Singaporean poet, writer & painter living in France
(Retired UN Civil Servant and Mediator of UNESCO)
CHANDRAN NAIR was born in Kerala, South India in 1945. He left India for Singapore with his mother Bhargavi Pillai at the age of seven. His father. Villayil Raman Gopala Pillai who wrote short stories and novels in Malayalam under the pen name of Njekkad, (their ancestral village) had migrated to Singapore in 1947. In 1973 Chandran Nair married Ivy Goh Pek Kien and they have three daughters Radha, Meera and Chandrika.
He was educated at Raffles Institution and the University of Singapore from which he holds a Masters in Science ( Marine Biology) and a Diploma in Fisheries (with distinction) but went into publishing on his graduation and worked as an international civil servant with UNESCO, first in Karachi (1981-1985) and then in Paris (1985 - 2004). As an United Nations specialist in book development he has travelled widely within Asia, Africa, Europe, the Caribbean and Latin America. He has also been a print and audio-visual journalist (with the Straits Times in Malaysia and Radio and Television Singapore, respectively) as well as a TV script writer.
He started writing at an early age (inspired by his father who had a wide circle of literary friends even when the family lived in a tiny Improvement Trust flat in the heart of the biggest gangster area of Singapore) and his first poems were published in his school magazine The Rafflesian in 1963. His first book of poems, Once the Horsemen and Other poems was published in 1972 and was well received as was his second collection After the Hard Hours, This Rain (1975) and he has co-translated with Malcolm Koh Ho Ping the Poems and Lyrics of the last Lord Lee,the last Emperor of the Southern Tang Dynasty. He also won the The New Nation Singapore Short Story Writing contest in 1973 with Leta and has published his stories in Short Stories From Africa and Asia (which he co-edited with Theo Luzuka), Commentary, Singapore Writing , Singapore Short Stories (Vol. 1) edited by Robert Yeo and also in translation in Malay in Cerpen cerpen Asean (Dewan Bhasa dan Pustaka).
He was founder President of the Society of Singapore Writers from 1976 to 1981, when he left Singapore to take up a post with UNESCO in Karachi.
While in Karachi he participated in stage drama and poetry sessions and also started painting . His interest in drama goes back to his secondary school days and the obligatory annual Shakespeare production that was staged for the public. He has acted, directed and produced and was also active in stage lighting.
He directed Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godotfor the University of Singapore Society in 1972 and Huis Clos (In Camera)by Jean-Paul Sartre for the Alliance Francaise in Karachi in 1982.
