The North-Eastern - Eelam Tamil magazine launched in the homeland

[Mario Arulthas]

Hi,

Please subscribe to The North-Eastern, a new English-language print magazine published in the Tamil homeland: www.northeastmag.com. See coverage of the launch events in Jaffna and Batticaloa on the Tamil Guardian here.

Our vision for the magazine is to have an English-language print journal that’s dedicated to critical thought, political analysis, cultural memory and long form storytelling, by those in or with roots in the homeland. We are keen on foregrounding emerging writers and writers from backgrounds that have historically and continue to be marginalised. It continues a long tradition (since the 1840s!) of Eelam Tamil journalism in the English language, and follows in the footsteps of the Saturday Review, Hot Spring and The Northeastern Herald/Monthly.

As you know, Eelam Tamil perspectives remain significantly underrepresented on the island, with much of the discourse in English filtered through a Colombo- or Western-centric lens. Important voices particularly those of women, youth, grass-root organisers and members of marginalised communities, are relegated to a perceived periphery.

We address this gap by publishing deeply researched analyses and essays from (paid) writers based in and connected to the Tamil homeland. We support emerging writers, researchers and cultural practitioners, and translate existing pieces and new submissions from Tamil to English. We also seek to broaden writing on Eelam Tamil nationhood by commissioning pieces on the environment and on the arts. In the first issue, we have seven pieces by emerging writers and five pieces by women. We also have a piece on a seasonal river in Valikamam and another piece on Bharathanatyam from Kilinochchi. We are honoured to have former North-Eastern Herald editor JS Tissainayagam write a piece for our inaugural issue. We publish poetry, both contemporary and from the past.

Another important aspect of the publication is the reproduction and translation of historical articles, sourced by digging through the archives of newspapers from the 50s-90s. For this issue, we translated the speech Thanthai Chelva wrote for the Vaddukkoddai Resolution and poetry from Kaasi Aanandan, both written in 1976. Please do take a look at our website to read the pieces: www.northeastmag.com.

The decision to print was not made lightly. We paid particular attention to the design language and worked with a brilliant artist in Tamil Nadu to come up with the layout and design. We also insisted on printing in the homeland, which means that the issues you purchase will be shipped from the island to where you are. We have faith that the quality of the magazine means that we will be able to continue to print an issue every quarter. 

You may wonder whether there would be a sufficient audience for an English-language magazine in the homeland. We believe there is, even if it is a small one at first. But we also firmly believe that we need to make materials available in order to rebuild the rich discursive culture in English that used to exist in the past. To aid this, we have shipped free copies of the first issue to schools, universities and libraries across the homeland and hope to continue to do so. We are confident that the audience will grow, as we publish. Major bookstores in the North-East have started stocking the magazine and are reporting sales.

We launched in Jaffna and Batticaloa a month ago, with lively discussions at our events (photos attached). We also held an event in Toronto and are hoping to do more in other places. Our subscriber count is slowly rising, with purchases from around the world (10 countries so far).

But we need more support. We will need to increase our subscriber count to cover the costs for this issue. One magazine (USD30) or a basic annual subscription (USD100 – 4 issues shipped to your home) will only cover the cost of the writers, design, print, website, shipping and our staff on the island if we scale up the number of subscribers significantly. Sending free copies to schools and libraries also adds to the cost.

Please consider subscribing and (if you can afford it) at a higher tier. We are working on finalising our second issue, which you can expect in August. We believe The North-Eastern will have a significant impact on the Tamil struggle, but we will need the backing of people like you, who (I hope) can see why this magazine is important for the struggle, not just through the narrative work, but through the building of capacity.

Best wishes,

Mario Arulthas