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The Literary Writer
The desire to write, particularly stuff of the literary kind, arises in people of a certain type; people who don’t fit in well with society, or those that generally don’t remain in the celebration mode, often turn to writing to get what life seems to have denied them. Writing requires a little optimism even in the most despairing of people. There’s a little hope in them that if their writing is given recognition, there will be some reason for them to be happy. It is this little hope that keeps writers going. But more often than not this hope is like a mirage that they keep chasing but rarely ever…
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Jagjit Singh, that Shakespeare among ghazal-singers
Jagjit Singh is unique among ghazal singers, indeed a Shakespeare among them. I have written this sentence in the present tense for such a man never dies. He understood the value of words in all their dimensions; their musical use, their connotative sense, and finer nuances. He knew to what extent a word could be stretched or bent without allowing it jar or get distorted. He could feel the poetry of the lines someone else wrote and transform it into soul-wrenching music that seemed to trickle out of his own suffering. The ghazal is an art form that puts the melancholic, the lost, and the defeated above most other…
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The Voice of a Magical Realist Novelist
The voice of a magical realist novel has a distinctive role to play because through it the novelist tries to point out some inner realizations to the reader. In its successful delivery to the reader is contained a crystallization of the intuitive discoveries that are not easy to communicate. Often the novelist chooses to tell everything in the first person singular, himself. But sometimes a character becomes the teller of the tale. In case that happens, the character who narrates the tale becomes a mask for the novelist who says everything through another’s mouth. Saleem Sinai is one such character. He becomes Salman Rushdie’s voice to talk of his response…
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A Sequel and a Prequel
These days I am writing a sequel to my debut novel, The Tailor’s Needle, after eleven years of its publication. The publication of my first novel had a unique journey being published first in Great Britain and then by Penguin Books India. The journey of its publication has been well discussed in this article: https://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/article/view/3073/0 As I write this sequel, I need to first think seriously about the nature of a sequel. My thoughts come to me in the form of questions. What exactly is a sequel and how is it different from another novel? How much of the first novel must enter into its plot? Should the genre of…
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Mystery
The unknown is important in life. If there were no mystery, life would be very boring. However, most of us want to know what is to happen in the future. To put it in Shakespeare’s terms, we want to ‘look into the seeds of time.’ Nature does not want us to know much about what is to happen but we want to know. Nature doesn’t want us to know whether a boy or a girl will be born to a pregnant woman. But we want to know. Nature does not want us to know when someone will die. But we want to find out the time when that will happen.…
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Interview
Interview with Professor & Author (Novelist, Dramatist, and Poet): Lakshmi Raj Sharma Rishabh ChaddhaFollowJul 26 · 11 min read About the Author Lakshmi Raj Sharma teaches English at the University of Allahabad. He is well- known for his debut novel, The Tailor’s Needle which explored the British Rule in India, and furthermore for his collection of short tales (Marriages Are Made In India and Intriguing Women) Professor Sharma had completed his formal and secondary education from Boys’ High School & College, Allahabad. He obtained his undergraduate degree from the University of Allahabad in 1975, then completed his postgraduate in 1977. He received his D Phi or honorary doctorate title from the same university in 1986. He…
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Writing the Magical Realism Novel
The Genius of Rushdie and Marquez Why are Salman Rushdie and Gabriel García Márquez, such extraordinary novelists? The answer is complex. But there is a reason for their unique achievement. The answer is that apart from what virtually every great novelist does – telling the story in a new way in a new vocabulary – they also write in a mode which is hellishly difficult. This mode of narration is called Magical Realism. The Oversimplification of Magical Realism Rushdie oversimplifies this mode called magical realism, by defining it as the improbable presented mundanely. That is just the tail of magical realism. The reality of magical realism is intricately connected with…
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My Stories and Me
I write fiction because it completes the one I am. My mind observes the world through stories. Life’s like that, I tell myself. A story copulates with life. Indeed, my own identity springs out of them. Stories store and restore me; me and my experience; They pickle me in. Sometimes grill me. They are truer than relationships. Relationships are not real; they are forced; By chance legitimized by that ill-gotten dame, Called, ‘Society.’ My bonds with my stories Are purer. There are no or few vested interests That fasten me to them. Stories force themselves Like babies to be born. I love or even dote on each And bring them…
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The Truth in Storytelling
The relationship between Beauty and Truth in Stories I love to tell stories. I want my stories to be beautiful tales about men and women that have moved out of the ordinary. What relationship does beauty have with my stories? Keats related beauty with truth. One cannot say what he exactly meant by the two terms. I can only say that there is a certain beauty associated with truthful storytelling. What is true will automatically be beautiful because it will be revelatory. All art must reveal. That should be the aim of art; it must reveal truthfully. What seems ugly to some can also be beautiful if it is truthfully…
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Rushdie, History, and Joking Seriously
Rushdie and Bombay If Salman Rushdie had not lived in Bombay in his early years, Midnight’s Children would probably be different. Bombay is a city that throws you into a local and a global culture simultaneously. It teaches you to be less critical, perhaps; to turn everything into a joke. If you are creative, Bombay helps you to anchor your imagination in the wild seas. Bombay has nature as well as the civility or criminality of the metropolitan town. The British have left an impact on Bombay no doubt but the Indian (the Hindu, the Parsee, and the Muslim) culture is deeply entrenched. This town allows newer ideas, fashions, and…
