The novel was written at a time when there was an emerging class of upper caste men (mostly Nairs) who received a Western style education, and were achieving prominent positions in British India.
Pavangal (1925), a translation of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables by Nalappat Narayana Menon, was a milestone in the history of Malayalam literature and it set off a social reformation of sorts in Kerala.
Literary critic M. Leelavathy notes: "The translation was an extraordinary phenomenon as it prepared the ground for the Communist movement to take roots in Kerala.
Important social novels of the period include Virutan Sanku by Karat Achutha Menon (1912) and Balikasadanam by Kocheeppan Tharakan.
P. Kesava Dev, who was a Communist in the thirties and forties turned away from diehard ideologies and wrote a symbolic novel called Arku Vendi?
After portraying the class struggle of farm labourers in Randidangazhi (Two Measures) in 1949, Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai turned away from party politics and produced a moving romance in Chemmeen (Shrimps) in 1956.
For S. K. Pottekkatt and Vaikom Muhammad Basheer, who had not dabbled in politics, the continuity is marked in the former's Vishakanyaka (Poison Maid, 1948) and the latter's Ntuppuppakkoranendarnnu (My Grandpa had an Elephant, 1951).
The non-political social or domestic novel was championed by P. C. Kuttikrishnan (Uroob) with his Ummachu (1955) and Sundarikalum Sundaranmarum (Men and Women of Charm, 1958).
With the phenomenal success of Chemmeen as a novel and as a film made Thakazhi turn to write on a larger canvas the inclusive accounts of the people around him.
The mature works of Pottekkatt, Basheer, Dev, Thakazhi and Uroob make the third quarter of the 20th century one of the brightest periods of the novel in Malayalam.
The day-to-day lives of this common humanity is the stuff of great fiction and Pottekkatt got the Jnanpith Award for his magnum opus Oru Desathinte Katha.
The Nairs, Ezhavas and Christians figure dominantly in the complex and involved story of the people who live in any Kerala village as neighbours.
M. K. Menon (Vilasini, 1928-93) attempted the biggest novel in Malayalam, perhaps also in any Indian language, in Avakasikal (Inheritors), probably motivated by the desire to write the grand narrative centering around a family.
1936), author of novels like Chambal, Ohari (Share) and Cricket, extended the thematic range of fiction, bringing in urban concerns.
P. K. Balakrishnan set the trend with his popular redaction of the Mahabharata from the point of view of Droupadi: she is reflecting on the circuitous course of her life during the last night of the battle of Kurukshetra (Ini Njan Urangatte).
K. E. Mathai (Parappurath, 1924-81), who also served in the army, is well known for his popular novels such as Panitheeratha Veedu (Unfinished House) Aranazhika Neram (Half an Hour).
Kakkanadan (George Varghese, b.1935), once attached to leftist ideology, turned away from it to write one of the most powerful narratives based on that experience in his novel Ushnamekhala (The Tropics).
O. V. Vijayan (1931-2004), having spent a number of years in Delhi, locates his classic novel Khasakkinte Itihasam (The Legend of Khasak) in the remote village in his native Palakkad.
It has a simple plot but the inlaid narration invests it with a metaphysical or even mystical aura, which marks it out among the works of fiction attempted by Malayalis during the post-freedom period.
To suggest a symbolically large design with a short physical frame, in other words to use a microscope as a magnifying glass, is the kind of technique that Vijayan resorted to.
After a stint at the existentialist novel a la Sartre and Camus, M. Mukundan is a front runner in the post-modern trend with such works as Mayyazhippuzhayude Theerangalil (On the Banks of Mayyazhi), Daivathinte Vikruthikal (God’s Mischief) and Kesavante Vilapangal (The Lamentations of Kesavan).
N. P. Mohammed (1928-2003) too tried his hand at political allegory in Hiranyakasipu high-lighting the horrors of totalitarianism, but moved on to the social novel as in Ennappaadam (Oilfield) and Maram (Tree), which are very sensitive portrayals of the life of the Muslim community, different in style from that of Vaikom Muhammad Basheer.
Muttathu Varkey (1918-89) has a number of popular novels to his credit, such as Inapravukal (A Pair of Doves), and Padatha Painkili (The Bird that Doesn’t Sing).
These works set a trend in story-telling, involving simple domestic characters in their everyday life with their joys and sorrows told in a rather sentimental melodramatic language.
They probably dominate the field of serial fiction in the pulp weeklies and magazines and are Kanam EJ (E. J. Philip, 1926-87), Pulinkunnu Antony, Kottayam Pushpanath, P. V. Thampi, Mallika Yunis, M. D. Ratnamma, etc.
Several writers are there who portray the decline of the feudal system and of the old order of the joint family, among whom easily the most gifted is M. T. Vasudevan Nair (b.1933), author of a large number of popular favourites like Nalukettu (Four-chambered House), Asuravithu, etc.
The landscape and ethos of the Valluvanad region and the transformations undergone by them in the course of the century, involving relics of the tarawad and the communal tensions provide a challenging theme for the highly evocative style of Vasudevan Nair’s narrative art.
Malayattoor Ramakrishnan (1927-97) wrote Verukal (Roots), depicting the story of his family or community, but he also fictionalised his experience as a senior civil servant in Yanthram (The Machine).
Young novelists today are deeply interested in experimentation both in theme and technique, taking long strides in the post modern direction.
Twenty-first-century Malayalam littérateurs include T. D. Ramakrishnan (Francis Itty Cora), Benyamin (Aadujeevitham), K. R. Meera (Aarachaar), T. P. Rajeevan (Paleri Manikyam: Oru Pathirakolapathakathinte Katha), Subhash Chandran (Manushyanu Oru Amukham), Khadija Mumtaz (Barsa), Susmesh Chandroth (Paper Lodge) V. J. James (Nireeswaran) and Sajil Sreedhar (Vasavadatha)