KANNADA LITERATURE: UPSC Daily Important Topic | 20 April 2022

■ KANNADA LITERATURE.

◇ Earliest Kannada inscriptions date from the 5th/6th century onwards, but the oldest surviving piece of literature in this language is the Kavirajamarga (The Royal Road of the Poets), a 9th century work on poetics.

 ◇ The best known poets of the 10th century were Pampa, Ponna, and Ranna, all of whom wrote Jaina Puranas.

◇ Pampa, author of the Adi Purana (an account of the life of the first  tirthankara Rishabha or Adinatha), also wrote the Vikramarjunavijaya,  based on the Mahabharata story.

◇ Ponna wrote both in Sanskrit and in Kannada, and was given the title of  Ubhaya-kavichakravarti.

◇ Chavunda Raya wrote the Trishashtilakshana Mahapurana, an account of the 24 Jaina saints, in  continuous prose.

◇ In the 12th century, Nagachandra or Abhinava Pampa wrote the Ramachandracharitra Purana.

◇ Kannada works of the 12th century include Neminatha’s Lilavati which tells the love story of a Kadamba prince and a beautiful princess.