episodes are acted out in rituals over a 21-day period in front of the icon of Vis.n.u.
These are attended by thousands of people, with about 400,000 pilgrims coming
in on important days. Vis.n.u, in S ́rı ̄ran.gam, is called Ran.gana ̄tha, the “lord of
the stage” or the “lord of the island.” Although the main icon within the inner
shrine depicts him as reclining on the coils of the serpent called Ananta
(“without end,” “infinity”), the smaller festival icon of him standing upright is
used in procession and celebrations such as the Festival of Recitation. On the
tenth day of the recitation, this icon of Vis.n.u is dressed as a woman. This is
considered to be a very special annual event and the ritual is called “Mohinı ̄
alankaram” (“the adornment as an entrancing woman.”) The crowds are the
thickest on this day and the next, the eleventh day after new moon (ekadas ́) in
the month of Margasirsa (December 15 to January 14). Vis.n.u, clad in white and
red silks, with beautiful jewelry sparkles as a woman. “She” is taken in a pro-
cession around the temple as the throngs worship “her.” This attire and dress-
ing of Vis.n.u is a special favorite with the pilgrims; “truly,” they say every year,
“tonight, the Lord is more beautiful than the Goddess (Laks.mı ̄) herself.”
The recitation of the Tiruva ̄ymoli begins the next day; the eleventh day of the
festival. On the seventeenth day of the festival (that is seventh day of the
Tiruva ̄ymoli recitation), the section in which Namma ̄l
̄
va ̄r, in the voice of a
woman addresses, the lord at S ́rı ̄ran.gam (the poem given in the beginning of
this chapter) is acted out. Just before the celebrations that day, the image of
Namma ̄l
̄
va ̄r is dressed as a woman in beautiful silk garments, with a hairpiece
and artificial limbs. The Lady Parankusa, as “she” is known, is carried in a palan-
quin to the Hall of a Thousand Pillars and the araiyarsby “her” side recite poems
with emotion. As they finish the moving verses, depicting “her” intense longing
for union with the Lord of S ́rı ̄ran.gam, the priests who are standing by Vis.n.u’s
icon, lift him from his palanquin into their arms and walk towards Namma ̄l
̄
va ̄r.
This festival icon of Vis.n.u, known popularly as “the Handsome Bridegroom,”
seems to be almost walking towards the devotee to be with “her” for a raptur-
ous union, and the crowds applaud. The following day, Namma ̄l
̄
va ̄r is back in
the Hall, back again in his usual clothes.
Sometimes, Namma ̄l
̄
va ̄r, Tirumankai A ̄l
̄va ̄r, and other poets, step outside the
Tamil literary conventions and see themselves as participants in an episode from
the epics, the Ra ̄mayana or the Maha ̄bha ̄rata, or one of the stories of Kr.s.n.a
(an incarnation of Vis.n.u) given in the Pura ̄n.as, devotional texts composed in the
first millennium ce. Namma ̄l
̄
va ̄r, and especially Tirumankai, see themselves as
women connected with Kr.s.n.a and speak in the voices of Yas ́oda ̄, Kr.s.n.a’s foster
mother, or one of the cowherd girls. The following verse by Namma ̄l
̄
va ̄r is typical
of the genre:
You were gone the whole day,
grazing cows Kanna!
Your soothing words burn my soul.
Evening tramples like a rogue elephant
and the fragrance of jasmine buds,572 vasudha narayanan