Passion at MIDNIGHT!

Anu & Mike--- or should we say "Usha" & "Hari"
in Midnight Hotel

The KERALA launch

Much Time To Sit & Stare....

Anita Nair, Shinie Antony, Jayanth Kodkani & me. Hormis
Tharakan sat extreme left.

The idea of Lament of Mohini started when I was---what?--- 14 years.

And then it changed and spurted and cantered, and became a book in 2000. The play Midnight Hotel was ready about six years before it saw the stage. Maria's Room began when I was on vacation in Goa after the various launches of Mohini. Harper Collins will bring it out in November 2009. Nearly a decade later.

What I'm trying to say is, give me time and wasted opportunities, and my work (novel or play) can go on and on. Would that be the ideal of every author? An ever-growing work? I can imagine an artist stuck to his canvas for years, changing and adding and removing, yearning for a state of perfection.

You then live with your characters and what they're doing, and you're comfortable with that because the novel/ play has become another home. When it is finally closed and the reader/ audience takes over, then you have lost your home because other residents have come in and they're free to comment, criticize, praise, and what they have isn't completely yours any longer. The delight of being published/ staged is an aphrodisiac. The feeling that your work is still yours is contentment.

So which is the better bet?!

the state of things...

It's that time when creativity is being burdened by the effects of creativity.
My children's book was "published" on August 15. That's it. It's more than ten days later. I haven't heard anything after that. I'm wondering whether this too will pass like the previous one without any readings or launches, courtesy the publisher. I remember being asked during a TV interview years ago whether I'd be up to the task of promoting my own book, networking and getting things moving. And I said, it's a pity the writer can't just sit and write; that he has to be market-savvy and pushy as well. My ideal life would be to live in a big old house in some isolated place (peferably by the sea) and venture out only to watch my own plays or for readings. The rest is writing....

My son has come up with a cover for my next novel due November. Great stuff. Son really shines. Pity we have to wait for two months to see it officially.

COMMIT!

I've been hearing a lot about social commitment and being honest about what you write and about bringing the actual state of the world into your page. I've watched a film on a writer, listened to various audience comments during a book reading and generally soaked in this commitment ambience this last week. If you're honest to your work or concept, won't that do?

There are writers and writers. There are stories and stories. Wouldn't it be more dishonest to drag in a feeling you don't feel but feel it should represent you because of what others feel?!

I see the world. It will come out in my writing. I don't think I should struggle to bring it out. If I feel strongly about something, that will definitely come out. In one way or the other. In one or more genres that I write in. Let's see, I do novels, plays, short stories, essays, the odd column, poetry; what else? I will express my thoughts about the world somewhere. So, readers, thanks for reading, and for the ideas, the writing is my side of the bargain.

Ninth & Tenth

Friday and Saturday saw the ninth and tenth shows of Midnight Hotel. The director has already told me he feels the play has done its bit in Chennai, and may not have an audience after this. There was a Kochi show scheduled for August 30 that was cancelled because of some sponsorship issue. I was looking forward to having the play in Kerala. Maybe it will happen one day. Anyway, ten shows in Chennai and Bangalore's good enough, and except for the last two, all shows played to full houses.



There's a Twitter entry from Kyra: one of their waiters jumped into the arms of the barman during an especially scary moment in the play! These are moments that make life worth living!



You write a play, and somehow it works. Director Mithran realised the nuances, and he's also a magician with lighting, design and sound. The cast was the best. And the backstage crew was excellent most of the time. Like I said, somehow, sometimes, it works. I wanted a play where wit was a major element, and it seems to have worked most of the time. The ninth show wasn't such a big success, both cast (in the beginning, anyway) and audience were out of energy. The next night made up for it. The audience was fantastic. I don't think my laugh-lines did so much during any of the previous shows. It was a fitting finale! And the cast and crew rose magnificently to the occasion. There were speeches earlier, this being a fund-raiser for CMC Vellore's patient programme. Both days the director held on to the mike, but I couldn't resist almost grabbing the mike from him after the play the second day and saying: "This is is the night of August 15th, and here we have Midnight's Children!" It was an uncontrollable urge, and I gave in!



Dr Binayak Sen, the human rights activist, was chief guest both nights, and he told me he enjoyed the play. He too must have seen the difference on the 2nd day. We had dinner at Mithran's house where there was a small discussion about what he'd been doing, his arrest and thereafter. Also, a bit of an ideology debate with Mike and Anu, the lead pair, and Dr Sen. Was this progress vs. human rights? Or was even the "progress" open to question? What was the role of the Maoists? But it was a dining-table discussion, not the debate the subject deserved.



Sunday afternoon, there was R. V. Ramani's film on Tamil writer Sundara Ramaswamy. Very interesting, because Ramani casts his net wide and catches other fish too. So there's an ambience that reaches outwards from Su Ra. Personally, I felt there could have been tighter editing at some places, but I enjoyed the leisurely feel nevertheless. I would have discussed it with Ramani if there was time. I liked the strand with the Brahmin-nonBrahmin debate. In many cases nowadays, there's too much discussion about differences and divisions instead of addressing the immediate problem. And the discussions continue, becoming more and more heated and alienating all parties, and the problems continue to grow.

The Magic Store Of Nu-Cham-Vu

He's finally here!

You'd probably find him in the stores right now. Nu-Cham-Vu, the greedy little creature from Anchan Bay is here at last. And recommended by no less than the redoubtable Ruskin Bond himself.

The book is called The Magic Store of Nu-Cham-Vu, and it's from Puffin.

The age group is a bit wide, from 9 to 175 years. So, you see, few kids are left out. The exciting thing for me is, my son Vinayak has done the illustrations and those who've seen the cover picture are raving about it.
"A long time ago, when the moon was still green and the sky had just recovered from a severe case of rainbow measles, there was a children's store on Ju-Juicy Street. It had a glass window upfront, with a large pair of eyes painted on it that blinked heavily during the rains. A tiny little waterfall flowed down the windowpanes. It sold things you and I know nothing about."

That's how the book begins.

It's interesting how this book took off. When I was in Scotland on the Charles Wallace fellowship, my friend had asked me to write a story for children. And I did, sitting at my desk in my office in the Dept of English in Pathfoot building at Stirling University. It was a little tale, and told of strange people with funny names. Including a monster named Nu-Cham-Vu. He was, if I may say so, the hero. And villain. But, alas, no one came to take Nu-Cham-Vu off my hands. I can understand. He's that sort of a fellow. Years later, when my friend joined another publishing house, she asked me for "that story you wrote, remember?" Of course I remembered! I sent it to her. Her colleague and another friend of mine asked me if I could alter the story to suit even younger children. I was reluctant to do so, so they left it at that.

This time I didn't want Nu-Cham-Vu to sit around moping. A moping Nu is a dangerous thing. I sent him off to my editor friend in Puffin. She submitted it to the editorial group and they said: why not make it a book, a bigger story? Aaahh! I did!

And then came Vinayak's "stunning illustrations", as the blurb says.

It's publishing date was Independence Day, August 15.

I hope it's reached the bookshops by now.

The Nu book for children.

Fruits of Labour

It's that kind of a year. Like the time squirrels wake up from their hibernatory absence and find a pleasant surprise waiting for them. A surprise that shouldn't actually be a surprise because they've been slogging at it before they went to bed. For me, this year is laden with the fruits of what I've been doing all these past years. Midnight Hotel is into its second run, and poised to travel too. It was written six or seven years ago. Five was written even earlier and maybe staged in June or July if all goes well. Maria's Room is scheduled to be out later this year through Harper Collins. It was written during the first two years of this century. The Magic Store of Nu-Cham-Vu (from Puffin) will be out only in August, but it was started (as a short story) in 2004, at my desk in the University of Stirling in Scotland. And two anthologies-- the first, Kerala Kerala Quite Contrary (edited by Shinie Antony) is being launched in Delhi by Rupa tomorrow. I have a story (prose cum drama) in it called Fort Lines. And another anthology's coming up with my poetry module for kids. Both were written early last year. Now as I work on my Scotland novel, I can also wade out now and then to see the fruits of an earlier labour.

preview in the new indian express, feb 27, 2009

My latest play

what an ending...

the first day of the last month.
the last post was on the second day of the first month.
what a year this has been.
terrorists brazenly walking in from the sea, entering mumbai and plucking out lives. as if there's neither law nor sensitivity left. if this is all it takes to appease god & religion--- or is it simply the lure of money in some cases? if this is all it takes, then let's wipe out god & religion from the face of the earth and hide them in our hearts. who'll find them then? who'll fight for what they can't see?

when those who rule this land continue with their vacuous, guarded, yellow ruminations, the brave will rise up and act.

youngsters with blind eyes and itchy fingers, frozen hearts that can't distinguish between faith and indoctrination. what wounds have caused them to inflict such destruction? will no one feel safe again? will our land be our cremation ground strewn with ashes of hope and courage?
empty words!
what will happen will happen.
the brave will rise up to shore up our defences. the brave will rise up.
when those who rule this land continue with their vacuous, guarded, yellow ruminations, the brave will rise up and act. let there be no more such surprises. let's be prepared to face the worst. or stay home locked up forever. for these rulers are not people to look up to.
we've split so much that from a country we've degenerated into groups and sub-groups and pathetic little divisions that no one can count.
democracy doesn't deserve us!
democracy as it is practised today in india is about dynasty rule, parochialism, bravado, exploiting voter vulnerability and a rare unique selfishness that sees only power and its comforts and ignores the swamp next door.
democracy has degenerated in this country. brave, politically correct words have become redundant and irrelevant. we need to take a different step forward.
those young terrorists entered through a chipped and worn-out door. let's fashion a new, stronger door and move it to a safer place.
let's join together to rule. and not allow these greedy dynasties to continue to pretend democracy.
let's begin.

BACK AGAIN!

And so here we are again, almost half a year later.

The last time I'd written about my novel Maria's Room which had made it to the Longlist of the Man Asian Literary Prize.

Well, it's been proved--- the theory that what goes up must come down-- and vice versa. I hadn't expected the book to make it to the Longlist. It did.

After that, I expected it to reach the shortlist, and probably even make it to the final place. It didn't!

Anyway, I'm busy writing more. A children's novel for Puffin and the play with the classical dance theme. Did I say, busy writing? Right now, distraction is the name of the game, and I'm having a tough time staying on course.

Why did God have to make my writing tools and the Internet on the same platform? Sometimes, God has a way of economising. Or maybe, it is convenientising. Anyway, though I have the chance of skipping from novel to play, I often skip from both to the Net, and surf so much that time passes without adequate notice, and I return to roost in uncertain areas of my work, where nothing seems to move.

But then, this is the beginning of the New Year, and that has a habit of inculcating a new mood and a new purpose. So, there. My uncertainty, and its possible solution.

Let's see what 2008 brings.

Just CLICK

Click on the title of the previous post to enter the
Man Asian announcement page.

Maria begins her journey....

So there, I'm back. With some good news, to boot. The reason why I wasn't here has now brought me back.

Polishing the final draft of MARIA'S ROOM for the Man Asian Literary Prize kept me away.

Now they've announced that Maria's in the race. We'll know her fate come October.

Until then it's a crazy fantasy trip for Penguin (Puffin, actually), a set of stories linked by this weird half-monster character (whose name I'll only disclose later). That has to be sent in by January. Another deadline is for a play that has lots of emotion and lots of dance (Bharathanatyam). Each work as different from the other as imagineable.

Here's an excerpt from the Man Asian website.


Hong Kong, 20 July 2007 – The Administrative Committee for the 2007 Man Asian Literary Prize
has today announced the longlist of works for this inaugural prize :

Tulsi Badrinath, The Living God
Sanjay Bahadur, The Sound Of Water
Kankana Basu, Cappuccino Dusk
Sanjiv Bhatla, Injustice
Shahbano Bilgrami, Without Dreams
Saikat Chakraborty, The Amnesiac
Jose Dalisay Jr., Soledad's Sister
Reeti Gadekar, Families at Home
Xiaolu Guo, 20 Fragments of a Ravenous Youth
Ameena Hussein, The Moon in the Water
Nu Nu Yi Inwa, Smile As They Bow
Jiang Rong, Wolf Totem
Hitomi Kanehara, Autofiction
N S Madhavan, Litanies of Dutch Battery
Laxmi Narayan Mishra, The Little God
Mo Yan, Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out
Nalini Rajan, The Pangolin's Tale
Chiew-Siah Tei, Little Hut of Leaping Fishes
Shreekumar Varma, Maria's Room
Anuradha Vijayakrishnan, Seeing The Girl
Sujatha Vijayaraghavan, Pichaikuppan
Xu Xi, Habit of a Foreign Sky
Egoyan Zheng, Fleeting Light

This longlist of 23 unpublished works of Asian fiction in English will be reviewed and evaluated by the 2007 ManAsian Literary Prize judges, who will announce a shortlist of works in October 2007. The winner will be announcedon Saturday, 10 November at an awards ceremony in Hong Kong.

The judging panel for the 2007 Man Asian Literary Prize is: Adrienne Clarkson, former Governor General ofCanada (Chair); André Aciman, New York-based author and scholar, and Nicholas Jose, writer, scholar and formerCultural Counsellor at the Australian Embassy in China.

The 2007 Man Asian Literary Prize longlist was chosen from among 243 submissions received from all over Asia.Approximately two thirds of the submissions came from South Asia ; the largest single group of submissions wasfrom India. The rest came from throughout East Asia. The Prize received submissions from well-established aswell as first-time authors, and entries included translated works as well as works originally in English.

[Some of the news reports that have appeared about the Long List talk about 23 Asians being selected, of which 11 are Indians--- I've counted 12!]

OOoooops!

Did I say the man in specs in the previous post?
Wonder which man in specs it is....

Nonsense Pictures

And The
Nonsense Continues
These are pictures taken at the Chennai launch of The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense edited by Michael Heyman who's the merry man in specs listening to my reading.....


Date: January 7, 2007. Place: Oxford Book Store.
Click on the title to see the source of these pictures which were purloined at about 8. 10 p.m. Indian Standard Time to grace this page.

Poems On A String

I thought I'd post a few poems this time. They are

on my website, but this seemed a good enough time.

DUSK
when the sun dips as if forever,
when streaks of feeling
silver the horizon's brow
and the waves start up in excitement,
frothing and insatiable,
my thoughts betray me
and i can barely feel the world...

ART OF CYCLING
the red new bike, barely smaller than his eight year-old frame
totters in a straining arc of steel and young thigh,
the quick of possession has already settled to drudgery and fear,
and his rolling screams are repeating a pattern.
i can close my eyes and doodle away those days of sentiment
like fluorescent on virgin canvas.

my dreams are squeezed out in futile doses
let me pause and guide him on his way
and pat him for his speed, encourage him to take the curves
explain afresh the pleasures of dangerous riding
to race the steeps and dare the climb abetted by the wind.
there's no life in cruising, son, your father's hopes are done.
let's tell them no, the rules of championship aren't weakened yet:
on a summer's day, there's much to be said for a marathon.

(the bike too has grown, as you can see!)

TOUCH
touch me again
for you've proved beyond doubt
touch cures

all day we cry
without pain
and struggle to run
all day for the night--
let the cloud split
its gloomy swelling
and pour
for you've proved beyond doubt
rain cures.

and, finally, one of the few poems I've written born of thoughts

from reading a newspaper report.

KUMARAKOM

(after the boat tragedy)
days after the drowning when companion villages
raised the memory of their various dead,
and boats and blame were re-examined,
and officials packed up, exhausted,
dredging out certificates and compensations;
one evening when the wails had stilled the sky
like ghost singers fading out, and the lamp
reached the threshold like any other evening,
the old woman hobbled out, muttering her prayers
and cursing each member of her family
for leaving her alone,
unaware of the reason
for the terrible silence in the house
that invaded even her deafness.

Words, words, words

The problem with writing something big--- like a novel, that is--- is that you have a carry case of "matter" wherever you go, and all sorts of impressions and ideas get collected in it, so that sometimes you feel tempted or even obliged to add all that stuff in your work.

It might present itself as an interesting possibility; only when you read through later or get a second opinion do you realise that you've been "hacking" into your own work through sly interpolation of peripheral detail. It takes such a long time, and you often get tired with words. If you read something really good in the meantime, there is a possibility that you can return fresh to your own work (without being too inspired by what you've read, hopefully). So the problem is Ideas & Words. I get into this obsession with words sometimes--- the sound and "feel" of a word; so much so that the meaning and the "fit" often suffer.

Freshness is all.

The word, its meaning and context have all to sharpen and live for you to be able to do the same for your reader. But when you're reading through large tracts of text you've written, you sometimes get fed up or alarmed or bored, and even good writing can appear stilted through over-reading. The best thing, I find, is to put it aside and return later.

But, still, re-reading is a must. Polishing your work when you're fresh is part of the craft. For me it is instinctual writing followed by craft. Which becomes the art! Having been a newspaper and magazine editor helps you to be precise and objective if not ruthless when confronted by favourite turns of phrases that don't really belong in your work. I have new writers sending me their work now and then to be evaluated, and the problem in most cases is that they've not read and re-read. And they just don't have it in them to cut out portions that don't belong.

Freshness is a mental state that is brought on by physical readiness. Walking, exercising and meeting people are "distractions" that become essential for a writer.

Which is why I wonder why I'm still sitting and staring into this screen day in and day out (sometimes, night-out too) ad losing all that freshness.

Check out my Slide Show!

The Great Stick Dance!!

By the way, in the previous blog....

Click on the little stickman to see

the Great Stick Dance!