Pillai, Ananda Ranga ___ 1709-1761 ___ Indian ___ writer

BIOGRAPHICAL SUMMARY
Ananda Ranga Pillai was born at Ayanavaram near Perambur, a suburb of Madras. His father, Thiruvengada Pillai, was persuaded to settle at Pondicherry by a brother-in-law, and eventually became a broker for the French (who ruled Pondicherry mostly from 1673 until 1954). When he died, Ananda continued the accounts service but soon succeeded to become a famous dubash and the courtier (broker-agent) for Joseph François Dupleix, the governor general of the French establishment in India. Pillai married Mangathayi Ammal and they had five children, although two of his sons died very young. He wrote a diary for much of his life (and, therefore, has been called the Pepys of South India), although his nephew is now believed to have authored the last entries, for 1760-1761. The diary is considered an important source for historians of the period, and Pillai is thought of as the greatest Tamil diarist. This text was amended in June 2008 with many thanks to M. Gobalakichenane (France) who is currently working on the Pillai diaries for a new critical Tamil edition.
A biography link
Wikipedia bio
The Diary Review - 18th century India

DIARY DATES, CONTENT DESCRIPTORS
1736-1761 ___ political military religious social commerce

WEB TEXT LINKS
large number of extracts from all eight volumes
etext
etext

ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT LINKS
Bibliothèque Nationale de France

SOME PUBLISHED TITLES
The Private Diary of Ananda Rangam Pillai
The Historical Material from the Private Diary of Ananda Ranga Pillai
 

May 2005, June 2008, April 2013
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IMPORTANT NOTES AND CAUTIONS: 1) The first line of basic information may be incomplete in several ways: some historical figures have different names (titles, pen-names); their birth and death dates may be unknown or uncertain (g - guess, c - circa); similarly, their occupations may be unknown, or they may have had other jobs; and, for early diarists, I've used 'British' a bit too freely. 2) The biographical summary may not be accurate. It was compiled quickly from various sources, mostly on the internet, and the facts were not checked anywhere near as rigorously as they would have been if they'd been intended for publication in a printed form. 3) The journal dates and descriptors (which are in no particular order) must be treated with caution: since I have not examined the diaries myself, the descriptors are only guesses based on bibliographies, anthologies and internet biographies. 4) For the biography and etext links, I have ignored any sites with charges, and I have avoided, wherever possible, those with pop-ups or too much advertising. I have limited myself to providing three etext links where there is some variety between them. 5) For the original manuscript links, I have limited myself to providing a maximum of two (although, for a few diarists, their original diaries are held in more than two places). 6) I have provided the titles - chosen randomly - for up to three printed editions of the diaries.