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''Premalekhanam'' (The Love Letter) is Vaikom Muhammad Basheer's first work (1943) to be published as a book. The novel is a humorous story of love. Through the hilarious dialogs, Basheer attacks religious Conservatism and the dowry system. ==Plot summary== A young bank employee, Keshavan Nair, Hindu by religion, ''Nair'' by caste lodges on the upper floor of the house belonging to Saramma's father. Saraamma is a Christian by religion, beautiful, young, unmarried, unemployed, happy-go-lucky with a sting on the tip of her tongue. Keshavan Nair is an honest simpleton haplessly in love with her. The book gets its title from the letter that Keshavan Nair composes to reveal to Saramma his love for her. The setting is 1940's Kerala. The story is a sarcastic commentary on the dowry system and is in favour of inter-religious marriage. But this is disguised in a funny love story. Basheer was not a ''Nair'' or a Christian, he was a lover of humanity. Saramma is an educated woman, and she is trying to get a job, and she has applied for jobs in many countries( because the story is set in Travancore, which was a country, or princely state). At last she gets a job. The job provider was Keshavan Nair, and the only job assigned to Saramma was to love him!He pays for that too in a monthly basis. Now the serious questions arise. They belong to different religions, then which religion will their children follow? They decides to teach their children every religion and it is up to the children to choose their religion. They plan to grow their children "Religion less". Then comes the other serious issue, How will they name the child? They cannot choose a Hindu name or Christian name, Keshavan Nair asks "Shall we go for Russian names?"Saramma asks "How will it be?" "Anything ending with 'Visky'is a Russian name" Saramma was not happy with it. Keshavan Nair asks "Shall we go for Chinese names like Kwang" Saramma is still not happy. Finally they decides to go with names over objects like sky, sand, Air, toffee, balloon. They finally decide to take a lot of these objects, The result of the lot will be two chits which say "Sky" and "Toffee". They name their child as "Skytoffee". Keshavan Nair shouts saying "Mr.Skytoffee","Skytoffee","Comrade:Skytoffee". Saramma interrupts "Do you want our child to become a communist" Keshavan Nair says "Let him decide on that". The story ends happily. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Premalekhanam」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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