M Krishnaswamy was her brother. Her elder brother B. M. Srikantaiah was a doyen of Kannada literature, a renowned scholar, writer, translator and poet, whose translations are present in university texts all over the world.

Vani was born in 1912 in Srirangapatna, Kingdom of Mysore in British India. She was born into a family of writers and scholars and many of her family writers later followed the same path, her nieces - Triveni and Aryamba Pattabhi being the prominent names. But Triveni died at a young age of 34 in 1963 following delivery complications. A strange co-incidence, her sister-in-law Belluru Mylaraiah Srikantaiah’s wife Devamma also died soon after giving birth to her fourth child, and her brother never married again.

Vani studied up to 10^th standard, which was indeed a great achievement at that era, when girls were not educated too much. At the age of just 10, she was married to an advocate M. N. Nanjundaiah. Subbamma published her first short story collection - Kasturi in 1944. She also took the pseudonym ‘Vani’ after that. She mostly published novels and short stories. Her other short story collections are Arpane, Naneya maduve, Aparupada Attithi, Babu Bharthane and Happy Birthday. Kaveria Madilalli, Sulgna Savidhana, Bedugade, Anjali, Mane Magalu, Chinnada Panjara, Avala Bhagya, Baleya Neralu, Prema sethu, Bale, Trishula etc are among her published novels. She passed away in 1988.

Published: February 18, 2019

Updated: February 18, 2019