Khasakkinte Itihasam was inspired by the Ottupulackal family's stay at a village called Thasarak near Palakkad (in central Kerala) for a year. O. V. Vijayan's sister was appointed as the teacher of a single-teacher government school in the village (1956). Some of the characters in the novel were modeled after real-life characters whom Vijayan encountered in Thasarak.
