As a journalist In 1942, TaRaSu went to Bangalore and joined as a sub-editor for the Kannada newspaper,
VishwaKarnataka, earning a sum of Rs. 25 as salary per month. During this period, he married
Ambuja. He later worked for the
Prajamatha,
Vahini and
Navodaya newspapers. His career in journalism also included a stint with
Prajavani,
Mysuru,
Kaladoota and
Vicharavani newspapers. Some of his most celebrated novels include
Masanada Hoovu, which talks about the plight of prostitutes and
Hamsa Geethe, which talks about the life of a musician in the context of Chitradurga being passed from the hands of the
Palegars to
Hyder Ali. Both of these novels have been made into films in
Kannada.
Hamsageethe was chosen as a text book for graduation classes and a
Hindi film,
Basant Bahar, was based on it. TaRaSu has also written many historical novels, the most famous being
Durgaastamana (fall of the Durga fort), which won him the
Sahitya Akademi award in 1985. This was the last novel that he wrote and it talks of the fall of Chitradurga Palegars under the hands of Hyder Ali. His another historical novel based on Chitradurga's history is
Kambaniya Kuyilu and its sequels
Tirugubana and
Raktaratri. He also wrote a novel called
Shilpashree which is based on
Chavundaraya, the person who commissioned the statue of
Bahubali at
Shravanabelagola. For nearly two decades, much of the historical source material for his numerous novels were sufficed by the eminent Indian historian
S. Srikanta Sastri. Sastri even wrote an erudite and scholarly foreword to one of Ta. Ra. Su.'s famous novels – "Nrupatunga". TaRaSu experimented with various narrative styles and was the first author to introduce the stream-of-consciousness literary technique in Kannada. He also used the
Indian independence movement as a background in his novels, like
Rakta Tarpana. When the Navya (modernist) movement of Kannada literature was in its infancy, TaRaSu contributed to its growth by coming up with various books belonging to this genre, like his collection of short stories,
Girimalligeya Nandanadalli which shows the confusion during the shift from progressive to modernist form of literature. ==Later life==