Duck of Destiny

This Duck has sailed

2007-05-12T03:12:00.000-07:00

Kindly adjust links, feeds etc. to
http://samitbasu.com

Devi

2007-05-01T23:00:00.000-07:00

I ended my run on Virgin Comics' Devi in March, after finishing issue 10, primarily because the work was getting too much to handle and I needed to focus on finishing the book. Have never really posted about the comics (well, I haven't really been posting about anything) so thought I'd put up links to some of the reviews Devi's been getting.
I had a very good time on Devi - the biggest rewards were getting to work with Mackenzie Cadenhead, super-editor, and Mukesh Singh, easily-international-level comics artist, and the occasional opportunity to unleash my inner Khooni Dracula writer. Writing mainstream comics is really interesting, and shakes you up in many ways - I learned a lot from my eight Devi issues about structure, writing in a completely different voice and teamplay. I'd always wondered how writers took over universes that they hadn't made up, what the boundaries were for things like new characters, voice changes, plot overhauls, deaths... now, well, I know. And I'm looking forward to doing it again.
The comics are (finally) out in India now, so do pick them up. The series is now in the hands of the extremely capable former juvenile delinquent Saurav Mohapatra, and Ron Marz has taken over editorially. Good times. I'm working on a few other projects for Virgin that I wish I could talk about. Soon, I hope.
Anyway, reviews: Devi 3, Devi 4, Devi 5, Devi 6, Devi 7, Devi 8, Devi 9

The Unwaba Revelations

2007-04-26T02:38:00.002-07:00

Finished the book, or at least the first version of it. It's supposed to arrive in December.

Shakti

2007-04-10T23:14:00.000-07:00

Meghna just sent me this pic a few minutes ago; this is in my flat, on my birthday, last December. Rehan and Shakti hadn't met before, but they got along like a house on fire. Given who they both were, no one was at all surprised. I remember them running around, him sitting on her head, pulling her hair and looking completely delighted.
My nephew turns one in two days. Shakti isn't here any more. But they met that one evening and I'm so glad they did. Glad there's a chance some of her warmth, her laughter, her grace, her immense coolness rubbed off on him. May there be other people in his life as wonderful as she was.
Miss you, Shakti.

Hear ye, Delhizens all

2007-03-27T10:50:00.000-07:00

quoth supreing-being-manifestation and all-round-star Shakti Bhatt:

Toto Funds the Arts, Delhi Chapter, invites entries for its flash fiction contest.

The winner will get a cash prize of Rs. 3000 and two runners-up will be awarded Rs. 1000 each. A public event will be organized for the winners to read their stories along with an established author.

Submission Guidelines

You cannot be older than 30 on June 1, 2007. Include a statement confirming your date of birth and that the story is original and unpublished.
The contest is limited to young Indians residing in Delhi and NCR. No NRIs, please.
Only one submission is allowed per person.
The story cannot exceed 500 words.
Entries can be either sent by e-mail to tfadelhi@gmail.com or by snail mail to:

TFA Contest, D/377 2^nd Floor, Defence Colony,

New Delhi 110024.

The deadline is 20 April 2007. Please mention your name and contact details separately, not on the entry itself.

Toto Funds the Arts is a non-profit trust based in Bangalore, set up to encourage and promote the talent of creative young Indians.

Lost twin

2007-03-01T07:08:00.000-08:00

Somehow, I knew this day would come. They got the age a bit wrong, though.

Capering Duck

2007-02-27T03:12:00.000-08:00

Will be doing a Q+A session with Sarnath Banerjee on the 5th of March in Cal, at the launch of The Barn Owl's Wondrous Capers. Do come. It's at the British Council, and I dont know what the time is yet; usually these things are at about 7. Not sure if you need passes, but if you do, you can download them from Sarnath's site when the announcement comes up. There will probably be at least one Famous Actor type involved, given that Rehaan Engineer is doing his Mumbai event today.
I will also go into complete hermit mode after this, and not emerge until Unwaba is finished, so friends who read this blog are encouraged to show up if seeing my ugly mug is on their to-do list.
Back to battlescene. Those damned rakshases take a lot of killing.

The horror, the horror

2007-02-19T10:42:00.000-08:00

I look at this script I'm writing, and I think...
The Ramsay brothers had no idea what they were missing.
Tomorrow, I return to Unwaba. Joy.

The Naked Truth

2007-02-14T02:31:00.000-08:00

Well into book, should finish by March. Yes, I know I promised February, but that won't happen. Even finishing by March involves a hell of a lot of all-nighters; I am old now and I write slowly. What to do.
Thanks everyone who's written in urging me to get on with it; you are not, repeat not, helping. Also, I must know this. Why is nearly everyone writing in campaigning for a sex scene? Why are surprising numbers of strapping, confirmed heterosexual males demanding Kirin-nudity? Have you not had enough bad sex writing from Indians?
No? Ok. Remember. You asked for it. I warned you.
Sigh. Clearly some of you are the people who have kept 'Chennai auntie massage' among the top three Google leads to this blog over the last two years.

Update: More mails, mostly saying 'Nooooooo!', which I have read while grinning evilly. This whole post, I hope you know, is essentially meaningless; if I had listened to people who told me what to write, I wouldnt have written the books I did. Of course, I might have written better books, but thats not the point.

Here is your shopping list. Go.

2007-02-13T03:00:00.000-08:00

You're still reading this blog? Bless you. I will return properly once the book is done. But since you are here, you are clearly both patient and discerning. So. Go to a bookstore.
Get this.

The Barn Owl's Wondrous Capers, Sarnath Banerjee

(more launches coming up in various cities, so visit Sarnath's site often. I'll probably be there at the Cal launch, cheering and whistling)
Also, get this.

The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense, ed. Michael Heyman, Anushka Ravishankar

(Much love to Mike, Nonsense Ph.D. and general genial genius, The Society for the Prevention of Sense and Anushka. Go read now, it's wonderful, and they've done an incredible amount of work collecting nonsense from all around this very nonsensical country)

And while you're at it, this.

Chowringhee, Shankar, trans. Arunava Sinha

(Translated by Bultu, a gentlemen the TOI recently called an internet product and an effortless reproducer. To make him happy, start several blogs at ibibo and make pots of money)

And this.

Crush, Annie Zaidi

(Join the Annie's Ardent Admirers Association, of which I am a proud member. Contact me for memberships at discounted rates)

Watchoo waiting fer? Go!

?

2006-11-02T00:38:00.000-08:00

Seven launch

2006-10-17T09:53:00.000-07:00

at Oxford Bookstore, CP, 19th, 630 pm. Come, and bring everyone. I'll be there, as will Hurree Babu and Anoushka Ravishankar, both of whom are very nice and much more interesting than me. And we will all read and talk and stuff.

Ultimate Coolness Parts I and II

2006-09-28T02:36:00.000-07:00

Part 1: Little Superstar
Part 2: Flying Robot

Scholastic SF Anthology

2006-09-20T23:38:00.000-07:00

Do pick up this new SF anthology from Scholastic India; It's called 7 Science Fiction stories, which should give you a fairly big clue as to what's in it.
I am, for one, with a story called Intergalactic Idol, and among the other writers in there, I've previously read (and admired) Nilanjana S. Roy, Anushka Ravishankar, Vandana Singh and Manjula Padmanabhan. It's aimed at younger readers, but, as always, don't let that stop you :)
Why are you still here? Go get it! Go!

Silly Pic time

2006-09-04T12:32:00.000-07:00

tagged by Teleute.

Calcutta, 2006. The poster behind me explains my actions, of course.

I tag Antara, Momo, Bini and the Bagchi

Virgin November solicits

2006-08-29T09:49:00.000-07:00

This is why I havent been blogging.
Im writing Devi from #3 onwards; Devi 1 comes out September in India, my stuff from November, monthly (July, September onwards respectively abroad) and EoS from November abroad, hopefully from November in India too.

Update: Amend that to 'I really don't know when anything's out, I hope it's all out soon, and I'll post and let you know when it is.'
Devi #3 is out in the US at least, though.

Much has happened

2006-08-27T06:21:00.000-07:00

Madness, weddings, presscons, airport security hassles, ice buckets in swimming pools, artist/models, star students, aquatic monsters, lectures, lunches, madness again.
However, I am back home now, and have bought a big red chair, with wheels, and a bright orange sticker that says Commencez...The Begin...
When Govindpuri furniture makers are giving you broad hints about your writing career, you know it's time to get to it.

Rehan rules all

2006-07-28T21:32:00.000-07:00

Seriously. Three months old, and he's already in the papers.
I'd stopped posting about the nephew after Jabberwock sent me a long rant about how 'pictures of a human baby' had been seen on my blog and how this made me the scum of the earth, but links to the msm are surely legit.
Anyway, so Rehan got his first visit from his supercool godmother, Mumbai's starriest stylist Sapna Bhavnani. Read all about it.

Delhi blogmeet

2006-07-28T14:41:00.000-07:00

is happening tomorrow, details here.
Will try and make it, but am currently wrestling with a deadline, so not sure I can. If I finish by tomorrow evening, will be there.
This post is also a plug for shareaplan.com, an events/friends/networking site set up by the blogosphere's very own, very glamorous Bridalbeer. More details about the blogmeet there, and much else.

The War Against Bloggerism

2006-07-17T22:17:00.000-07:00

Ah me.
I am silenced.

The Trousers of Time: Possible futures of Indian speculative fiction in English

2006-07-04T00:25:00.000-07:00

The origins of speculative fiction in India are twofold; first, the incredible wealth of mythical, historical and folklore traditions, and second, the incredibly popular genres of science fiction and fantasy in both literature and film in the West.

Thousands of years ago, flying saucers, death-rays, hideous alien monsters and incredible machines were captured by Indian writers in tales of wonder and imagination, massive epics that still enthrall the world. India is a country crawling with legends, folk-tales, mysteries, horrors and supreme strangeness, which should have rendered Indians strongly culturally geared towards a fondness for fantasy and science fiction. It is surprising, to say the least, that even with these resources at our disposal a nation as culturally predisposed to the fantastic as we are should have produced a contemporary speculative fiction genre that is marginal at best, at least in literary terms, especially since the speculative works of authors like Salman Rushdie and the Arthur C. Clarke award-winning Amitav Ghosh are firmly excluded from the murky depths of genre.
Market conditions and literary prejudices are held largely responsible for the lack of a strong tradition in the field of speculative fiction especially in English, but the future definitely looks bright. We’ve seen an increasing number of speculative fiction works across media over the last few years, and a slow trickle of fantasy and science fiction manuscripts has slowly begun to weigh down desks in Indian publishing houses . This project will discuss future roads down which Indian writers seeking to produce successful speculative fiction might do well to tread if we are to have a body of work in the field that matches western sci-fi and fantasy in quality and richness, while simultaneously possessing a strong and distinct Indian/South Asian identity – new themes, new ideas, new colours in the already bewildering palette of spec-fic. We’ll be discussing not just the literary aspect of things, but the practicalities as well – markets, publishing, access, publicity.

The Trousers of Time, as tailored by Terry Pratchett, are where possible futures are divided, and right now there’s no way of knowing which leg Indian speculative fiction will be hurtling down. I’ve been writing fantasy for four years now, and I for one don’t know at all. This project is, in many ways, a speculative work in itself, and is by no means finished at this point – how could it be, when the genre it discusses is just getting started? Consider this a first draft. I’ll be putting up more material from time to time, and you should add corrections, suggestions, comments and developments as the future becomes clearer, threads fray and tear, and seams bulge all over the place.

Before we get into this, though, there are several people to thank: The good people at Sarai-CSDS, who gave me one of their Independent Fellowships to do this, and the writers, critics and editors who contributed so generously to it.

Essays:
IWE and genre
The Indian superhero
The South Asian diaspora and speculative fiction
Indian children's literature and speculative fiction
Comics, graphic novels and Indian spec-fic

Interviews:
Anil Menon
Ashok Banker
Cheryl Morgan
Gotham Chopra
Jai Arjun Singh
Jaya Bhattacharji
Jeff VanderMeer
Manjula Padmanabhan
Mary Anne Mohanraj
Matthew Cheney
Payal Dhar
Rana Dasgupta
Sarnath Banerjee
Thomas Abraham
Vandana Singh
Zoran Zivkovic

IWE and genre

2006-07-03T23:17:00.000-07:00

"Civilisational or religious partitioning of the world population
yields a 'solitarist' approach to human identity, which sees human
beings as members of exactly one group…This can be a good way of
misunderstanding nearly everyone in the world. In our normal lives, we
see ourselves as members of a variety of groups – we belong to all of
them… Each of these collectivities, to all of which this person
simultaneously belongs, gives her a particular identity. None of them
can be taken to be the person's only identity or singular membership
category."
– Amartya Sen, from the prologue to Identity and Violence: The
Illusion of Destiny

Remember, books are people too. It's fairly clear that questions
related to literary taxonomy are primarily questions for booksellers
and critics, not readers or writers. On the other hand, these are
questions writers at least might consider being aware of, because they
play a very real role in determining their means of earning a
livelihood – which, while obviously not the objective of writing in
itself, is something a lot of writers would enjoy being able to do.
While struggling to get my own work published, I've learnt that
writing, while remaining the only meaningful experience in the entire
publishing process, is merely a stage of the entire quest, and in that
light, it's been rewarding discussing some rather non-writerly
questions with other writers as well as publishers and critics.

Some of this project springs from personal frustration; the division
of books into categories that aren't immediately obvious (non-fiction,
for example, is completely inoffensive) has always disappointed me as
a reader, and as a writer, simply because nearly all my favourite
books, like my favourite people, are multi-dimensional; they defy
definition, they grumble greatly when categorized. My own work is
found in shelves marked, depending on the speculations of bookstore
managers, Indian writing, SF/fantasy, children's literature and once,
memorably, cookery. Literary borders are as difficult to draw as
political ones, though their creation fortunately involves less
bloodshed. That said, the social sciences of the literary world are
both fascinating and relevant, and their flaws, such as artificial
segmentation and aggregation, are the same as those of any process
that seeks to study heterogeneous objects as a mass.

This set of essays, however, is fundamentally flawed on many levels -
it is about a nascent, hard-to-define sub-section of literature, the
as-yet-mostly-nonexistent sub-genre of Indian speculative fiction in
English, which is itself a bastard child of two parents who, not
being dead, are difficult to analyze as they are not only infinitely
complex at any point, but, to complicate things further, change all
the time as well. However, since we're dealing mostly with science
fiction and fantasy here, I'll hope I can be forgiven for looking into
the future, and for making what might turn out to be wild, fantastical
claims.

What is Indian/South Asian literature in English? Even if we get past
the tricky question of origin, which has obsessed scholars since the
term came into being, and include the non-resident and the genetically
partially South Asian, in recent years the growing diversity in South
Asian English literature should lead to more questions – having
overcome the 'South Asian' part of the question by being
all-inclusive, how do we now define 'literature'? Do we include comics
and graphic novels, speculative fiction, thrillers, chick-lit, campus
novels and crime fiction, all of which have reared their heads in
India over the last decade? This should prove a lot more difficult for
the sagacious and scholarly to do, given that literary snobbery is far
more acceptable than racism – and that Indian-origin writers abroad
might have very thin connections with India, but large advances and
literary awards add a great deal of density to the study of the field
– build its brand, in other words, however gut-shrinking that might
sound, while diversity in the form of new, not necessarily mainstream
writing increases the number of spices in the curry, but, in the eyes
of many not-so-neutral observers, does not necessarily add to its
taste.

The term 'speculative fiction' is another puzzler. It's a beast that's
known by many names – weird fiction, SFF, literature of the
imagination – literature that in some way transcends the real, though
it's nearly always a mirror image of the real, with certain upgrades.
Speculative fiction, spec-fic to friends, is essentially an umbrella,
a bar where a number of disgruntled genres come to hang out, its
leading patrons being fantasy, science fiction, horror and alternative
history. It's claimed by the bartenders that magic realism is also a
customer, though one suspects magic realism, a frequent invitee at
literary wine-and-cheese soirees, would deny this if asked. The term
is often attributed to Robert A Heinlein, who used it as a synonym for
science fiction in an essay in 1948. Whatever the genre includes, the
reason for the term's existence is simply that books within the genre
are difficult to classify, and terms like spec-fic sound vaguely
impressive, are easier to explain than more bizarre concoctions like
magic realism, and also convey that these books aren't Literature,
silence disgruntled writers complaining that their work isn't 'just'
SF or fantasy, and bring together a great many fascinating writers who
write about mind-bogglingly diverse things in mind-bogglingly
divergent styles, and allow everyone concerned to ignore these facts:
all (good) fiction is inherently speculative, all fiction involves
imagination, and escapism in literature depends on content, not
classification or theme.

In contemporary speculative fiction, one of the most frequently
discussed sub-genres is one that is in the process of being created –
the New Weird, a genre starring speculative fiction writers like Neil
Gaiman, M. John Harrison and China Mieville, who all work under the
speculative umbrella, but blend their tales with other literary genres
as well. This is something science fiction has in common with science
– the most exciting work takes place in the overlaps between fields,
when boundaries are diffused and maps are redrawn.

"Something is happening in the literature of the fantastic. A
slippage. A freeing-up. The quality is astounding. Notions are
sputtering and bleeding across internal and external boundaries.
Particularly in Britain, where we are being reviewed in the papers, of
all things, and selling copies, and being read and riffed off by yer
actual proper literary writers. We are writing books which cheerfully
ignore the boundaries between SF, fantasy and horror. Justina Robson,
M John Harrison, Steve Cockayne, Al Reynolds, Steph Swainston and too
many others to mention, despite all our differences, share something.
And our furniture has invaded their headspace. From outside the field,
writers like Toby Litt and David Mitchell use the trappings of SF with
a respect and facility that has long been missing in the clodhopping
condescension of the literati."
-China Mieville, author of Perdido Street Station, The Scar, etc., in
a guest editorial in The Third Alternative 35

Of course, spec-fic and mainstream literature have often had
cross-border talks – think of the magic realism of Murakami, or
Rushdie, or Marquez, or the not-SF SF of Margaret Atwood. Some of the
most iconic writers of contemporary speculative fiction blend genres
frequently and with ease – consider the exuberant book-peopled
universe that is Terry Pratchett's Discworld, or Stephen King's Dark
Tower series – in the last few years, Susannah Clarke's Jonathan
Strange and Mr. Norrell was a successful marriage between speculative
fiction and the 19th-century English novel. And then, of course,
there's the most successful writer in the world, J.K. Rowling, whose
blend of spec-fic and school stories have changed the world. Philip
Roth does alternative history; Bret Easton Ellis does horror. In a
sense, the term New Weird examines a phenomenon that's not new at all,
in a literary world of which the most outstandingly weird aspect is
its compulsive need to segregate stories into categories in the first
place. Given that the term isn't very old, most New Weird writers
probably aren't even aware that they could be so described, because,
fortunately, no one wakes up in the morning and says, 'Today I will
start a New Weird novel.' Jeff Vandermeer, one of the New Weird's
leading lights, describes it as " an affliction visited upon many of
us involuntarily. Labels like that one are at this point simply a
marketing tool."

"I always tell wannabe writers not to read too much in the field where
they work. Obviously you need to keep in touch, but a deep knowledge
of the Old West or world history stands you in better stead than a
shelf of other people's fantasy books. Import, don't recycle. That's
actually wisdom, that is."
– Terry Pratchett, author of the Discworld books, in an interview at
www.scifi.com

This is something Indian/South Asian writers of spec-fic would do well
to absorb. While it is, of course, necessary to keep in touch with
contemporary spec-fic (for practical reasons, to make sure you're not
reinventing the wheel, as well as for sheer reading pleasure) there's
no particular reason to feel disheartened by the fact that the first
glimmering of a body of work that could be called Indian spec-fic in
English began to be available in India about seven decades after pulp
SF magazines became wildly popular in the US, not to mention about a
century after Bengali SF became popular and a few millenia after the
Indian epics spoke of flying chariots, amazing weaponry and other
worlds – there's still a lot that Indian spec-fic could give the
genre, though there is also a lot of catching up to do. The sheer
richness of India as a spec-fic source material resource – not just in
terms of myth and folklore and history, but in contemporary politics,
the arts, entertainment and social trends, and in the completely
absorbing story of India as a growing, rapidly evolving nation – calls
out for imaginative speculative treatment. And typically, this
resource has already been mined by Western writers in search of
something exotic to offer saturated Western SF markets.

This is not to suggest even for a moment, of course, that Indian
writers should see themselves in anyway constrained to write only
About India, since that might be damaging for their own writing, and
might only reinforce stereotypes already present in the publishing
world - the last thing Indian writers like being reduced to is writers
whose only possible role could be Explaining India. At the same time,
there's obviously nothing wrong with Indians writing about India and
things Indian if that's the space in which the writing is naturally,
organically set, and there are several Indian stories that survive,
indeed, thrive on, constant retelling. And there are still a number of
brilliant spec-fic novels just waiting to be written that are, in
various senses, Indian, and if Indian writers don't write them, others
will. The process has already begun.

Even if we set aside the existence of India's wealth in natural
resources as far as spec-fic is concerned, the sparsity of finished
Indian spec-fic is all the more remarkable given the abundance and
immense popularity of Indian writing in English. Of course, the
absence of Indian spec-fic books on bookshelves worldwide does not
mean these books aren't being written – it just means they aren't
being distributed even if they are being published. Spec-fic and
literary publishing are mostly segregated (another reason for
genre/mainstream borders) and the remarkable success of Indians in one
field is in no sense a source of increased attention for Indian
writers in the other. Besides, the literati aren't the only with silly
prejudices in the publishing world; the SFF publishing space has its
own problems, the most blinding one being that readers of spec-fic,
especially in the US, are presumed to be looking for the familiar
unfamiliar – bug-eyed aliens, even more Tolkienspawn, more simplistic
George Lucas clones – that spec-fic, far from being literature that
explores new territory, boldly going where no books have gone before,
is as much literary comfort food as, say, most mass-produced
contemporary chick-lit. As publishers search for the familiar, much of
what is new and exciting but unfamiliar fails to break through the
crystal ceiling. Familiar plots, familiar characters, familiar tropes
gain strength through repeated cloning, making sure that the spec-fic
market remains white-male dominated, both in terms of protagonists and
writers. This is clearly something Indian writers will have to
struggle against, but they will certainly not be the first to join
battle – pioneers like Samuel R. Delany and Octavia Butler have
already made huge steps to make the spec-fic world aware of these
prejudices, and they haven't been the only ones. Thanks to a variety
of factors, such as a real tiredness among readers of repetitive plots
and the phenomenonal information/culture bomb that is the Internet,
even American publishers are slowly opening their minds and their
coffers to spec-fic material from across the world – consider the
success of manga, the fastest growing phenomenon in world publishing
today. Spec-fic is certainly less inward-looking than it used to be,
and the New Weird, however questionable its definition, is a very real
symptom of this.

And it's a better time now, than ever before, to be an Indian spec-fic
writer. The initial forays into Western markets have been made; Indian
spec-fic writing is increasing, albeit slowly, over various media as
the global popularity and increasing mainstream acceptability of
spec-fic trickle across to India; perhaps most importantly, the Indian
readership of spec-fic is growing and diversifying, as more
cutting-edge spec-fic, again, in various media, begins to be available
in ever-expanding bookstore chains. If good spec-fic is written now,
there's more chance of it reaching Indian readers, and readers
worldwide, than ever before. To achieve that, here's one possible
future; Indian writers bring their home-grown skills into the world of
spec-fic, blurring and reinventing genres, adding themes, experiences
and visions as yet unseen in the spec-fic world. In other words, they
colonize the New Weird, making it truly new. And truly weird.

Rana Dasgupta, author of Tokyo Cancelled, on putting books into boxes:

Q: In publishing terms, you're seen as a 'literary' writer. But in
your first novel, you've used themes that relate fairly extensively to
the domain of speculative fiction - the memory database, the woman who
turns into a store, the relationship with a doll, and so forth. but
since your writing style puts you under 'literature', these influences
would then fall in the realm of 'magic realism', another imposed
classification to distinguish speculative-in-literary from
straightforward genre fiction, putting you into yet another artificial
pocket with writers like Margaret Atwood, Toby Litt and David
Mitchell. What are your thoughts on literary/publishing
classifications like 'mainstream' and 'genre'? If, under threat of
torture, you had to classify your own work, where would you place it
on the speculative/literary spectrum?

A: Frankly I find the game of categorization very boring, whether it
is by nation or "genre". It may have some function for people in
marketing, but it's of no interest to me in my own writing. I write
something only because it seems to have a particular force to me, not
because it will satisfy the requirements of a particular genre, or
appeal to a certain kind of person.

In my personal view, books categorized as "science fiction" often meet
the standards of "literature" better than books categorized as
"literature" do. This is because i have a particular idea of
literature. for me, literature is philosophy: its purpose is not to
describe what we already know to be the case, but to create an
experiment with the imagination. Science fiction has always done this,
of course. Moreover, "reality" now seems to be an entirely science
fiction-style project, and to eschew science fiction totally is often
to retreat into some kind of improbable, and uninteresting, refuge.

I don't think serious writers have any business internalizing the
slogans and generalizations of industry. To me it is entirely
destructive to their work. It can only result in the censorship of
the imagination - because something does not fit easily within a
genre, or will be too complex for the imagined audience, etc. It is
precisely in
the moments when one is surprised by one's own writing, or fearful of
its implications, that one reaches into spaces that are interesting
and enduring.

The Indian superhero

2006-07-03T20:54:00.000-07:00

"You must admit that the genesis of the great man depends on the long
series of complex influences which has produced the race in which he
appears, and the social state into which that race has slowly
grown....Before he can remake his society, his society must make him."
– Herbert Spencer

Superhumans – Nietzschean uberbeings who bend circumstances, stories
and worlds around their fiery wills – are creatures Indians should be
familiar with. Among the heroes and villains of the Ramayana, the
Mahabharata and the Puranas we have several characters who could teach
Superman a thing or two about high-flying deeds of derring-do. And
through a strange combination of market forces, timing, and
serendipity, the time seems to be ripe for Indian superheroes to step
up and be counted – after making some very serious decisions about
clothing, of course.

It's an interesting time to be discussing superheroes from India,
because Krrish, a big-budget superhero film, is due to release in a
few days*, featuring state-of-the-art special effects, a martial-arts
choreographer from Hong Kong, a cast full of Bollywood stars, music,
dancing, chaste love and lots of leather – and is expecting
competition from another Bollywood SFF film, Alag. Besides this,
Virgin Comics, a new publisher looking to redefine comics and
animation worldwide using India-themed content, is due to unleash its
first collection of Indian heroes (not superheroes, they say, because
cape-and-tights crusaders are best left to traditional comics
powerhouses DC and Marvel) in about a month – which means that the
time to discuss them as 'potential' phenomena is fast running out.
While the establishment of Virgin Comics and Animation is definitely
cause for hope among Indian speculative fiction writers looking to
start out professionally and it is to be hoped that Krrish will turn
out to be a compelling, entertaining superhero blockbuster, experience
leads one to believe that Bollywood's attempts at speculative-fiction
material are best discussed in advance, because the actual viewing of
SFF Bollywood movies thus far has always been extremely inimical to
discussion of these ludicrous masterpieces as anything other than a
source of unintentional humour.

A prime example of this is an internationally famous box-office turkey
named 'The Indian Superman', a completely unabashed copy of the
original, featuring Dharmendra as the Jor-El copy, Ashok Kumar as
Jonathan Kent and Puneet 'Duryodhan' Issar as Superman, and also
starring Jagdeep and Shakti Kapoor. Fortunately, this is not India's
best-known superhero film thus far. That honour goes to Mr. India,
where Anil Kapoor plays a man visible only in areas lit by red lights.
The annals of non-superhero SFF Bollywood films, too, are full of
unforgettable classics – Ajooba, for instance, featuring the who's who
of Bollywood at the time, and featuring Russian-made monsters, large
stuffed tigers and a Rishi Kapoor miniature doll cavorting inside a
blouse. Of course, not even the worst excesses of Bollywood SFF
filmmaking could match Lollywood's International Gorillay, the climax
of which features arch-fiend Salman Rushdie being laser-skewered by
four lightning-emitting flying Korans. But since these essays aim to
take South Asian SFF and its future seriously, perhaps these classics
are best left for other discussions. Like their TV counterparts
Shaktimaan, Aryamaan, Hatim and Captain Vyom, Bollywood's superheroes
thus far have mostly been badly produced, badly copied version of
well-known western costumed vigilantes from film and comics, though
Bollywood's defenders might point out this is only right, given how
vigorously early American superhero comics copied one another.

Indian comics have also featured a number of interesting spec-fic
heroes, from Chacha Chowdhury's sidekick Sabu from Jupiter to Amitabh
Bachchan as the pink-clad Supremo, in an Indrajaal Comics series
featuring Bollywood scriptwriter Gulzar, from half-machine RAW spy
Koushik to Raj Comics snake-man Nagraj. The heroes of Indrajaal
comics, notably the dashing detective Bahadur, commanded genuine cult
appeal and are cherished collectors' items today. The superheroes of
Raj, Diamond and Manoj comics also inspired a considerable fan
following in India, thriving on local content, the intrinsic appeal of
comics and the lack of high-quality alternatives. Comprehensive lists
are available on the Internet, created lovingly by fans who grew up
devouring the adventures of Indrajaal Comics heroes Mandrake the
Magician and Lee Falk's Phantom – indeed, the lack of memorable Indian
superheroes is even more ironic when one considers that the Phantom,
widely believed to be the first comics action hero to wear a
skin-tight costume, was originally based in India, in the 'Bengalla'
forests, and his first enemies were the Singh Brotherhood.

The comic-book superhero in its current from is an American creation,
and has been popular since the late 1930s. Other nations have
superheroes too, of course – Japan probably has even more than the US
– but have not managed to sell them to the world as well as the
Americans. It's interesting to note that thanks to the superhero,
speculative fiction is the mainstream in comics, and more literary,
serious, set-in-reality comics have to seek audiences in the margins –
a hierarchy that resembles Bollywood more than Hollywood, assuming
that Bollywood films, thanks to their not-so-realistic action
sequences and musical numbers, can be said to contain speculative
content. Be that as it may, the triumphal march of the American
comic-book hero across media and across countries is a sign of many
things – globalization, Americanization, the triumph of hype and
marketing, the universal power of the heroic archetype. And the
evolution of the superhero down the decades has been a potent metaphor
for the state of the world – from the clean-cut, often absurdly
simplistic, high-minded, clean-living and completely unconvincing
heroes of the Golden Age, the confused, violent, bitter heroes of the
Silver Age and the amoral, angst-ridden, equally confused, thoroughly
deconstructed, often self-mocking, ultimately human super-protagonists
of the current day. And as the superhero genre becomes more and more
complex, and succumbs to two major pushing forces – Hollywood, pushing
it towards the pop-culture mainstream, and grown-up comic-books called
graphic novels pushing it towards literature, multicultural, diverse
heroes become a necessity, to deal with an ever-growing, ever-changing
audience not just in America, but across the world.

Mainstream comics down the decades have always been more
audience-driven than writer-driven; the phenomenon of comicbook
writers becoming famous literary figures working in various media with
fan followings outside the field of comics is fairly recent. While
science fiction and fantasy literature have always been a step ahead
of their readers – in fact, the process is interesting and
Ourobouros-like; a path-breaking new work creates an army of fans, and
copies of that work then flood the SFF market to feed those same fans,
resulting in the need for more path-breaking work – superhero
comicbooks, until recently, were much more a reflection of what their
publishers thought their fans wanted. Through letters, conventions and
now the Internet, fans have been one of the key factors in determining
what the superhero industry does, and where it goes – sometimes to the
extent that fans wrote in and voted to decide major plot developments,
such as the death of the second Robin.

And as America became more multicultural, and its comics found their
way around the world, the blatant cultural/social/political
stereotyping of the early days had to be done away with. New,
important sections of fandom had to be represented in the comics they
read, wholly new and very diverse sets of people were reading
comicbooks, and people who were offended by representations of their
kind in comics found it easier to raise their voices in protest – so
black and Asian characters could no longer play just one note or serve
as identikit cannon fodder, female characters could no longer be silly
sex objects, right-wing patriotism had to be toned down a bit, and a
few superheroes had to be gay. While this diversification couldn't do
away with stereotyping – many mainstream comicbooks remain riddled
with the worst clichés in the world – blatant racism, sexism, jingoism
and other politically incorrect prejudices were no longer openly
acceptable. Along with this came a growing demand for new plots and
new exotic settings – and once the word exotic featured in the list of
demands, could India really ever be far behind?

There are a surprisingly large number of Indian superheroes out there
in the universes created by Marvel and DC, which no doubt means that
there is a significant market among the South Asian diaspora for the
comic series they feature in. And since Gotham comics started
distributing Marvel and DC comics in India a few years ago, the demand
can only have increased. The only thing that hasn't happened yet,
alas, is research. Indian characters continue to fit into standard
roles, and we're yet to see a South Asian comics hero who does for
South Asians what Luke Cage did for African Americans, or what Northstar did for the gay community. And the arrival of Virgin Comics,and
potentially other comic-book companies in its wake if its projects
turn out to be successful, mean that the mainstream speculative comic
becomes a tremendously exciting avenue of exploration for the South
Asian writer and artist, both in its existing form and in potentially
reinvented forms. Which is not to say that writers outside the
subcontinent can't create South Asian convincing spec-fic comicbook
heroes; just that they haven't really bothered to, yet, as the
following list of Indian superheroes currently stomping around in the
West will demonstrate. While the list is by no means comprehensive, it
serves as a pointer to the roles available for South Asians in comics
published worldwide today – and also reveals, alarmingly, that the
Indian superheroes created in America, by and large, aren't
particularly any better or more convincing than the American-clone
superheroes created in India.

Bombaby, the Screen Goddess, was a creation of Slave Labor Graphics,
California, starring Saira Banu-esque Sangeeta Mukherjee, dutiful
daughter (!), struggling sister, potential arranged marriage victim
(!) and avatar of that well-known Hindu deity (!), the goddess of
Mumbai (?)

Grant Morrison, one of the brightest talents in comics worldwide,
mind-bending writer of The Invisibles and Animal Man, came up with
Vimanarama, where a young British-Asian boy named Ali, whose father
runs a corner-shop (!) in Bradford (!) accidentally releases ancient
monsters who want, of course, to destroy the world, and can only be
stopped by the Ultra-Hadeen, a team of giant metal-clad
Vishnu-avatar-esque superheroes similar to Jack Kirby's Eternals.
Featured Bollywood (!) inspired artwork starring many lotuses.

DC comics' deadliest assassin, Lady Shiva, isn't Indian, but is
worshipped by turban-wearing fanatics (!) as an avatar (!) of Shiva
(!) the famous Hindu goddess of death (?)

Chandi Gupta, a DC Justice Leage Europe (JLE) member, was left by her
parents with a cult (!) who, again, thought she was a Shiva
incarnation (?). This cult was evil (!) and planned to sacrifice her.
Like all clever Indians, Chandi turned NRI – in London, where she
lived under the name Maya, she helped the JLE win a battle, and then
joined them. On one of her earliest missions, she encountered and
defeated her former guru, (!) the Mahayogi (!)

Adri Nitall, was an unfortunate young lad from the village of Jajpur
(!) who was turned into a vampire by Marvel's version of Dracula's
minions, while his father, Taj (!) Nitall, hunted vampires with Van
Helsingh.

Black Box aka Commcast, Garabed Bashur (?), is a Marvel supervillain
from India, who, now that India is a known IT hub, is a cyberpath who
can psychically process electronic data. Right up there with Bashur in
terms of common Indian names is Shakti Haddad, a genetics expert
code-named Cerebra, who co-founded the X-Men of the future. Their
names, however, fade into insignificance when confronted by Chris
Claremont's IT genius Muaharam Ram. Chris Claremont, one of superhero
comicdom's most respected writers, is also a frequent Indian character
introducer, which is nice, except that his Indians are terrible
caricatures like the bindi-wearing Amina Synge (?) or his two most
famous Indian characters, Neal Sharra (?), or Thunderbird, who is from
Calcutta, in Bangladesh and Assam (!), where his family owns a tea
plantation and runs the Indian National Police (?). His lover, Karima
Shapandar (?), the Omega Sentinel, is a former Indian National Police
operative doomed to destroy mutants like Neal, which might have been a
good idea.

Of course, some Indian characters are better drawn than others – where
'better' is taken to mean 'no obvious mistakes.' Jinx, an Indian
elemental sorceress, is a relatively inoffensive DC supervillain.
Paras Gavaskar, or Indra, is a mutant Marvel superhero from the New
X-Men, who is probably one of the most believable Indian superheroes
out there. Fortunately there's nothing Hindu or god-like about him, he
just has retractable armour plates. Spiderman India, an interesting
relocation of the world's favourite web-crawler, featured a lungi-clad
teenager named Pavitr Prabhakar taking on green goblin/rakshas and a
multi-armed Doc Octopus-esque Hindu demon, and drew a lot of media
attention in India, where even mainstream literary coverage is
minimal.

The winner of the prize for best-done Indian comics character goes to
Fables creator Bill Willingham, for his stylish, smart and cliché-free
version of the Jungle Book gang – Mowgli, a world-roaming secret agent
who goes under the name of Vincent Jagatbehari, is an excellent
creation and probably the only charismatic Indian in world comics
today, and Kipling's animals are well extrapolated from the book.

Of course, given how rare well-rounded (emotionally, that is)
characters are in mainstream comics as a whole, and that the new
evolved spec-fic comicbook (Watchmen, The League of Extraordinary
Gentlemen, Sandman, Preacher, Transmetropolitan, Fables, V for
Vendetta, Hellboy) is essentially a product of the last two decades,
the result of the maturing of an industry after years of professionals
gaining expertise and experimenting with the form, it seems
unreasonable to expect a wave of intelligent, fully formed South Asian
heroes to emerge immediately, no matter how demanding the market. But
given time, opportunities and a sufficiently large wave of talented
writers and artists, there's no reason why Indians shouldn't be a
significant force in the evolution of the superhero comicbook,
adapting it to create new, exciting, entertaining and enriching
varieties of speculative fiction. It's actually possible now, for the
very first time.

*this was written a while ago, before Krrish was released. Turns out that was a good thing, as I suspected.

The South Asian diaspora and speculative fiction

2006-07-03T19:59:00.000-07:00

The Great Indian Diaspora has always been a key topic of discussion whenever the theme of Indian writing in English has come up. Many of the world’s most successful writers of Indian origin live outside the subcontinent yet set their books there, and many critics feel this harms the authenticity of their work. A lot of the criticism stems from the fact that a number of serious literary writers from India are also the most commercially successful writers from India, and the uncomfortable relationship between the creation of literature and the sale of literary products to well-defined markets is not something most critics or writers seem to want to talk about – and hence every aspect of the plot, the settings and language used by Indian writers at home or abroad who work in and sell their works to Western markets has been ruthlessly analyzed and criticized, often unfairly, for being strung together to dupe susceptible readers . Diaspora writers who write about India or Indians have also regularly been accused of selling out, of peddling India to the West with over-exotic, elephant/arranged-marriage/spices/maharaja-laden versions of India that have nothing to do with reality, but bring them large advances, of sitting in comfortable ignorance in the West and not truly understanding the nation they are seen to be ‘explaining’ to the rest of the world.

Fortunately for genre writers of Indian origin living outside India, they are less likely to be accused of distorting reality, since that is what they set out to do in the first place in order to understand the real world better. Or of being overly exotic – how exotic is an elephant when placed next to a demon or a spaceship? Unfortunately for them, they are unlikely to pick up huge advances from the literary publishing world at this point, because the publishing market for speculative fiction is a very different one from mainstream lit, and while the mainstream fiction market is still eager for Indian fiction, the speculative fiction world, which already has a fair number of colourful, mysterious, fragrant otherworlds.

British diaspora writer William Dalrymple stirred up a good amount of controversy recently with an Observer article where he claimed, among other things, that the diaspora was the last brown hope as far as Indian writing was concerned. While his views came in for some stringent criticism and ridicule, even prompting writer Amit Chaudhuri, that most literary of Indian litterateurs, to write speculative fiction (in an article where he compared the planets Dalrymple and he lived on), one observation he used while making his claims was that most of India’s most commercially successful and most widely published authors spend a large chunk of their time outside India – not noting, however, that this might have something to do with the fact that in writing, as in all other jobs, access is important, and resources flow to the places where they are optimally utilized.

In fact, what really most significantly differentiates the SFF writer in the Indian diaspora and the Indian writer in India is access. SFF is a very close-knit, community-driven market, possible even more so than mainstream lit, and a lot of sales of manuscripts are made at giant SFF conventions, where fans, editors, agents and writers gather to celebrate all things speculative. While obviously the quality of a work of fiction would determine its eventual future, the practicalities are important too – it’s impossible for even great books to reach bookshelves unless they reach the right editor or agent at the right time, and simply because there isn’t a tradition of Indian spec-fic publishing, it’s difficult to establish one. While opinions are widely divided on how relevant these conventions are for writers to sell manuscripts to editors and thus get their work published (completely essential, say some, no longer relevant, say others, in the interviews that follow these essays), the fact remains that Indian/South Asians in the diaspora are simply in a better place as far as getting their work out is considered. Also very relevant is the fact that apart from the leading names in children’s fantasy literature, contemporary, cutting-edge spec-fic is not widely available in India at all. But these problems, while very real now, will hopefully disappear, thanks largely to the Internet, over the next few years. As conditions stand now, though, it is very likely that if there is a genuine wave of Indian/South Asian speculative writing over the next few years, it will be led by the diaspora. Of course, the question that comes before this is whether writers in the Indian diaspora are writing speculative fiction in large numbers in the first place.

Mary Anne Mohanraj, US-based writer and founder of the Speculative Literature Foundation:
“Most South Asian/diaspora authors I encounter seem more concerned with writing mainstream 'literary' fiction. In part this is simply where their interests lie -- in part, I wonder whether some of the leanings in that directions come out of a desire for respectability. Making your living as a writer is generally not one of the acceptable career tracks for an ambitious South Asian, and it may be that many authors are
afraid to venture into sf/f for fear of even more mockery from the relatives. But that's pure speculation on my part -- it may be just that most South Asian/diaspora authors didn't grow up reading and loving spec fic, and so it doesn't occur to them to try writing it.”

”Cecilia Tan and I tried to pitch an Asian companion volume to _Dark Matter_ (an anthology of speculative fiction from the African diaspora) some years ago, and were told that the publisher didn't think there was a sufficient market for it. Maybe in a few years...”

But hopes of a wave of SFF writing from the diaspora aren’t entirely speculation even at this point. Already, a few writers living in the US like Vandana Singh and Anil Menon have established their presence in the SF community, getting short stories published in leading genre magazines, and in the process of finishing their first speculative fiction novels.

SFF author Vandana Singh, author of the Younguncle series of children’s books:
“I think there is definitely an interest in seeing something new. Unfortunately Americans in general are sadly uninformed about India and what little they know is often caricatured and stereotyped beyond recognition. In addition there are a lot of Western SF writers who have used Indian characters or settings in their stories, sometimes honestly and sometimes with a hostility that harks back to the old colonial British hack writers of penny-dreadfuls. An Indian SFF writer thus has to overcome all these stereotypes. One of the things that helps is that writers of colour in North America are getting together across ethnicities --- African-Americans, South Asians --- forming groups like the Carl Brandon Society that gives out its own rewards to people or writings that focus on issues of race --- or publishing anthologies like So Long Been Dreaming that are being treated seriously by SFF critics and academics alike. So I think there is a lot of hope and new interest, now, in expanding the boundaries of SFF. We have more and more Indian names popping up. For instance there is Anil Menon --- remember his name, you will see it again! And emerging others who are going to Clarion workshops, working away at their stories, getting ready to see their names in print. “
“It is true that in the West the SFF culture has developed an enormous fan base and also great support for new, emerging and established writers, through conventions and writers’ workshops. There is no reason why these things cannot be organized in India, where we already have traditions like the literary mehfil. Even in the US conventions and workshops arose as ideas dreamed up by penniless writers (probably over coffee at 3 am), evolving from a very small scale to epic proportions (the last Worldcon I attended in Boston had at least 5000 participants). I think we have to start small, with writers getting together in neighborhoods and localities and giving honest critiques of each others’ works. The next steps may include launching small-press magazines or ezines for publishing outstanding works, holding conventions, doing readings at bookstores to popularize SF and generating fan newsletters. “
“We can consider Japanese SF as an example. Now Americans generally think the world revolves around them, and unfortunately this is mostly true of American SFF writers and editors as well. But lately I’ve been hearing more and more about Japanese SF in US publications, and of American SF writers going to Japanese SF conventions. (The next Worldcon is in Japan, by the way.) I am no expert on the history of Japanese SF but I really think that creating their own subculture of SF helped put the Japanese on the world SF map. There is no reason why Indians can’t do this as well. Now, with the publication of the international SF magazine Internova (from Germany) there is a real interest among SF writers around the world (particularly Europe) to find SF from all over the globe and publish it. I have heard of SF from Croatia and Argentina, from China and Sri Lanka. Each SF community enriches the whole. “

Indian-origin US-based SFF writer Anil Menon, is optimistic about the future of South Asian SFF:

“If it wanted to, Indian SFF could kick some major ass. Indians (south-asians) are born storytellers. The earliest speculative fiction -- Jataka tales -- was home grown. We have the talent, we have the untold stories and we have an audience -- mostly young and mostly female -- sick of reading about cowboys in outer space. But we're like the elephant who doesn't realize its an elephant. So we politely wait for American or British editors to develop a taste for SFF with an Indian flavor. That's not going to happen any time soon.”

”But it doesn't matter. The way I see it, the future used to happen exclusively in the US. It doesn't any more. The focus has shifted. The future has been democratized. Look at what the Japanese did with Manga. Suddenly, Superman is a 60 year old dude with a weird penchant for wearing his underwear on the outside. We've as much a shot at manufacturing the future as do the Americans. And we can probably do it cheaper too.”

”What's to prevent us from building websites like Strange Horizons, which are entirely volunteer and donation driven? Why can't we start small print-on-demand publishing houses? In the US, there's a lot of resistance to publishing innovations, and for good reason: they could lose their shirts. But heck, we are already broke; what do *we* have to lose? Why can't we have our own Clarion India, conferences and awards?”

”I'm not saying that we shouldn't address western audiences. Of course we must. But sometimes it seems to me that we're like the dude who went sailing around the world when the pot of gold lay right in his backyard.”

On breaking into the SF community and getting his stories into print:
“ It's been a lot easier than I had expected. In my case, Clarion West turned out to be the big break. I met a lot of writers and editors in the six week program, got a lot of tips, and my writing improved. But there was/is no secret handshake. I remember that Charles de Lint, who was one of our instructors in 2004, was so impressed with a student's story, he sent along a recommendation when she submitted it to Fantasy & Science Fiction. It still got rejected. It's almost a cliche that the key to good writing is rewriting. But equally important, a successful submission is usually a resubmission.”
“There's definitely a lot of interest. I've found my "Indian stories" move a lot faster than the "ethnically neutral" ones. What I find in most contemporary stories though is that the Indian-ness, if present, tends to be an exotic touch; a character may have an Indian name, but she/he could just as well be Irish-Eskimo.”
Thomas Abraham, president, Penguin Books India:

On the probability of the diaspora leading an Indian SFF wave:

“I don’t see why not. And not just the diaspora but from here. Leaving aside conferences, access is pretty much available to everything else. And even going with the notion that flights of imagination are still inevitably rooted someway to cultural influences; we’re now (at least in urban India) definitely tech advanced for SF and have a mythology that’s definitely richer than Celtic folklore to be able to produce world class fantasy. The problem is we need a basic readership here, which I think will be available over the next 10 years. All those Potter and Alfred Kropp readers will hopefully graduate into reading SFF.”
On Indian SFF writers needing to piggyback on Indian themes:
“Not as a generalization, but if they don’t, they have to labour against the prejudice that “there’s nothing new here; this is essentially a western universe”. It’s a bit of a catch-22 situation. It would be far easier to position their work as rooted in their own cultural contexts and try to break through on the exotica platform. But conversely they would probably come up with the objection from agents that this is too culturally alien to succeed in the west. But that’s now. Increasingly these barriers are being wiped out and hopefully in ten years it won’t matter.”

Critic, writer and prolific blogger (The Mumpsimus) Matthew Cheney:

“I think we're already seeing some exhaustion in the SF field with the typical props and models of writing, and so U.S. and British writers are looking elsewhere for ideas. Also, we live in a world where it's much easier to encounter people from outside our own countries, and to gain information about places other than our own, and many readers hunger for it. Some of it may just be the attraction of exoticism, but I think the success of
books like Tobias Buckell's "Crystal Rain", which mixes a variety of influences in a traditional SF adventure story, or Ian MacDonald's "River of Gods", which is more specifically Indian, bodes well for the future, because such books show writers trying to bring an honest sensibility about non-Western or post-colonial cultures into their work,
and to do so in as honest a way as possible

Ashok Banker, the best-known name in Indian SFF worldwide:

“We should be writing about our culture, our mythology, our people, right? But then you look around at the US genre scene today: There are fantasy novels with characters named after Indian characters, set in places like Hastinapura and Ayodhya! There are references to Indian myth, legend, history everywhere! You can hardly read a genre novel today without encountering multi-cultural references...and I'm talking about genre fiction written by white, European or American writers.”

”By the same yardstick, why shouldn't it be acceptable for an Indian or Asian writer to write a book using American characters or European-Celtic elements? For that matter, why should subject matter be restricted to a writer's own culture or nationality? A good writer writes about anything he or she pleases, and should be free to do so.”

”But try stepping across the same line that western writers step across routinely and see the result. I don't think you'll find the acceptance you accept, and it might often have nothing to do with the quality of your writing or intrinsic strength of your book.”

Jeff VanderMeer, award-winning SFF author (Shriek, City of Saints and Madmen):

“There's a difference between an artistic scene or movement and getting attention and publicity for that scene or movement. No one needs to rely on a diaspora to create original, innovative, and moving work. The important thing is to focus on the work and to create something powerful and important. Then, in the fullness of time, you make people come to you. This is increasingly true considering we live in an Internet age where everyone is just a click away.”

”That said, I think it is imperative that non-English speaking countries leverage the internet by creating website for the fiction of their country, with translations into English. There's no avoiding the fact that English is the language that dominates the marketplace outside of Asia. But I do not believe you have to physically be in the US or UK to be successful. It may be harder, but it is possible. You just have to have people who are PR and market savvy in addition to people producing amazing work.”

Cheryl Morgan, writer, critic and blogger who runs online SFF magazine Emerald City:

”Editors are always looking for something new, so if you can blend South Asian culture and traditions into your writing it will help get it noticed. Ashok Banker has had some success with that. I'm afraid I don't know enough about South Asian writing to answer the last question, but I do think that we will see more and more SF books set in "Third World" countries from now on. There's a general view that the American Economic Empire is on the wane, and that "the future" will happen in India, China, South America and Africa. Ian McDonald's _River of Gods_ has been a huge success - you guys should build on that.”

“Remember that Zoran Zivkovic has been very successful despite writing in Serbian and never leaving Belgrade. He just got a good translator and submitted stories to places like Interzone, and Jeff VanderMeer's _Leviathan_ anthologies. Now he's won a World Fantasy Award and the small presses all love him. There's nothing particularly Serbian
about Zoran's writing, he is just talented and has worked hard.”

Indian children's literature and spec-fic

2006-07-03T19:06:00.000-07:00

The luckiest bibliophiles in the world are the ones who aren’t told what not to read as children, and can make up their own minds depending on what sort of book they actually like reading. A lot of these children grow up to be speculative fiction readers, some because they admire the incredible capacity of good spec-fic to deal with themes both epic and deeply personal, others because they retain their childlike sense of wonder and like spec-fic’s special effects. And the very best children’s literature, from Pullman, Rowling, Pratchett, Colfer, Snicket and Stroud to Milne, Nesbit, Barrie, Dahl, Seuss, Carroll, Tolkien and Ray, has always contained speculative elements; from myths and fairytales to spaceships and werewolves, children’s literature has always stepped outside the real world’s boundaries and set minds free. Various people have had problems with this down the ages, mostly members of crackpot religious organizations and associations of conservative parents. Adult writers of speculative fiction have it easier, the only people who don’t like them are critics. In a post-Potter universe, it’s no surprise that children’s fantasy literature reigns supreme in bookstores all over the world, and the most talked-about authors are usually the next next next JK Rowlings. Children are far less aware of literary hierarchies than their grown-up selves, far less interested in what the books they’re reading portray about them as individuals, and establish literary pecking orders mostly on the basis of ‘I’ve read more than you,’ which can only be a good thing for books and their writers.

Jai Arjun Singh, critic and blogger, on spec-fic, children and literary respectability:
"Well, I think it goes without saying that children by their very nature are more open-minded and receptive to fantastical elements than adults are. But I think the real reason is more basic and depressing: parents tend to think it's alright for kids of a certain age to indulge themselves with what is perceived as "meaningless fun" - and then, as they grow older, to read Serious Literature. That perception runs very deep and is probably responsible for the step-sisterly treatment given to fantasy for adults, and the schism between Children's Literature and Adult Literature."

Vandana Singh, writer of speculative fiction and children’s books, on the divide:
“The world of the imagination has recently (only in modern times, I think) been infantilized. The Real World is seen to be for grown-ups, and all that fairy-tale stuff for kids. This is truly sad and remarkably stupid as well, because you can see in every culture that the oldest tales have elements of magic or other-worldliness to them. Their value lies not in literal interpretations (in which case myths become nothing but unsuccessful attempts at explaining natural phenomena) but because they speak the language of the unconscious mind --- the language of symbol and metaphor. They tell us about ourselves --- our fears and dreams. After all, reality is such a complicated beast. If you are to hold it, understand it, you need something larger than reality to do so. Enter Imaginative Literature. “
“Speculative elements in children’s fiction has a long history even in our times --- the world, however, needed the Harry Potter phenomenon to wake up to the fact. We insiders were reading Diana Wynne Jones, Ursula K. Le Guin, Lloyd Alexander and others long before Rowling set pen to paper. For whatever reason Harry and his friends came at the right time to spark a massive public interest in children’s imaginative literature, and this led to a discovery on the part of the public to a literature that they had, for a very long time, ignored. Now everyone is jumping on the bandwagon of children’s spec fic, and that is all to the good. “

Ashok Banker, prolific SFF author, on the children’s SFF wave:
“Actually, there's nothing 'new' or 'now' about this phenomenon. The most popular books for children for the past several decades have been SFF stories. From the LoTR books, which were essentially young adult fiction repackaged and marketed for older readers in the USA, to the Narnia series, The Dark is Rising series, and several others, the bestselling works of YA fiction have always included spec fic titles. At the same time, there's always been a healthy mix of other genres--so, for instance, there are excellent YA books which are wholly realistic and contain zero spec fic elements, my 13-year old daughter's favourite author is Sarah Dessen, for instance, who writes intense, realistic novels like Dreamland and The Truth About Forever that just happen to feature YA characters but are literature by any yardstick.”

”What has changed recently has been the phenomenon of J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter books. That's singlehandedly changed the entire publishing world, not just YA fiction. To a great extent, yes, it's opened up the doors for a whole barrage of similar fantasy series marketed at YA, some of which is quite readable and enjoyable, while a lot of it is predictably over-marketed, over-published editorially 'created' crap. This is no different from, for example, the horde of 'christian mystery' thrillers that have exploded since the success of Dan Brown's The Da Vince Cold--achoo!”

”The other major catalyst of the rise of spec fic in YA publishing has been film and TV. As I mentioned earlier, 25 years ago, SF fans were considered to be wierdos and eccentrics who had their head in the clouds (or outer space) and were dismissed as 'Trekkies' or beanies. Today, the biggest film franchises almost all have spec fic elements. It's the biggest single genre in the movie and entertainment biz now, and it encompasses gaming, which is a multi-billion industry far bigger than even the movie biz, movies, TV, books, comics, merchandizing, toys, you name it.”

”This mass explosion has made SFF not only respectable and acceptable even to parents who might earlier have become nervous about their kids reading 'escapist' stuff two decades ago, it's also made the genre tropes intimately familiar to every kid. Back then, the scene in a book or movie wherein the hero explained what a werewolf was, and how it could be killed, was a secret thrill to those of us who spent our days and nights immersed in such arcane lore...Today, every Potterhead knows what a Lycan is and how a silver bullet brings him down splat!”

In India, languages which have rich and well-established literary traditions of their own also have, as is only to be expected, extremely good children’s speculative fiction. In English, too, we have some truly wonderful children’s/Young Adult writers, most of whose books contain speculative elements – Kalpana Swaminathan, Manjula Padmanabham, Anushka Ravishankar and Vandana Singh have all produced work in recent years that’s exciting, entertaining, intelligent and not didactic or patronizing at all.
But the young reader’s open-mindedness can work both ways; while it ensures that children don’t see books as political statements, it also means that children won’t gravitate naturally towards books by Indian authors just because they are Indian – stories are all-important, and, in the wake of Pottermania, hype. The global children’s writing market is probably even more difficult to break into for foreigners than adult literary fiction, and so far Indian children’s literature hasn’t produced a champion that’s given it what IWE usually demands as a token of success, the big UK/US publishing deal that’s the best way of ensuring that an Indian book gets talked about in India. And as far as publicity for Indian children’s writing is concerned, the situation is fairly dismal – most publishers don’t put any significant amount of money in the promotion of their children’s titles, and while in an ideal world good work would find huge audiences simply by being good work, in this world most Indian children hungry to read more aren’t even aware of what’s good in new Indian children’s writing, while national news channels continue to flash updates every time JK Rowling sneezes. This is not to say even for a moment that Indian kids should read Indian writers’ books ahead of the latest big international craze, thus missing out on the wave of seriously good children’s books that have been sweeping across the world in the last decade, but just that it would be so much more pleasant if Indian children knew that there were actually books available that gave them great stories in familiar settings.

Jaya Bhattacharji, editor, Young Zubaan, on current possibilities for speculative childrens’ writing:
“Pottermania has contributed a great deal to the surge in this form of writing. Given that the Rowling phenomena has been pivotal in encouraging reading, irrespective of the size of the book, I think, a lot of children’s writers, feel that since this is probably the genre that is selling, it is the one to emulate. “
“There certainly is a market in India for this kind of fiction. I am certainly all for any genre that encourages reading and releasing the imagination. But the Indian market has to evolve its own signature/stamp of fantasy fiction. We cannot rely totally on imitating fiction that is necessarily based on a Western/Christian tradition or of even trying to yoke the two systems together. A lot of the fantasy fiction that comes from the West is in the classic form of Good vs Evil; or in the Romance tradition of being on a Quest; or in search of the Holy Grail, whatever it may be; or reliance on Greek mythology. In India, we have a huge amount of influences to rely upon, which don’t necessarily encompass the idea of a quest or the Holy Grail. Sure, we do have a strong sense of Right and Wrong; Good vs Evil, but it is tempered by the cultural melting pot that we live in, where a lot of traditions are being intermingled. So, if fantasy has to emerge in India, it has to develop its own distinctive identity. “
“The book market for children is completely unpredictable, so the current flavour of the decade is fantasy as it has a reading public, hence sales. Given the huge investments required in children’s publishing, most publishers, authors, literary agents will want/ten to be conservative and capitalise on a winning formula rather than take a risk. It is pure economic sense to promote fantasy and hence, its noticeable dominance of the market. “

Payal Dhar, YA SFF author, on Indian children’s writing:
“My biggest complaint with Indian authors writing for children is that they have a particular idea of what children *should* read and not what they *want* to read or even need to read. As a result, we get a very sanitized depiction of the world, glossing over whatever is uncomfortable. I'd like to see that change. I'd like to see a Jacqueline Wilson or Judy Blume come out of India.”

”Then again, there is a lot of very good fiction available for children, even if it is not by Indian authors. Having been a weird and withdrawn kid (and now adult!) who spends most waking hours reading, I know that anyone (children as well as grown-ups) who wants a good read just goes and gets a book that sounds interesting. They don't say, "I will only read something by an Indian author." On the other hand, what does sometimes matter is, you don't find anything to identify with - yourself, your surroundings, your society. It isn't a crippling disadvantage, though, and doesn't spoil the fun of reading, which is the main thing.”

Jaya Bhattacharji on what she wants to see in children’s spec-fic:
Fantasy for children in India, can be set in any context, time zone etc, but it has to be well written. In the sense, that there should be good, cohesive logic to the universe that is being created. There should be details of the environment and the people and certainly not a cacophony of voices, which really don’t do much for the characters. Each character should have a distinct voice. If different traditions are to be mixed (and frankly, I am all for experimentation in literature), then it has to be done cleverly, treated lightly and presented in an interesting manner. By clever, I mean that the author should not be “showing off” their immense reading and familiarity with these other traditions, but create multi-layers and echoes in the story, that will prompt the young reader to submerge, discover and be totally entranced by the new literary creation. At the end of the day, it has to be a GOOD STORY. Also, a story well told will live for a very long time to come and not necessarily be written and created with “a” single market, fixed in time. In fact, it will then be read for many generations to come. “

The primary mindset barrier Indian speculative children’s writing needs to break is not the same one its adult counterpart. Even today, a lot of successful Indian children’s books tend to be ‘about India’ books, rather bland retellings of history and myth pushed down their throats in large quantities by parents worried about their children losing their connection with their homeland in the flood of wizards, goosebumps, American high schools and Unfortunate Events that take care of their children’s fiction demands. How quality Indian children’s fiction, speculative or otherwise, can be moved out of bookstores and into homes is unfortunately not a problem writers can deal with. But until publishers find a solution, Indian children’s writers will have to keep on writing good books that are no doubt hugely satisfying to write, but don’t allow them to afford more time to write even more hugely satisfying books.

Comics, graphic novels and Indian speculative fiction

2006-07-03T18:45:00.000-07:00

Speculative fiction and comics have gone hand in hand from the very
beginning; even today, apart from the mainstream superhero comicbooks,
which are essentially spec-fic, the greatest and best-known comic
writers in the world, like Alan Moore or Neil Gaiman, are wildly
popular for SF and fantasy creations which use the comic-book medium's
ability to tell compelling stories and create a sense of scale and
wonder to rival the very best speculative fiction text-only books,
bringing the strengths of both text and art to create a truly
wonderful compound. And in India, the enduring popularity of Asterix,
Tintin, and the home-grown Amar Chitra Katha series serve to underline
the fact the fact that the comic book is a medium the speculative
fiction writer cannot afford not to take seriously.

With the publication of Sarnath Banerjee's Corridor two years ago, the
setting up of comics publisher Phantomville and the arrival in India
of Virgin Comics and Animation, graphic novels have been in the Indian
news fairly consistently for a while.

The term graphic novel is, of course, a controversial one at every
level – attributed to Will Eisners ground-breaking A Contract with
God (1978), though it's the term had been around since 1964. The
phrase was created as a term to help sell comicbooks to serious
literary publishers, to distinguish serious, literary comics from more
pulp fare, building a serious artistic movement aiming, as per Eddie
Campbell's 2004 manisfesto, "to take the form of the comic book, which
has become an embarrassment, and raise it to a more ambitious and
meaningful level."

The next decade should be an extremely exciting time for the comicbook
medium in India – on the one hand, literary graphic novels, and on the
other, high-flying spec-fic comics that revisit myth, history and the
future, should make their presence felt in a very significant way both
among Indian readers and worldwide with Indian themes and settings.

Gotham Chopra, Chief Creative Officer, Virgin Comics and Animation:

"I am proud to be a part of what we think is a creative
renaissance in India. I think India in of itself will become the
dominant market for publishing and other forms of entertainment and
servicing that is certainly our goal. But there is also a richness to
our heritage and stories that we think the world will really fall for
if its package the right way with great quality."

"As with any new business, there are a thousand new challenges every
day! I think the toughest is identifying the best and most real
opportunities amongst the million that come at us every day and
staying focused on them. Also, of course is building the right team.
I have no doubt that the right mix of creative and managerial talent
exists in India but finding them is not the easiest thing in the
world. We also only want to work with dreamers - those who share our
vision and want to be a part of something truly innovative and bold."

"I am a sucker for mythology and have always been a history buff as
well. Of course re-inventing our great myths - the Ramayan and
Mahabharat - is a no-brainer and something we are exploring. But I'd
rather take our rich mythology and our Asian thinking and integrate
it into contemporary stories and dramas. I think we have a type of
story-telling that will increasingly find a global audience, a
richness to our characters and their backstories that roots them in a
greater sense than just themselves and propels good narratives.
In terms of things to dodge, I think super heroes in the classic
mold. The days of tights and capes seem to be passing in terms of teh
emergence if new heroes. I definitely think there is room in the
pantheon for new and dynamic characters that have powers as part of
their arsenal but I generally look away from the classic caped
crusaders as we develop new stories."

Others are more guardedly optimistic, at least about the future of
well-done comics in India.

Sarnath Banerjee, comics writer/artist and co-founder of Phantomville:
"Historically comics reading population was quite narrow-minded,
people could make an acute demographic profile of an average comic
book reader. However that profile has changed already, at least in the
west. It has become a cultural phenomenon since the last ten years, a
lucky number of absolutely brilliant graphic novelists and a vacuumed
in the reading market created this. Pundits says it is here to say,
that is why the top three publishers in the world have developed their
own graphic line, I am talking of Penguin, Random house and Gallimard.
Other powerful words-only publishing houses have joined the band
wagon. Corporations are putting money. The comics form is crossing
over to Cinema and advertising. In short these are exciting times for
comics."

"Unfortunately, I feel we have to wait till it gets filtered down from
the western, particularly the American market. As Phantomville, we are
trying several approaches to sell a larger number of books without
resorting to violence- multiple distributors, presentations in
Universities, word of mouth, keeping the price of book embarrassingly
low etc. yet the progress is very slow. In France the first print run
of comics is 10,000 copies even for a beginner, in India 5,000 copies
is the magic number, it means you are a bestseller."

"This embodies the whole phenomenon of the book trade. India is an
emerging power with a vast middle class, a growing consumer economy,
but not for books. Whether comics or otherwise. However I am told that
self-help and management books are doing well."

"One Corridor is not going to change the outlook to comics. To build a
comics culture in the country a lot of investments have to be made.
Capital has to be spent on training and shaping comics illustrators,
which is a specialised art. As you are aware that although there is
no dearth of good writers is the country comics illustrators are
almost insignificant. I know many talented writers including you,
given an opportunity will want to do and have the capacity to do
brilliant comics, but somehow are crippled by lack of visionary
illustrators"

"In a royalty-oriented publishing house this is almost impossible to
achieve, because the charges of a good illustrator is almost
astronomical, and they tend to charge by panels. Under no
circumstances would the book recover the money spent on creating it.
These are the problems faced by my peers such as Rajesh Devraj, who
conceived this idea of converting the Tamil cowboy, Quickgun Murugan,
into comics, but couldn't justify the capital to be paid to the
illustrators. I feel your trilogy has great possibility to crossover
into comics, but who will support a project of that scale? These are
questions that bother us. Where will the money come from? Which
marketing department will accept a proposal like that?"

"Although, clearly it can't be avoided but speculatively there should
be a five-year ban on any thing on Hanuman, for the sake of Hanuman.
And while you are at it Mahabharata and Jatakas, only for five years.
Let us explore some other stories. I feel these tales have done what
cricket has done to hockey and what Bollywood has done to other
cultural forms that could have come out of India."

Which leads us to the question: But do 'real' writers, even
non-literary genre types, write for comics? Yes, of course, they do
that stuff abroad, but comicbooks are still seen as children's fare in
India, and doesn't SFF get enough flak even in book form? The easy
answer to this is that comicbooks for grownups have only just started
being widely available in Indian bookstores, and it's difficult for
Indian readers to become supremely well-versed in the arts and
sciences of good new comics unless they have access to them. As more
comics are created for and by Indians, a readership seems bound to
follow, because comics do hold immense appeal for the most high-nosed
of readers.

Sarnath Banerjee elaborates:
"Comics can fit in a lot of complex ideas in a single page, they can
create atmosphere and psychological states, a theme can be explored in
all its facets and point of views. This is particularly relevant in
discussing history, sociology, anthropology, natural sciences and
emerging technologies, reproductive or otherwise."
" Informed minds have to come together and collaborate creatively to
get to this phase. "Let's do comics because it has simple funny
pictures that will instruct simple people on simple principles of
watershed management" is merely one way of looking at things."

The Indian comics industry as it stands today is extremely
underdeveloped, and relies heavily on the unrelenting retelling of
classic Indian myths, the unabashed regurgitation of American
superheroes and some original comics that are funny, pacy and work for
children at an entertainment level and for adults, both in India and
among the diaspora, as memorabilia, but don't approach in any sense
the production or stylistic qualities of contemporary international
work. One major reason for this, of course, is a lack of money in the
industry as far as creators, both writers and artists, are concerned;
this needs to change before any indigenous quality comics become
available all over the country, because the production of comics
always has been a laborious, time-consuming and difficult process. But
given the intrinsic appeal of the medium, the kind of devotion that
Indian comics, whatever their defects, inspire in their readers across
ages and countries, and the kind of attention comics have been getting
in the mainstream media, it's not unreasonable at all to be optimistic
about the future of Indian comics.

For speculative fiction writers, this is actually more of an
opportunity than it is for writers of mainstream literary fiction, at
least in terms of finding readers – spec-fic comics are tried and
tested, drive markets in the US and in Japan, the two largest
producers of comics, and are much more likely to sell (and, thus,
attract publishers) even in India, where comics have been selling in
large quantities for about 50 years. The arrival of more comics
publishers in India, if and when it happens, should see even more
opportunities for people who can spin a good spec-fic yarn, but can't
draw to save their lives, to see their work in visual form and
actually make that spectacular movie that runs in their head while
they're writing with their Indian leads that Hollywood would have
rejected, and with the kind of visual effects that Bollywood couldn't
have afforded.

Thomas Abraham interview

2006-07-03T12:56:00.000-07:00

Thomas Abraham is President and CEO of Penguin Books India

Q: Penguin represents a lot of international publishers in India,
including a number of leading SFF imprints. At this point of time,
which are the most popular SFF sub-genres in India?

A: --Actually we represent just one serious SFF imprint Orbit. Penguin US has a large range (Roc & Daw) but they’re essentially US territory limited so we don’t bring them in. Bloomsbury, Faber & Puffin have a few children’s fantasy titles but that’s it. Before getting into sub genres, it’s worth noting that Orbit’s YA SFF imprint Atom failed and had to be aborted. So SFF essentially is still cult rather than mass market in India. The biggest sellers would be Jordan (10K) and Scott card (7.5K) from our lists. David Eddings, Terry Pratchett, Tad Williams, Le Guin etc etc—you know the usual suspects—also do fairly well. Looking at the kind of fantasy that sells, well it’s still druids and dragons. Epic and quest fantasy I suppose. SF is still stuck with Asimov and Clarke, with Dick making an appearance in a few bookstores. Can’t really pick a single sub-genre that would rise to the top unless one includes techno-thrillers. These apart I guess it would be the space/parallel universe genre. You’ll find very little new SF available here; though Fantasy has a fair bit of new stuff.

Q: Do you think international SFF agents/publishers are receptive to the
concept of a South Asian writing genre fiction, traditionally a
Western preserve? Is there an increased interest in non-Western SFF
in a saturated Western market, and is it beginning to show?

A:--Not that I’ve noticed. There is always a kind of exotica/novelty interest and South Asian material if it grips somebody may do well. But remember Song of kali by Dan Simmons did really well and the whole Calcutta as chaos motif was one of the key differentiators. So if Simmons could do it, I don’t see we shouldn’t. But I think unlike lit-fic which took the other route, commercial genres will have to break out here first.

Q: In most countries with developed SFF markets, SFF is seen as
low-caste, compared with literary fiction - for adults, at least. Does
this prejudice hold true in India as well? If so, does it also show in
terms of book sales, or do internationally well-known SFF authors sell
as well as acclaimed mainstream literary works?

A:-- I wouldn’t go so far as lowering their varna, but yes they’re definitely seen as commercial. Interestingly in the UK, they’re coming out of the closet by as simple an expedient as new jacket design. Men in tights are out. Contemporary mood image covers are in. And sales shot up because, believe it or not, people could now read these books on the tube. India is rather unique in the fact that the differential between lit-fic and comm-fic isn’t much. Vikram Seth for instance would do 25K in hardback and a new Grisham would do about 40K in pb. And yes, the blockbuster level apart, internationally acclaimed SFF writers do as well as second rung thriller writers or literary writers (about 3 to5k). And here interestingly, the commercial tag apart, SF/F is often seen as abstruse and difficult.

Q: Indians living abroad are beginning to make their mark felt in other
kinds of fiction than mainstream literary fiction today - chick-lit
being a prime example. Given that writers of South Asian origin living
outside South Asia have more access to the spec-fic market, in terms
of magazines, conferences and up-to-date reading material, do you
think it's likely that if there is a substantial wave of Indian SFF
writing, writers from the diaspora will be playing a leading role in
its development?

A:--I don’t see why not. And not just the diaspora but from here. Leaving aside conferences, access is pretty much available to everything else. And even going with the notion that flights of imagination are still inevitably rooted someway to cultural influences; we’re now (at least in urban India) definitely tech advanced for SF and have a mythology that’s definitely richer than celtic folklore to be able to produce world class fantasy. The problem is we need a basic readership here, which I think will be available over the next 10 years. All those Potter and Alfred Kropp readers will hopefully graduate into reading SFF.

Q: Picture your own SFF universe, where the best of South Asian writing
is married to the best of SFF writing. What sort of hybrid children
would you like to see, in terms of themes, content and style?

A:--Fusion as in music is always the most difficult to get right. The probability of falling between two stools is high. The problem is essentially that a lot of good writers won’t try their hand at commercial genres because it would feel low-brow. I ‘m not too sure a hybrid would work or is even necessary. ‘Vikram Seth meets Philip K Dick’ may sound good as a blurb line but may not be great reading. And who loves mutants anyway? I’d much rather a good writer who had the imagination to write SFF, just sat down and wrote a good book. In India we would need some great storytelling to break the genre through. (see last question)

Q: Do you feel that practically speaking, writers from countries not
normally associated with spec-fic markets need to emphasize on their
own countries' myths/folklore/history in order to provide some kind of
diversity and succeed in the international marketplace?

A: --Not as a generalization, but if they don’t, they have to labour against the prejudice that “there’s nothing new here; this is essentially a western universe”. It’s a bit of a catch-22 situation. It would be far easier to position their work as rooted in their own cultural contexts and try to break through on the exotica platform. But conversely they would probably come up with the objection from agents that this is too culturally alien to succeed in the west. But that’s now. Increasingly these barriers are being wiped out and hopefully in ten years it won’t matter.

Q: While acknowledging that spec-fic isn't monolithic and there are a
hundred different directions it's growing in at any time, what do you
feel are the most exciting fields of work in contemporary science
fiction and fantasy? What area would you like to see more work in? And
what do you think new writers should avoid?

A:--Unfortunately I haven’t really been keeping pace and am not really qualified to comment on any of the questions. Though I think there’s some great work being done in the field of urban fantasy with terrific crossovers into the graphic novel. But the biggest hope emerges from the fact that almost all the top sellers in the children’s segment now are SF/F variants.
But coming back to my thesis that we really need to build a homegrown SFF blockbuster, I’d love to see a classic SF thriller that would sell 50K here. And staying with the marketability and the need to establish the genre by bringing in new readers, my own gut feel is that a good SFF-alternate history a la Ward Moore’s Bring the Jubilee is what’s needed.

Vandana Singh interview

2006-07-03T12:47:00.000-07:00

Vandana Singh teaches Physics and writes speculative fiction and children's books.

Q: Are you working on a novel now? Is there anything you can reveal
about it, if so?

A: I have been intermittently working on a novel or three in the last few months. I say intermittently because my day job keeps me insanely busy, but I actually have words down for two of the novels, so it is not all in my head!

One is a fantasy about magic in the real world, but magic treated as a discipline rather than something merely supernatural in which practically anything can happen --- in other words, magic as a science. It is about a group of characters, from an eleven year old girl to a 21-year-old guy, who are practicing and re-discovering ancient magic in one of many secret communities around the world. The other novel is good, old-fashioned science fiction about an Indian girl who goes to Mars to join a human colony there. The third one --- the one I am so excited about, it almost makes me sick --- is set in my hometown of Delhi. All three of these books might be considered Young Adult Fiction but since I read happily and indiscriminately across boundaries, I'll leave categorization to others.

Q: The SF publishing market is hugely different from the mainstream
literary one, with a wholly separate set of publishers and agents -
which means that if there's any glamour left to the whole 'Indian
writing' phenomenon, it doesn't apply in these markets. Besides, most
SFF writers currently breaking through abroad go through the short
stories in magazines/meeting people at conferences routine before they
managed to get signed up. You've had spec-fic stories published in
leading magazines and anthologies, and attended conferences, which is
the best route towards getting SFF novels published in the West
(Congratulations!). Given that Indians living in India don't have
access to conferences abroad, do you think that these inequalities are
just things that Indian SFF writers
looking to get published internationally will just have to take in
their stride, or is there anything that they can do to help their work
get seen? How important is location as a factor in the future of
Indian SFF?

A: Indian writers have to write what is in our heart and soul and gut --- not what we think might sell abroad. That means being true to ourselves, irrespective of the subject matter. And because the best SFF is ultimately revolutionary, in that it forces us to see ourselves as we are and as we can be, it also means that we must examine everything, including our dearest assumptions. Indian SFF cannot help but be influenced by the great Anglo-American SFF tradition, but if we want to influence it in turn, rather than be second-rate imitators, we must forge our own views, our own imperatives, our own universes. Part of that involves reading and thinking about what the world has to offer --- read Asimov, Le Guin, Calvino, Borges, Li Po, the Epic of Gilagamesh --- and part of it involves what and who we are --- read Premchand, the Ramayana, Ghalib, the Bhakti poets. In other words we must always be aware of and in dialogue with the great works of the non-English Indian traditions (some of which, by the way, have vibrant SF literatures) from Madhavan Kutty to Premendra Mitra and beyond.

It is true that in the West the SFF culture has developed an enormous fan base and also great support for new, emerging and established writers, through conventions and writers’ workshops. There is no reason why these things cannot be organized in India, where we already have traditions like the literary mehfil. Even in the US conventions and workshops arose as ideas dreamed up by penniless writers (probably over coffee at 3 am), evolving from a very small scale to epic proportions (the last Worldcon I attended in Boston had at least 5000 participants). I think we have to start small, with writers getting together in neighborhoods and localities and giving honest critiques of each others’ works. The next steps may include launching small-press magazines or ezines for publishing outstanding works, holding conventions, doing readings at bookstores to popularize SF and generating fan newsletters.

We can consider Japanese SF as an example. Now Americans generally think the world revolves around them, and unfortunately this is mostly true of American SFF writers and editors as well. But lately I’ve been hearing more and more about Japanese SF in US publications, and of American SF writers going to Japanese SF conventions. (The next Worldcon is in Japan, by the way.) I am no expert on the history of Japanese SF but I really think that creating their own subculture of SF helped put the Japanese on the world SF map. There is no reason why Indians can’t do this as well. Now, with the publication of the international SF magazine Internova (from Germany) there is a real interest among SF writers around the world (particularly Europe) to find SF from all over the globe and publish it. I have heard of SF from Croatia and Argentina, from China and Sri Lanka. Each SF community enriches the whole.

Q: Indians living abroad are beginning to make their mark felt in other
kinds of fiction than mainstream literary fiction today - chick-lit
being a prime example. Is there a significantly large number of
spec-fic writers among the diaspora?

A: I think we are few and far between. For the longest time I thought I was the only Indian SF writer around (apart from luminaries like Amitav Ghosh, who may not even identify himself as an SF writer). A few years ago a couple of American editors I met seemed puzzled by my existence. I was Indian --- I should write about saris, incense and arranged marriages, right? What was I doing, dabbling in science fiction? Most interestingly, an Indian author I talked to seemed surprised by my description of my writing “SF from a third-world perspective.” “Do you mean you write about reincarnation?”

Anyway, from those sorry times just a few years ago to now, we have more and more Indian names popping up. For instance there is Anil Menon --- remember his name, you will see it again! And emerging others who are going to Clarion workshops, working away at their stories, getting ready to see their names in print.

Q: How have publishers and agents responded to the concept of an Indian
writing SFF? Is there an increased interest in non-Western SFF in a
saturated Western market, and is it beginning to show? Are anthologies
like So Long Been Dreaming the first of many?

A: I think there is definitely an interest in seeing something new. Unfortunately Americans in general are sadly uninformed about India and what little they know is often caricatured and stereotyped beyond recognition. In addition there are a lot of Western SF writers who have used Indian characters or settings in their stories, sometimes honestly and sometimes with a hostility that harks back to the old colonial British hack writers of penny-dreadfuls. An Indian SFF writer thus has to overcome all these stereotypes. One of the things that helps is that writers of colour in North America are getting together across ethnicities --- African-Americans, South Asians --- forming groups like the Carl Brandon Society that gives out its own rewards to people or writings that focus on issues of race --- or publishing anthologies like So Long Been Dreaming that are being treated seriously by SFF critics and academics alike.

So I think there is a lot of hope and new interest, now, in expanding the boundaries of SFF.

Q: Do you feel SF/fantasy (speculative fiction) has a future in India?
Why, either way?

A: It had better --- we practically invented it --- at least science fiction’s older cousin, fantasy, has a long history in India. But really I think that there is no other literature in the world, apart from speculative fiction, that deals with the way the world is changing, and with all kinds of possible futures. There is no other fiction that has the potential of telling the truth about the human condition now, even if it is against the backdrop of an invented universe. Considering how fast things are changing in the so-called third-world, what other literature can we turn to, in order to truly examine ourselves and where we are going? What other literature has the revolutionary potential of revisioning entire worlds, entire societies?

As an Indian growing up in New Delhi, I was addicted to science fiction. I grew out of it in early adulthood when I realized it was not written for me, it did not speak to me (I had not discovered Le Guin yet). I returned to it as a PhD student in the US because I literally felt alienated and wanted to read something that spoke to my condition. When I discovered writers like Ursula Le Guin, Octavia Butler and others, I knew there was a place in SF for me.

So imagine SF books written by Indians for the world at large, but also for Indians. Indian teenagers and young adults reading these may never grow out of reading SF, as I once did!

Q: In fiction aimed at adults, SF/fantasy tend to be seen as low-caste,
but in the world of children's/YA publishing, the most popular books
in recent times always seem to contain speculative elements. Do you
think this is because younger people are seen to be more accepting of
non-identifiably-real-world situations, or because the children's/YA
book market is now large enough for it to have its own rules – or is
it something different entirely?

A: The world of the imagination has recently (only in modern times, I think) been infantilized. The Real World is seen to be for grown-ups, and all that fairy-tale stuff for kids. This is truly sad and remarkably stupid as well, because you can see in every culture that the oldest tales have elements of magic or other-worldliness to them. Their value lies not in literal interpretations (in which case myths become nothing but unsuccessful attempts at explaining natural phenomena) but because they speak the language of the unconscious mind --- the language of symbol and metaphor. They tell us about ourselves --- our fears and dreams. After all, reality is such a complicated beast. If you are to hold it, understand it, you need something larger than reality to do so. Enter Imaginative Literature.

Speculative elements in children’s fiction has a long history even in our times --- the world, however, needed the Harry Potter phenomenon to wake up to the fact. We insiders were reading Diana Wynne Jones, Ursula K. Le Guin, Lloyd Alexander and others long before Rowling set pen to paper. For whatever reason Harry and his friends came at the right time to spark a massive public interest in children’s imaginative literature, and this led to a discovery on the part of the public to a literature that they had, for a very long time, ignored. Now everyone is jumping on the bandwagon of children’s spec fic, and that is all to the good.

So I guess what I am saying is (in my non-expert view) that there are many reasons, and I think I’ve outlined the two main ones.

Q: What sort of children's fantasy/SF would you like to see coming out of
Indian writers in India and abroad? And what do you think writers in
the sub-genre would do best to avoid?

A: Personally I’d like to see anything that is truly imaginative, that comes from deep places inside the author’s soul. The subject and setting need not even be Indian, although it would be great if we had more books with Indian kids having adventures. (When I was a kid I used to think, for the longest time that cool things only happened to kids named Jack or Susan with blue eyes). As for what to avoid: avoid imitations, avoid pandering to stereotypes. Avoid --- like the plague --- writing to get published. Write what is in you, write what you cannot help writing if they chained you up and stuck you on a desert island.

Q: What particular period of Indian history do you think would make for
really engaging SFF?

A: Gosh, practically any period would be fascinating. I never realized when I was living in India that my own backyard was the most exciting place (or at least, one of the most exciting places) in the world. When I went to the US as a graduate student I realized how richly experiential life in India can be. Even a visit to the sabzi market is full of interest (going to an air-conditioned grocery store cannot compare). There is something about our part of the world --- if you open your eyes and ears and heart, there are stories waiting to be plucked from the air. I grew up in Delhi. Along the lanes of my childhood, or hidden in surrounding forests, there lie the ruins of ancient and medieval kingdoms. Sher Shah Suri walked here, the Pandavas rested there. Myth and history, folklore and legend in one seamless whole, waiting for the listening ear, the seeing eye of the writer who will let these ancient tales brew in the mind, along with the modern icons and imperatives of our frenetic age --- to come up with something uniquely his or hers. What are we waiting for?

Gotham Chopra interview

2006-07-03T12:30:00.000-07:00

Gotham Chopra has played many roles in huge projects across media, from writing books to producing Hollywood movies. He is currently Chief Creative Officer at Virgin Comics and Animation

Q: Graphic novels and comics are the fastest growing market in fiction
today, and Virgin Comics and Animation seems like a fascinating
project. You're not only trying to produce comics from India in India,
thus creating a market and creating new groups of readers, you're also
looking to create a whole niche in western publishing markets. How has
the experience been so far, in the process of creation, and what are
the problems you've faced?

A: It's an exciting venture, most notably because it's never really been
done before. I am proud to be a part of what we think is a creative
renaissance in India. I think India in of itself will become the
dominant market for publishing and other forms of entertainment and
servicing that is certainly our goal. But there is also a richness to
our heritage and stories that we think the world will really fall for
if its package the right way with great quality.

As with any new business, there are a thousand new challenges every
day! I think the toughest is identifying the best and most real
opportunities amongst the million that come at us every day and
staying focused on them. Also, of course is building the right team.
I have no doubt that the right mix of creative and managerial talent
exists in India but finding them is not the easiest thing in the
world. We also only want to work with dreamers - those who share our
vision and want to be a part of something truly innovative and bold.

Q: The comics Virgin plans to publish are by and large related to the
larger literary genre of science fiction and fantasy, or SFF. Do you
think Indian readers are by nature receptive to SFF? Do you think your
comics could start a wave of increased popularity for SFF in India? If
yes, what are your own favourite SFF influences (books/comics/movie)
and where do you see the genre going in the near future?

A: I think the fact that we have such a rich mythic heritage does in
fact form the bedrock of a great SFF market. Readers first have to be
equipped with great imaginations to consume and appreciate good SFF.
The great texts of our past - the yoga vashista and vedic tomes
include references to things, places, dimensions that even the best
SFF writers of today have not dreamt up. The Indian market has of
course drifted away from that, become consumed with Bollywood, but I
think they will still react to a great and imaginative story. In
terms of my favorites - I always have loved the great SFF writer
William Gibson. The Dune series is a classic. Comics in the genre- my
favorite writer would be Warren Ellis. Movies: Star Wars of course is
the seminal myth of my generation and I'll put the original Matrix up
there with any other film.

Q: I understand you're looking at creating content across a variety of
media. Is text-only book publishing a part of your plans?

A: We live in an era of integrated media whereby a good story can be
spun out into as many ways you can think of. We think of the comic or
graphic novel as a great storyboard - the R and D lab - from which we
can spring films, games, wireless content and much more. That doesn't
mean we skimp on the publishing side of things. In fact, we think
that's the most important part, building a solid foundation from
which we can be creative and have some more fun.

Q: What sort of material would you like to see coming out of South Asian
comics – not just as head of Virgin, but as a comics fan? Is there any
particular aspect of Indian history/culture/media that you're
particularly fascinated by, and are dying to see in comics? And what
do you think Indian comicbook writers would do well to avoid?

A: I am a sucker for mythology and have always been a history buff as
well. Of course re-inventing our great myths - the Ramayan and
Mahabharat - is a no-brainer and something we are exploring. But I'd
rather take our rich mythology and our Asian thinking and integrate
it into contemporary stories and dramas. I think we have a type of
story-telling that will increasingly find a global audience, a
richness to our characters and their backstories that roots them in a
greater sense than just themselves and propels good narratives. I
think that's always critical - giving your protagonists really strong
backstories. Even if you don't include any of it - and that is often
the case - a strong backstory really helps build the spine of a good
tale.

In terms of things to dodge, I think super heroes in the classic
mold. The days of tights and capes seem to be passing in terms of teh
emergence if new heroes. I definitely think there is room in the
pantheon for new and dynamic characters that have powers as part of
their arsenal but I generally look away from the classic caped
crusaders as we develop new stories.

Q: In other media, SFF content is often treated as marginal, low-caste,
bereft of real literary content, and thus outside mainstream
literature. Interestingly, in comics, SFF content IS the mainstream,
and more literary comics are mostly marginal, even underground. What
do you think is the reason for this?

A: A good comic writer understands that it is such a dynamic platform to
imagine a whole world and turn it into something visual. It's a film
with an unlimited budget. There is something very fulfilling about
having an idea in your head and then watching a greta artist start to
really bring that alive. In the movies that requires millions of
dollars. In a good graphic novel, when an artist and writer find the
synergy and rhythm, it happens almost effortlessly and they both
compliment one another. As with most art forms, there's a huge gulf
between the good stuff and the bad stuff - and the good stuff can be
mind-blowing.

Q: A huge problem for readers and writers in India has been that they
simply don't have access to cutting-edge comics and SFF novels - in the
case of graphic novels, price is often a very limiting factor. Until this
situation corrects itself, do you think the best placed Indians (in terns of both . reading and writing) are those who belong to the diaspora? Will the diaspora play . the leading role in the creation of SFF material both in comics and in books, at . least in the first wave of Indian SFF?

A: We're working in. Bringing the world's best content to India has been
the mission of my partner and co-founder of Virgin Comics, Sharad
Devarajan, for many years with his first company. And certainly as we
mine the rich talent of India and create new books, we want India to
be key in the emergence of these stories on the global stage. As far
as getting the stuff now, I think you'll start to see innovations as
the whole branded character industry grows. You'll also find a lot of
surrounding countries from Singapore to UAE moving more aggressively
in these areas and that obviously having an effect.

Q: Finally, a question about heroes. What sort of heroes are you planning
to create for an Indian market? Do you think there's a degree of
saturation with superhero comics in the west, or are readers
insatiably hungry for their favourite superheroes? Do you think the
Indian superhero works as a concept?

A: I think it all depends on how we define the concept of a superhero.
To some degree there is an insatiable appetite in the west for the
great comic heroes - the Batmans, Supermans, and Spidermans. But I
also think in India, we've had the original superheroes for years!
The Krishnas and Ramas and Lakshmis and Kalis. Not so much their
personas as the attributes that make them up, the characteristics
that define their divinity, are what can make for the most powerful
and provocative new heroes. Sticking a cape and tights on our great
Indian Gods and Goddesses is too much of a short-cut. We need to
understand the subtleties of our pantheon, tap the collective
creative mind of our heritage and I am confident that even Superman
doesn't stand much of a chance!

Mary Anne Mohanraj interview

2006-07-03T12:16:00.000-07:00

Mary Anne Mohanraj is a writer born in Sri Lanka. She's actively involved in running SFF magazine Strange Horizons, DesiLit and the Speculative Literature Foundation.

Q: A South Asian running a Speculative Literature Foundation. Fabulous.
What's the experience been like, and where is it going?

A: Interesting, though we're learning as we go, since spec fic has never
had its own arts foundation before. We've had some tremendously
successful programs, such as the travel grant and our new mentorship
program. We're always in need of new volunteers to help us initiate
more innovative projects. We have lots of ideas; we just need the
volunteers and the donations to make them happen.

Q: Do you think a wave of South Asian speculative fiction looks possible? And if so, is it going to come from South Asia or from the diaspora?

A: When you say 'South Asian speculative fiction,' do you mean spec fic
by S. Asians? (As opposed to spec fic with a S. Asian setting,
possibly written by non-desis?) Assuming that you do mean spec fic
by S. Asians, I'm not sure we're really at the point of seeing a
wave. So far, I've encountered isolated authors (some quite
excellent), and there doesn't seem to be sufficient critical mass yet
that they've even started talking to each other much.

Most S. Asian/diaspora authors I encounter seem more concerned with
writing mainstream 'literary' fiction. In part this is simply where
their interests lie -- in part, I wonder whether some of the leanings
in that directions come out of a desire for respectability. Making
your living as a writer is generally not one of the acceptable career
tracks for an ambitious S. Asian, and it may be that many authors are
afraid to venture into sf/f for fear of even more mockery from the
relatives. But that's pure speculation on my part -- it may be just
that most S. Asian/diaspora authors didn't grow up reading and loving
spec fic, and so it doesn't occur to them to try writing it.

So far, there are just a few authors who do write spec fic (such as
Vandana Singh, Anil Menon, Ashok Banker, Amitav Ghosh (and myself, of
course)). Of course, a decade ago, there were far fewer, so the
numbers do seem to be increasing. If this trend continues, then
maybe, sure, in a few years, we may see a wave of spec fic authors,
both from South Asia and from the diaspora. I'd like that, but we'll
have to see what happens.

Q: What themes/characters would you like to see explored in speculative
fiction from South Asia? Are there any themes, ancient or
contemporary, that you feel really should have been explored by now?
What do you think South Asian SFF writers should avoid?

A: Again, you seem to be conflating fiction drawing on S. Asia and
fiction by S. Asian writers, and I want to keep pulling those apart.
I hope that S. Asian writers explore all the themes that any writer
would explore, and that they feel free to do so in any setting.

As for fiction drawing on S. Asia, I'm personally always interested
in literature that reflects (and reflects on) the cultural situation
(past, present, and future). I'd be fascinated to read stories that
explore gender, ethnicty, and class issues in a S. Asian (or S. Asia-
derived) setting. (And, not incidentally, those stories would also
be eligible for some of the spec fic awards for that type of
material: the Tiptree, the Carl Brandon, and the new Plunkett Award).

Q: The SF publishing market is hugely different from the mainstream
literary one, with a wholly separate set of publishers and agents -
which means that if there's any glamour left to the whole South Asian
Writing in English' phenomenon, it doesn't apply in these markets.

A: I'm not sure that's entirely true; spec fic magazine and anthology
editors are always looking for fresh settings and material, and I
know that Strange Horizons in particular has an active commitment to
seeking out non-mainstream authors and their work.

Q: Besides, most SFF writers currently breaking through abroad go through
the short stories in magazines/meeting people at conferences routine
before they managed to get signed up.
Given that people living in the subcontinent don't have access to
conferences abroad, do you think that these inequalities in access
are just things that South Asian SFF writers looking to get published
internationally will just have to take in their stride, or is there
anything that they can do to help their work get seen?How important is
location as a factor in the future of South Asian SFF?

A: Well, assuming your English skills are strong, there's no real bar to
submitting material to magazines that accept online submissions (such
as Strange Horizons). It's true that if the magazine requires print
submissions, there's some additional mailing costs, and if the
magazine isn't available online, there'll be additional purchase
costs to familiarize yourself with the work. That's unfortunate,
especially given the difference in exchange rate. But aside from
that financial barrier, a S. Asian's chances of being published in an
American or British spec fic magazine are, I believe, just as good as
a local's, if not better (by virtue of being different, new, perhaps
even strange).

Conventions can be tremendously valuable for learning about the field
and finding a supportive community, but they don't actually make it
much more likely that you'll sell a story. It's much more important
to work on your writing skills than worry about the people you aren't
meeting at conventions. If you live in an isolated area, but have
net access, you can gather much of the same information in online
communities (such as the old newsgroup rec.arts.sf.composition), and
can participate in online workshops (such as Critters).

Q: South Asians living abroad are beginning to make their mark felt in
other kinds of fiction than mainstream literary fiction today -
chick-lit being a prime example, albeit in slightly unfortunate
circumstances. Is there a significantly large number of spec-fic
writers among the diaspora?

A: Not yet.

Q: How have publishers and agents responded to the concept of a South
Asian writing SFF? Is there an increased interest in non-Western SFF
in a saturated Western market, and is it beginning to show? Are
anthologies like So Long Been Dreaming the first of many?

A: I don't think publishers and agents are particularly interested in S.
Asians writing spec fic (except perhaps in the case of Banker's
_Prince of Ayodhya_ series, which recasts a famous epic story as a
fantasy series). But I do think that there's a more general
increased interest in non-Western spec fic, although as always, the
prime criterion is simply whether readers are interested, and whether
they're buying it.

Cecilia Tan and I tried to pitch an Asian companion volume to _Dark
Matter_ (an anthology of speculative fiction from the African
diaspora) some years ago, and were told that the publisher didn't
think there was a sufficient market for it. Maybe in a few years...

Q: Do you feel that practically speaking, writers from countries not
normally associated with spec-fic markets need to emphasize on their
own countries' myths/folklore in order to provide some kind of
diversity and succeed in the international marketplace? How important
is this constraint, if so?

A: Write what obsesses you. If you're fascinated by your country's
myths and folklore, by its history and politics and culture, and want
to draw on that in your work, terrific. It may give you a slight
edge in the market, just because it's a nice change. But far more
important is that you write the stories that you love, that you feel
compelled to tell. If that happens to be an Arthurian romance, so be
it -- maybe you, Ms. Mehta, will be the next T.H. White.

Payal Dhar interview

2006-07-03T12:07:00.000-07:00

Payal Dhar's first novel, A Shadow in Eternity, a young adult fantasy novel, was recently published by Young Zubaan

Q: You recently published a fantasy novel aimed at children/young adults.
How has the experience been? Do you think there's a market for
speculative fiction already, or is it a potential market?
--
Ans: There is already a thriving market for fantasy. It's not just the Harry Potter phenomenon - fantasy has existed for decades, though Potter has now made it 'fashionable', for want of a better word. That, actually, is a double-edged sword really - with SFF flooding the market, it *is* a great time for the genre; but plenty doesn't ensure quality, and right now there is also a lot of ordinary work floating around.
--

Q: What are your primary influences? Are there any Indian ones?
--
Ans: I guess I am a fan of fantasy fiction - Terry Pratchett, Robert Jordan, Tamora Pierce, Jonathan Stroud, J.K. Rowling, Douglas Adams, and more. I'm not really sure how exactly the idea of creating a different, parallel reality first struck me; perhaps it was mainly the influence of Jordan's Wheel of Time series. Indian influences - well, no, I can't recall any.
--

Q: Stock question, but why fantasy?
--
Ans: I find it easier to do than "real life". It's my world and I get to play god - creating a world, making rules for it. It is fun, and that is my main motivation for writing.
--

Q: Have you tried to get your book published internationally (apologies
if this has already happened and I just haven't heard)? What has that
been like? Have international SF agents/publishers been receptive to
the concept of a South Asian writing genre fiction, traditionally a
Western preserve?
--
Ans: Haven't really interacted with international publishers or agents apart from the early days when I was sending my manuscripts to any publisher in any corner of the world who were willing to accept unsolicited material. But whether they were receptive to South Asians writing fantasy is not something I would be able to gauge. To be honest, I think I got turned down because my work just wasn't good enough. Though, of course, I wouldn't exactly expect them to say, "Sorry, we don't feel receptive to the concept of a South Asian writing genre fiction, so we can't publish your work!"
--

Q: When you're writing, do you feel any pressure to be distinctively
Indian in some way?
--
Ans: Nope.
--

Q: Do you feel SF/fantasy has a future in India? Why, either way?
--
Ans: While not assuming that I can speak for the reading masses, personally I see no reason why it should not have a future, seeing that it has a thriving present! I read a lot of fantasy and I know many people who do. We are always on the lookout for new books and authors, be they Indian or foreign. Good writing, believeable characters, a gripping storyline are all a reader really wants, and the SFF genre is no different from any other.
--

Q: Internationally, a lot of speculative fiction aimed at the age group
you're looking at ends up being part of a cross-media franchise – TV,
books, merchandise. There's no history of this in India, but do you
think it's possible eventually, or are the worlds of TV/film and books
in India too isolated for this to happen unless something fundamental
changes about the markets in question?
--
Ans: It will take some time for that to happen, I guess, and before that our idea of fiction for a younger audience needs to undergo a sea-change. Unfortunately, in India we are a bit too concerned about what children should read/watch, and not overly concerned at projecting a realistic world to them in a manner that they can understand. Also, for a lot of people, Indian books (for children) mean mythology or designer history. While that does have its place, there is nothing in the market to reflect the way society has changed, nothing that an Indian child can read and individually relate to, nothing that will help them understand the world around them.

I suppose what I'm trying to say in a roundabout way is that fiction for the younger age group has yet to come of age; cross-media franchising comes later down the line. Also, that the worlds of commercial/popular TV/film and books are too isolated from each other is a valid point. Comparatively few Indian books seem to get adapted as (commercial) films here. (And perhaps therein lies the answer to why Bollywood churns out trash with such reliable regularity...!!)
--

Q: In fiction aimed at adults, SF/fantasy tend to be seen as low-caste,
but in the world of children's publishing, the most popular books in
recent times always seem to contain speculative elements. Do you think
this is because children are seen to be more accepting of
non-identifiably-real-world situations, or because the childrens' book
market is now large enough for it to have its own rules – or is it
something different entirely?
--
Ans: I am not really sure about this as most fantasy readers I know are actually adults and most 'classical' fantasy authors write primarily for a mature audience. Witness Tolkien,Terry Brooks, David Eddings, Douglas Adams, Robert Jordan, Terry Pratchett, Stephen King, George R.R. Martin to name just a few. Some of these can, of course, be read across all ages - Robert Jordan and Terry Pratchett are widely read by teenagers as well as adults, just as it would be erroneous to call JK Rowling an exclusively children's author. But someone like George R.R. Martin is most definitely not meant for children, with his graphic descriptions of violence. Similarly for Stephen King (apart from one kids' book).

To call these authors low-caste, one would have to redefine the term!

Here, it is easy to confuse the nose-in-the-air literary critics and real readers. Literary analysts could well look down upon fantasy and science fiction as being non-reflective of real world society and situations. But fantasy has - and will continue to have - a dedicated following among its readers/fans of all ages, just as any other genre does. At the end of the day, the readers matter more.
--

Q: What sort of children's fantasy/SF would you like to see coming out of
India? And what do you think writers in the genre in this country
would do best to avoid?
--
Ans: Like I said before, good narration, memorable characters and an interesting story work for any genre. My biggest complaint with Indian authors writing for children is that they have a particular idea of what children *should* read and not what they *want* to read or even need to read. As a result, we get a very sanitised depiction of the world, glossing over whatever is uncomfortable. I'd like to see that change. I'd like to see a Jacqueline Wilson or Judy Blume come out of India.

Then again, there is a lot of very good fiction available for children, even if it is not by Indian authors. Having been a wierd and withdrawn kid (and now adult!) who spends most waking hours reading, I know that anyone (children as well as grown-ups) who wants a good read just goes and gets a book that sounds interesting. They don't say, "I will only read something by an Indian author." On the other hand, what does sometimes matter is, you don't find anything to identify with - your self, your surroundings, your society. It isn't a crippling disadvantage, though, and doesn't spoil the fun of reading, which is the main thing.
--

Manjula Padmanabhan interview

2006-07-03T11:11:00.000-07:00

Manjula Padmanabhan is a writer, artist and cartoonist who writes, among various other things, speculative fiction for children and adults.

Q: As a writer who's done work across genres and across age groups and
who's been published outside India, could you compare publishers'
responses to your work? As in, how relatively difficult is it to get
SF for adults, or SF for children, published abroad?

A: I think most authors will agree with what I’m about to say – that there’s no general experience. Unless the author happens to be a “star”, in which case his/her experience is unique to a particular moment in time, each book that gets published struggles to find its way into readers’ hands and there’s no quick route around that struggle except by chance.
My assumption is that publishers will assess authors first as foreigners and second as genre-writers – I don’t know whether this is clear, so I’ll say it again differently: in the matter of getting published outside India, an Indian writer is likely to find that the first barrier has to do with ethnicity. The barrier of genre will not be considered until after the ethnicity-issue has been solved – and if it isn’t solved then, of course genre won’t matter. I say “my assumption” because it’s just a guess. I haven’t been told this or heard anyone say it.

Q: What can Indian spec-fic writers do to help their work get seen?

A: If anything, it would have to be at the level of Indians settled abroad clubbing together to publish their own work, for their own readers. If a big enough interest and market were created in that way, it would attract “mainstream” publishers, SF or otherwise.

Q: What themes/characters would you like to see explored in speculative
fiction from India? What do you think Indian SFF writers should avoid?
A few comics/graphic novel publishers are planning to hit
international bookshelves with South Asia related content in a big way
over the next few years. Of course their success will depend largely
on the quality of the books concerned, but at this time, do you think
it'll work a) abroad and b) in India? Are enough Indians interested in
either comics or speculative fiction?

A: Ummm. I don’t generally miss a particular type of literature if it isn’t already available. It’s an attitude I have in general – I don’t miss Indian food when it’s not easily available, for instance – I never make an effort to eat it in foreign cities. In a similar sort of way – yes, I know it’s not a great analogy, but it’s an easy one to relate to – I don’t miss seeing specific genre-literatures set in India or written by Indians.
Indian readers can be highly supportive in specialized instances – remember Amar Chitra Katha comics? They were a smash hit (I HATED ACK – but that’s besides the point). They were that era’s speculative fiction – as are all mythologies – of course there are some Indians who don’t acknowledge that the myths are fiction so I suppose there’s a problem with calling them that. I don’t know if there would be general public interest in non-mythological speculative fiction … I would tend to expect NOT – not for its own sake. If a piece of NMSF were to become highly visible and successful in the west, that would be different – it would then become acceptable and successful in India.

Q: Internationally, a lot of speculative fiction ends up being part of a
cross-media franchise – TV, books, merchandise. There's no history of
this in India, but do you think it's possible eventually, or are the
worlds of TV/film and books in India too isolated for this to happen
unless something fundamental changes about the markets in question? I
read that Harvest was made into a film - was it easier because
it was a play?

A: HARVEST was made into a film DESPITE being mildly SF. It wasn’t made as a commercial film, it had funding from the Ford Foundation and it wasn’t distributed widely. It would never have been filmed at all if not that Govind Nihalani is a film-maker who (a) enjoys taking risks and (b) is familiar with my work – if we had not been friends, I very much doubt that a film would have been made of the play. I don’t think it was of any consequence that it was already a script (i.e., that it was a play, rather than a novel) – and I believe that the primary reason it was possible to get funding for it was that the play had won a prize and therefore had already generated a little publicity for itself. On its own, with no prize, it would have been invisible in India. I knew at the time I wrote it that there would be no question of writing it for its own sake – I had no doubt that a play of its type would find no takers in India – and even after the publicity it got, the play has certainly not been popular in any form. It does not surprise me in the least. It presents a harsh view of reality and has very little comfort to offer the average reader.
Aside from mythology, SF isn’t a popular genre in Indian films (or hasn’t been, so far) so it would require a major shift in thinking for tie-ups to become the route to literary success.
In a lighter vein – perhaps there’s no need for SF in Indian cinema because regular commercial cinema is entirely fantasy-based anyway??

Q: Do you see any of your books heading filmwards?

A: No.

Q: We now have a fair number of Indian editors comfortable with editing
books that are aimed at Indian readers and not specifically at readers
abroad. But there are very few editors in India who are comfortable
reading SFF, let alone editing it. Do you think this will seriously
affect the quality of SFF novels coming out of India?

A: I’m sure you’re aware of the need for publishers to be thinking of sales before committing any manuscript to print – so I’m assuming that my answer to this question is already known to you – but yes, of course the fact that editors are biased against SF will affect the quality and quantity of SF coming out of India.
Publishers can’t afford to produce books that can’t be sold. It always surprises me when readers and writers alike (usually only young, as-yet-unpublished authors) seem to think that books get published as a result of editorial whims – instead of realizing that the commercial element in publishing very often takes precedence over literary concerns. It isn’t because editors don’t like SF that there isn’t much being published in India – it’s because publishers believe that readers WON’T SPEND THEIR MONEY on SF titles.

Q: Your favourite SF/fantasy writers, for adults and for children.

A: Without stopping to think about it much – JRR Tolkien, Edgar Rice-Burroughs, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Phillip K. Dick, Robert Heinlein, Kurt Vonnegut – but very many more whose names are refusing to spring to mind at this moment. I prefer short stories to long fiction and I used to read much more SF in my twenties than I do now, in my fifties. Dunno why. I think the golden age is over – perhaps because a lot of SF no longer seems adequately fictional any more. Even HARVEST – it’s hardly fiction – it’s almost yesterday’s news bite (which is why I referred to it as “mildly” SF, a couple of responses back).

Jeff VanderMeer interview

2006-07-03T10:05:00.000-07:00

Jeff VanderMeer is a multiple award-winning much-travelled American speculative fiction writer, author of spec-fic novels like Shriek and City of Saints and Madmen. He blogs at vanderworld.blogspot.com

Q: While acknowledging that spec-fic isn't monolithic and there are a
hundred different directions it's growing in at any time, what do you
feel are the most exciting fields of work in contemporary science
fiction and fantasy? What area would you like to see more work in? And
what do you think new writers should avoid?

A: I'm very much against advising new writers to do anything other than to follow their inspiration. What I would say is that we don't need more paint-by-numbers work in any area of the field. The more idiosyncratic and original, the better, wherever that might take you. As for what I find most exciting--I find the diversity the most exciting. The fact that exciting things are being done in almost every area of SF/F.

Q: Do you feel that practically speaking, writers from countries not
normally associated with spec-fic markets need to emphasize on their
own countries' myths/folklore in order to provide some kind of
diversity and succeed in the international marketplace?

A: What I don't like to see, frankly, is the colonization of other countries by the West, especially the US and the UK. It's not so much that they need to emphasize their own myths/folklore as to not put aside their own unique experience and way of looking at the world because they think they need to adopt an American/European model to succeed. What you don't want to do is lose your uniqueness.

That said, I also do not believe in any way that writers of one culture cannot use the folklore of another culture. This is, quite simply, silly. A writer's job is to lie effectively and to empathize and to find a way of making universal our human experience. There is no such thing as cultural appropriation when a writer does something well. All the rest is just bad writing.

Q: Given the importance of location and access to not only current work,
but also events like conventions, in the world of SFF publishing, is
it likely that for countries where evolved SFF markets don't exist,
it's the diaspora living in the West that will provide the push for
the birth that country's speculative fiction scene?

A: There's a difference between an artistic scene or movement and getting attention and publicity for that scene or movement. No one needs to rely on a diaspora to create original, innovative, and moving work. The important thing is to focus on the work and to create something powerful and important. Then, in the fullness of time, you make people come to you. This is increasingly true considering we live in an Internet age where everyone is just a click away.

That said, I think it is imperative that non-English speaking countries leverage the Internet by creating website for the fiction of their country, with translations into English. There's no avoiding the fact that English is the language that dominates the marketplace outside of Asia. But I do not believe you have to physically be in the US or UK to be successful. It may be harder, but it is possible. You just have to have people who are PR and market savvy in addition to people producing amazing work.

Q: In recent years, there's been a lot of talk about the New Weird, about
speculative fiction writers blurring genre borders. Given that South
Asia doesn''t have a history of much SFF publishing, or a growth curve
through magazines and anthologies as seen in more developed spec-fic
markets, do you think that the way ahead for South Asian SFF lies in
blending speculative fiction with literary traditions that are more
associated with South Asian writing? Is there any particular tradition of South
Asian writing/aspect of South Asian culture/myth/history that you'd
like to see married to speculative fiction?

A: New Weird was an affliction visited upon many of us involuntarily. Labels like that one are at this point simply a marketing tool. There's nothing about the art of writing the idea of "New Weird" and it connects writers who are otherwise quite different in an awkward way.

I'm not sure I'm qualified to answer the second part of your question. Most of my experience is with traditional Indian folklore--in traditional forms and through those marvelous Indian comic books I read as a kid. There's nothing better in terms of learning how to tell tales than reading those comics of traditional stories like the Ramayana. I loved that. I also very much like Hong Kong cinema. When I think about how I might use Asian influence, I think of combining the tropes of Hong Kong cinema with Indian folklore, except I might be a little reluctant in that case, despite what I said above, because it's not just a folklore, it's somebody's religion.

I also think of modern Asian writers from Japan, China, and South Asia who are creating a new reality for fiction based on experience in Asia, not the West. But, like I said, I'm not the best person to ask. I think influence and writing subject matter accretes naturally anyway--you can't tell someone what to write about.

Q: In your opinion, what are the most significant events in the world of
speculative fiction publishing over the last decade, and what would
they imply for the future?

A: The rise of the Internet as a legitimate publishing source is very important in terms of narrowing the geographical distance gap between writers and readers. The rise of Print On Demand publishing has huge implications, because if you hook up with the right system, you can gain access to and distribution in the West--and we in the West can gain better access to and distribution in the East. Why? Because more and more POD plants are being built in foreign countries. So, conceivably, one day you might publish a book as an independent publisher in, say, Mongolia, and have it instantly available on Amazon in the US--and printed in a US plant and sent to the customer.

Q: In your own work, you've kept away from high fantasy and written
about fantastic cities in a very local sense. What would you rather
see in speculative fiction from distant lands - the epic or the local?
Why?

A: Both, but not in the generic European or Medieval sense. In all fiction, I would like to see as much evidence of the writer's personal life and experience and milieu as possible--if that's what the writer wants to convey. I mean, there's nothing wrong with turning out generic stuff. You have to make a living and you have to enjoy what you write. But if you have a choice, don't turn away from those things that make you unique and will make your writing unique.

Anil Menon interview

2006-07-03T09:44:00.000-07:00

Anil Menon worked for about nine years in the software industry worrying about things like secure distributed databases. Then he shifted to a different kind of fiction. His short stories have been accepted for publication in magazines such as Albedo One, Chiaroscuro, Fusing Horizons, InterNova, Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, New Genre, and Strange Horizons as well as anthologies such as TEL: Stories, Time For Bedlam and From The Trenches. His story Standard Deviation was awarded an Honorable Mention in the Year's Best Fantasy and Horror (2005). He was nominated for the Carl Brandon Society's 2005 Parallax Prize for his story Archipelago. He is a 2004 Clarion West graduate. His edited volume, Frontiers of Evolutionary Computation (Kluwer Academic Publishers) was released in February, 2004.

Q: The SF publishing market is hugely different from the mainstream
literary one, with a wholly separate set of publishers and agents -
which means that if there's any glamour left to the whole 'Indian
writing' phenomenon, it doesn't apply in these markets. Besides, most
SFF writers currently breaking through abroad go through the short
stories in magazines/meeting people at conferences routine before they
managed to get signed up. You're on this track; how has the experience been?

A: It's been a lot easier than I had expected. In my case, Clarion West turned out to be the big break. I met a lot of writers and editors in the six week program, got a lot of tips, and my writing improved. But there was/is no secret handshake. I remember that Charles de Lint, who was one of our instructors in 2004, was so impressed with a student's story, he sent along a recommendation when she submitted it to Fantasy & Science Fiction. It still got rejected. It's almost a cliché that the key to good writing is rewriting. But equally important, a successful submission is usually a resubmission.

The SFF community is also very nurturing; remember, these people love the Other. Many of the writers were themselves fans once. They remember what's it like to stand on the other side of the glass. SFF has the same relationship to mainstream lit as rock b' roll has to the rest of music (but alas, minus the groupies). It's been a blast so far.
Q: Given that Indians don't have access to conferences abroad, do you
think that these inequalities are just things that Indian SFF writers
looking to get published internationally will just have to take in
their stride, or is there anything that they can do to help their work
get seen? How important is location as a factor in the future of Indian SFF?

A: Thanks for asking this question!

If it wanted to, Indian SFF could kick some major ass. Indians (South-Asians) are born storytellers. The earliest speculative fiction -- Jataka tales -- was home grown. We have the talent, we have the untold stories and we have an audience -- mostly young and mostly female -- sick of reading about cowboys in outer space. But we're like the elephant who doesn't realize its an elephant. So we politely wait for American or British editors to develop a taste for SFF with an Indian flavor. That's not going to happen any time soon.

But it doesn't matter. The way I see it, the future used to happen exclusively in the US. It doesn't any more. The focus has shifted. The future has been democratized. Look at what the Japanese did with Manga. Suddenly, Superman is a 60 year old dude with a weird penchant for wearing his underwear on the outside. We've as much a shot at manufacturing the future as do the Americans. And we can probably do it cheaper too.

What's to prevent us from building websites like Strange Horizons, which are entirely volunteer and donation driven? Why can't we start small print-on-demand publishing houses? In the US, there's a lot of resistance to publishing innovations, and for good reason: they could lose their shirts. But heck, we are already broke; what do *we* have to lose? Why can't we have our own Clarion India, conferences and awards?

I'm not saying that we shouldn't address western audiences. Of course we must. But sometimes it seems to me that we're like the dude who went sailing around the world when the pot of gold lay right in his backyard.

Um, sorry about the spittle.

Q: What themes/characters would you like to see explored in speculative
fiction from India? What do you think Indian SFF writers should avoid?

A: I can speak to the first question. I'd like to see a lot more stories set in south-east Asia. I believe places make a huge difference to the stories we tell. Vandana Singh's Delhi is a beautiful example. So is the late A. K. Ramanujan's retelling "A Story And A Song"; arguably, it's the best piece of flash fiction ever written. We're redolent in people and places, so why not make use of it?

South-Asians tend to see the world in context-sensitive terms. Take the ancients love of taxonomies. They thought of even love making as a kind of grammatical exercise. A. K. Ramanjuan has written some great essays on "the" south-Asian worldview. We don't quite know what the result will be if we really, really work Benares and Bangalore into modern spec fiction. I'd like to read and find out.

Q: Indians living abroad are beginning to make their mark felt in other
kinds of fiction than mainstream literary fiction today - chick-lit
being a prime example. Is there a significantly large number of
spec-fic writers among the diaspora?

A: In numbers, no. At least, judging from the conferences I've attended. But there's certainly a presence. My feeling is people are beginning to wake up.

Q: How have publishers and agents responded to the concept of an Indian
writing SFF? Is there an increased interest in non-Western SFF in a
saturated Western market, and is it beginning to show?

A: There's definitely a lot of interest. I've found my "Indian stories" move a lot faster than the "ethnically neutral" ones. What I find in most contemporary stories though is that the Indian-ness, if present, tends to be an exotic touch; a character may have an Indian name, but she/he could just as well be Irish-Eskimo.

Q: In recent years, there's been a lot of talk about the New Weird, about
speculative fiction writers blurring genre borders. Given that India
doesn't have a history of SFF publishing, or a growth curve through
magazines and anthologies as seen in more developed spec-fic markets,
do you think that the way ahead for South Asian SFF lies in blending
speculative fiction with literary traditions that are more associated
with South Asian writing? Is there any particular tradition of South
Asian writing that you'd like to see married to speculative fiction?

A: I think the literary tradition would kill South-Asian SFF. Mainstream lit in the English speaking world is dying. It's dying because it's stylized, experientially impoverished, full of self-conscious irony, and written for other writers, not readers. It's old-people lit. It's fiction with an intravenous drip. The kids are smart to stay away from it; they're all playing video games and reading manga.

I love the droll humor we find in our folktales. The Jataka tales are still funny (esp. the ACK comic versions drawn by Jeff Fowler). I'd like to see us work humor into spec fic, not just whimsy.

Q: Do you feel that practically speaking, writers from countries not
normally associated with spec-fic markets need to emphasize on their
own countries' myths/folklore in order to provide some kind of
diversity and succeed in the international marketplace?

A: No. It makes sense to use what one knows, but sometimes you gotta be stupid. Take Karl May, the German writer. He wrote stories, in German, about American cowboys. The cowboy movies of Sergio Leone were much influenced by May. Consequently, the baby-boomer's imago of the American cowboy comes from a German who'd only visited the US once, a few years before his death. There's a moral there somewhere.

Matthew Cheney interview

2006-07-03T09:37:00.000-07:00

Matthew Cheney is a writer, teacher, critic and prolific SFF blogger (The Mumpsimus)

Q: In your opinion, what are the most significant events in the world of
speculative fiction publishing over the last decade, and what would
they imply for the future?

A: Most of the things that affect the SF publishing world are parts of the
publishing world in general -- the conglomeration of major publishers
into only two or three giant corporations, the rise of online
booksellers for new and used books, the proliferation of new media for
accessing writing (ebooks, blogs, etc.).

In some ways, the rise of what gets called "New Weird" writing --
writing that mixes various genres, that has at least some sense of
literary style, etc. -- has been important in helping to broaden what SF
is generally available to readers -- the success of China Mieville's
work has opened up avenues for other writers whose work would, before
that, probably have been relegated to the small presses. That Jeff
VanderMeer's books are all being reprinted by major publishers across
the world is an example of that.

Q: One fallout of the spec-fic world becoming so vast, vibrant and
self-sustaining is this; the rest of the world is more left out than
ever.Writers working in SF and fantasy from India, say, find it even
harder to get their work read, because the SFF publishing market is
hugely different from the mainstream literary one, with a wholly
separate set of publishers and agents - which means that if there's
any glamour left to the whole 'Indian writing' phenomenon, with India
being the theme for major lit fairs like the Frankfurt Book Fair and
the London Book Fair, it doesn't apply in these markets. Besides, most
SFF writers currently breaking through abroad go through the short
stories in magazines/meeting people at conferences routine before they
managed to get signed up. Exactly how important are conferences in the
world of spec-fic? Given that Indians don't have access to conferences
abroad, do you think that these inequalities are just things that
Indian SFF writers looking to get published internationally will just
have to take in their stride, or is there anything that they can do to
help their work get seen?

A: All of this depends on how you define SF publishing. It's not
monolithic, and while yes there are specialty publishers and imprints,
there's plenty of overlap. What there may be less of is an overlap in
readers -- the demographic that reads Indian mainstream lit in the U.S.
is quite different from the demographic reading core science fiction.
I'm not particularly optimistic about the future of core science fiction
reading and publishing; it seems to me that most such science fiction is
nostalgic, conservative, and becoming a hardened genre rather than a
fluid idiom, which is what it was up until about the time of the
cyberpunks, who may have been such science fiction's last gasp. Such
science fiction functions much like western novels -- it continues to
have an audience, but is seldom more than a reshuffling of familiar
materials. When the materials are new, they make the work into
something other, and this other has more and more luck getting published
as mainstream fiction now than it does as genre fiction, where the
audiences are often less adventurous: they know what they want, and they
expect to get it, and it better be exactly like it was last time, or
they don't like it. (Of course, I'm generalizing wildly, but I think
it's important to counter some of the narrative you're creating.)

As for conventions, they're not nearly as important as they used to be.
They're fun sometimes, they're more than a bit ridiculous, and they're
pretty much just a chance for people with somewhat similar interests to
hang out and drink a lot. Oh, and give each other awards. We like to
give a lot of awards, because it makes us feel good, and gives us
something else to argue about. Conventions are useful for networking if
you already know some people, but they're not very useful if you don't
have some sort of "in". I didn't go to my first convention until I
already knew a bunch of writers.

The internet is probably the most useful tool for the aspiring writer,
if used well. It's hardly a meritocracy, but it's better than previous
avenues. More and more magazines accept electronic submissions,
particularly from writers from countries other than the one the magazine
is based in. Much information about editors and agents, what they do
and how to approach them, is available via the internet. More and more
readers find people with similar interests via message boards and
weblogs. Etc. SF is still very much U.S.-centered, but that center is
beginning to disperse more than it has in the past.

Q: In recent years, there's been a lot of talk about the New Weird, about
speculative fiction writers blurring genre borders. Given that India
doesn't have a history of SFF publishing, or a growth curve through
magazines and anthologies as seen in more developed spec-fic markets,
do you think that the way ahead for South Asian SFF lies in blending
speculative fiction with literary traditions that are more associated
with South Asian writing? Is there any particular tradition of South
Asian writing/aspect of South Asian culture/myth/history that you'd
like to see married to speculative fiction?

A: In terms of what will grow well in a country, it depends on what the
writers want to write and readers want to read. I think we're already
seeing some exhaustion in the SF field with the typical props and models
of writing, and so U.S. and British writers are looking elsewhere for
ideas. Also, we live in a world where it's much easier to encounter
people from outside our own countries, and to gain information about
places other than our own, and many readers hunger for it. Some of it
may just be the attraction of exoticism, but I think the success of
books like Tobias Buckell's "Crystal Rain", which mixes a variety of
influences in a traditional SF adventure story, or Ian MacDonald's
"River of Gods", which is more specifically Indian, bodes well for the
future, because such books show writers trying to bring an honest
sensibility about non-Western or post-colonial cultures into their work,
and to do so in as honest a way as possible.

Q: While acknowledging that spec-fic isn't monolithic and there are a
hundred different directions it's growing in at any time, what do you
feel are the most exciting fields of work in contemporary science
fiction and fantasy? What area would you like to see more work in? And
what do you think new writers should avoid?

A: I'd like to see more new work that is surprising. I don't have any
interest in reading books that are just like all the other books I've
read. New writers often want to be just like the writers who first
captured their imaginations, and so they write imitations, which is a
good way to learn some skills, but it's not what we should be paying
much attention to as readers and editors and critics. We've got Charles
Stross already, we don't not a bunch of mini-Strosses. We've got China
Mieville already, we don't need more. These are interesting writers
because they're not just like everybody else, but the danger of their
success is that suddenly 100 people start trying to write just like
them, and that's a dead end. Even Stross and Mieville shouldn't try to
write like themselves. (Self-imitation is a danger of success -- just
look at what happened to the quality of Isaac Asimov's work when in the
1980s he tried to imitate his old successes.) New writers should strive
for an original vision, for material that they can make theirs, and they
should do so with passion and vigor, writing the truth of the world as
they see it, striving all the while to be not merely entertaining (we've
got plenty of things to entertain us) but also something more -- and
there are a thousand somethings more to strive toward.

Q: Do you feel that practically speaking, writers from countries not
normally associated with spec-fic markets need to emphasize on their
own countries' myths/folklore in order to provide some kind of
diversity and succeed in the international marketplace?

A: Not necessarily. Sure, in the publishing world there's an expectation
for marketing reasons that someone who fits into some sort of national,
ethnic, racial, sexual, etc. category will write work that fits into
some general stereotype of what such a person should write, but I don't
think writers should concern themselves about that. Writers who try to
write for a market will probably write hollow, lifeless, imitative
stories. Writers need to write about what most concerns them, what
excites and infuriates them, what they can't not write. If they do
that, eventually they'll find an audience of some sort. If a writer
just wants to make a lot of money and reach a wide audience, they
shouldn't write books and short stories, they should get into movies and TV.

Q: Do you think there's any evidence of interest in Western markets for
speculative fiction from countries as alien to readers as other
planets?

A: Evidence? Sure -- look at the success of everything from Bruce
Sterling's "Islands in the Net" to Geoff Ryman's "Air". That most such
books have been written by Americans and Brits so far is unfortunate,
but I expect it will change soon. Maybe I'm just an optimist.

Jai Arjun Singh interview

2006-07-03T09:27:00.000-07:00

Jai Arjun Singh is a writer, critic, journalist and blogger (Jabberwock)

Q:Is there a market for speculative fiction already, or is it a potential market? Why do you think so, either way?

A: Five years ago I would have said purely potential market. Now it's probably a mix of both. SFF has acquired a cult following here in the past few years - thanks, among other things, to the increasing availability of graphic novels and fantasy literature, greater media willingness to talk about them, and the publication of your books.

But it's still very much a cult following and there's large potential market still. [I was flipping through V for Vendetta in office the other day. No fewer than five people - all of whom are fairly avid readers and frequently review fiction for Business Standard - had reactions ranging from honest perplexedness to avuncular indulgence when they came up to me and saw that I was reading a comic.]

Q: What sort of fantasy/SF in books and comics would you like to see
coming out of India? And what do you think writers in the genre in
this country would do best to avoid?

A: I wouldn't mind seeing some alternative histories, there's so much scope for those. What if Gandhi had lived past 1948, been actively involved in the politics of the first few years of independent India - and gradually morphed from this benevolent father figure into a regression-fascist, taking the country away from Nehru's vision of modernity. What if we'd lost the 71 War? What if Sanjay Gandhi had lived, gotten into coalition politics and built up a large enough base to impose a second, more potent Emergency? Lots of other possibilities.

And this will probably remain a fantasy in itself, but I'd like to see a lot more really explicit sex in Indian comics - pornographic versions of Amar Chitra Katha and what-not (there's so much potential in Indian mythology, why not use it). Speculative, conspiracy-theory writing along the lines that the real reason the Mahabharata War occurred was that Krishna had been secretly bonking the Kaurava women on the side. Obviously, that sort of thing can never really be published in this country but you get the idea...

Q: Internationally, a lot of speculative fiction ends up being part of a
cross-media franchise – TV, books, merchandise, films, comics. Is
there any history of this in India as far as you know, or are the
worlds of TV/film and books in India too isolated for this to happen
unless something fundamental changes about the markets in question?

A: Can't say with any authority. (Wasn't there a Shaktimaan comic book at some point? And of course there were those Amitabh Bachchan-as-Supremo comics.) I think it's possible for cross-media franchises to develop but for it to be done well enough to make an impact, it needs to be done by the right people; people who have a real understanding of the possibilities of the genre, and people who can work across media (you and Sarnath can make a start). Otherwise you'll have a situation where the impact of a really good SFF book/comic will be spoilt by the associations with a really crappy TV serial/film, or vice versa.

Q: In fiction aimed at adults, SF/fantasy tend to be seen as low-caste,
but in the world of children's publishing and comics, the most popular
books - the mainstream in these categories - always seem to contain
speculative elements. Do you think this is because children and comic
book readers are seen to be more accepting of
non-identifiably-real-world situations, or because tthese markets are
now large enough for it to have its own rules – or is it something
different entirely?

A: Well, I think it goes without saying that children by their very nature are more open-minded and receptive to fantastical elements than adults are. But I think the real reason is more basic and depressing: parents tend to think it's alright for kids of a certain age to indulge themselves with what is perceived as "meaningless fun" - and then, as they grow older, to read Serious Literature. That perception runs very deep and is probably responsible for the step-sisterly treatment given to fantasy for adults, and the schism between Children's Literature and Adult Literature.

Q: We now have a fair number of Indian editors comfortable with editing
books that are aimed at Indian readers and not specifically at readers
abroad. But there are very few editors in India who are comfortable
reading SFF, let alone editing it. Do you think this will seriously
affect the quality of SFF novels coming out of India?

A: Of course it will. However talented an author might be, you need an editor with enough experience, comfort and interest in the genre. Much as I enjoyed Simoqin and Manticore, I think both books could have been even better if you had as an editor someone who really knew the genre.

And of course genre-snobbery has absolutely no place in editorship.

Q: Indians living abroad are beginning to make their mark felt in other
kinds of fiction than mainstream literary fiction today - chick-lit
being a prime example. Do you think diaspora has an important role -
as writers and readers - to play if Indian SFF is to become
widespread and popular?

A: I don't think so. I think, in the initial stages at least, Indian SFF will have to include some references from the country's mythology and history (like you did in Simoqin) - or, if the SFF is dystopic, there will have to be an understanding of the ground realities in India. (I'm not saying this is necessarily what I'd like to see myself, just that it's what's required for a market to develop.) This will probably be best done by writers/illustrators who have spent a significant part of their lives in India.

Cheryl Morgan interview

2006-07-03T09:18:00.000-07:00

Cheryl Morgan is a writer, reviwer and blogger who runs the popular SFF-news/reviews site Emerald City

Q: Though this point of view comes from a country where there's very
little work in speculative fiction or comics going on, it seems to me
that while earlier there was much concern about speculative fiction
not being given enough respect in literary circles, or not being
considered serious enough, now the speculative fiction/comics fields
are so evolved that they've become separate worlds altogether, with
enough popularity and critical acclaim to set their own standards,
administer their own awards, and be content within themselves, while
obviously both drawing from and contributing to mainstream literary
fiction. Is this correct? If not, do people in the spec-fic world feel
any need for 'literary' validation?

A: It very much depends on the person. Some actively prefer being in a
ghetto. Others hanker after wider recognition. Certainly it is very
galling to see books like _Oryx & Crake_ (Margaret Atwood), _Cloud
Atlas_ (David Mitchell) and _Never Let Me Go_ (Kazuo Ishiguro) being
praised by mainstream critics and short-listed for literary awards
whereas books that are equally well written, but have "science
fiction" on the cover are dismissed as "crap".

On the other hand, there is some bleed-through taking place. For
example, Pan Macmillan have been marketing books like Jeff
VanderMeer's _Shriek_ and Hal Duncan's _Vellum_ as mainstream in the
UK. SF&F readers hear about them on the Internet so will buy them
anyway, and mainstream readers will buy them because they don't
appear on the "science fiction" shelves in the bookstores.

I should also note that how SF&F is perceived can vary widely between
different Western countries. The US has many universities that offer
courses in SF, the UK very few. My friend Kevin Standlee, who is
American, proudly puts the fact that he co-chaired a Worldcon (a
business with a $1 million turnover) on his resume. I would never
dare mention Emerald City in a job application in the UK because I'd
be immediately dismissed as an idiot. A number of UK fans have
expressed concern about online convention reports - they are worried
that if their employers find out they attend SF conventions they will
lose their jobs.

Q: In your opinion, what are the most significant events in the world of
speculative fiction publishing over the last decade, and what would
they imply for the future?

A: I don't think any specific events have had any great impact, but
there are two trends that I think are very important. The first is
the advent of the Internet, in particular of forums and blogs. SF&F
has always been a community-based field. For a long time this has
been through conventions, but now people are able to communicate on a
daily basis regardless of where they are in the world. The community
has expended considerably as a result.

The other major trend is the rise of small press publishers. The
major publishers, all of which are now multinational conglomerates,
are tending to focus more and more on best-sellers. That doesn't mean
no SF&F. They'll happily publish Neil Gaiman and George Martin and
anyone else who can sell in vast quantities. But they are less keen
on midlist writers and experimental works. Some of the best SF&F
being published today is coming out of small presses.

Q: One fallout of the spec-fic world becoming so vast, vibrant and
self-sustaining is this; the rest of the world is more left out than
ever. Writers working in SF and fantasy from India, say, find it even
harder to get their work read, because the SFF publishing market is
hugely different from the mainstream literary one, with a wholly
separate set of publishers and agents - which means that if there's
any glamour left to the whole 'Indian writing' phenomenon, with India
being the theme for major lit fairs like the Frankfurt Book Fair and
the London Book Fair, it doesn't apply in these markets. Besides, most
SFF writers currently breaking through abroad go through the short
stories in magazines/meeting people at conferences routine before they
managed to get signed up. Exactly how important are conferences in the
world of spec-fic? Given that Indians don't have access to conferences
abroad, do you think that these inequalities are just things that
Indian SFF writers looking to get published internationally will just
have to take in their stride, or is there anything that they can do to
help their work get seen?

A: One obvious tactic is to claim that you are writing "Magic Realism".
The mainstream critics in the West are really quite stupid and
arrogant. They'll accept a fairly large degree of fantastical writing
from anyone whose cultural background is non-Western. It is only
Western writers who are supposed to have "grown up" and stopped doing
that weird stuff.

Of course that doesn't help if you write SF, so here are some suggestions.

1. Get yourself a good Internet connection. Once you have that you
are part of the community.
2. Submit stories to Strange Horizons. If you get in there then you
will have fiction published in a well-respected venue that everyone
in the online world can see.
3. Submit to other fiction magazines. If your work is good they won't
care where you live.
4. Start your own blog or LiveJournal, and post comments to
well-known blogs to get your name known.

Having done all that you will find people saying "I wish you could
come to conventions so I could meet you", but actually you don't need
to because you are in touch with them on a daily basis anyway.

5. Play up the "cute foreigner" angle. Post photographs of your local
area in your blog. Talk about local tourist traps, or having monkeys
steal fruit from your garden, or whatever. Sure it can be demeaning,
but it will get you traffic.
6. Once you are starting to get well known, post a sample chapter or
two from one of your novels on your site. I know one or two people
who have sold books by doing this.

Get the idea? Basically the Internet is a great leveller of the
playing field. It still helps a lot if you live in London or New York
and can meet editors socially, but conventions are a lot less
important than they used to be.

Oh, and get more flights into India from the US. There is an academic
SF conference every year in India. Charles Brown and I are quite keen
to go, but it is very hard to get there from California.

Q: In recent years, there's been a lot of talk about the New Weird, about
speculative fiction writers blurring genre borders. Given that India
doesn't have a history of SFF publishing, or a growth curve through
magazines and anthologies as seen in more developed spec-fic markets,
do you think that the way ahead for South Asian SFF lies in blending
speculative fiction with literary traditions that are more associated
with South Asian writing? Is there any particular tradition of South
Asian writing that you'd like to see married to speculative fiction?

A: Editors are always looking for something new, so if you can blend
South Asian culture and traditions into your writing it will help get
it noticed. Ashok Banker has had some success with that. I'm afraid I
don't know enough about South Asian writing to answer the last
question, but I do think that we will see more and more SF books set
in "Third World" countries from now on. There's a general view that
the American Economic Empire is on the wane, and that "the future"
will happen in India, China, South America and Africa. Ian McDonald's
_River of Gods_ has been a huge success - you guys should build on that.

Q: While acknowledging that spec-fic isn't monolithic and there are a
hundred different directions it's growing in at any time, what do you
feel are the most exciting fields of work in contemporary science
fiction and fantasy? What area would you like to see more work in? And
what do you think new writers should avoid?

A: I don't like advising people to write in particular niches because it
can lead to you writing to a formula. You should decide what you are
good at writing first, and then look at where you should be marketing
yourself. As you say, there are many directions that SF&F writing is
taking. Most people should be able to find something that suits them.
The only bandwagon I'd suggest you jump on is the one created by
_River of Gods_.

Having said that, please, no more 10-volume fantasy trilogies. The
world doesn't need any more of those.

Q: Do you feel that practically speaking, writers from countries not
normally associated with spec-fic markets need to emphasize on their
own countries' myths/folklore in order to provide some kind of
diversity and succeed in the international marketplace?

A: Not necessarily. I think it helps, because it makes you stand out,
but if your writing is good enough then you will sell.

Remember that Zoran Zivkovic has been very successful despite writing
in Serbian and never leaving Belgrade. He just got a good translator
and submitted stories to places like Interzone, and Jeff VanderMeer's
_Leviathan_ anthologies. Now he's won a World Fantasy Award and the
small presses all love him. There's nothing particularly Serbian
about Zoran's writing, he is just talented and has worked hard.

Zoran Zivkovic interview

2006-07-03T09:09:00.000-07:00

Zoran Zivkovic is a World Fantasy Award-winning Serbian speculative fiction writer, essayist, publisher and translator

Q: Though this point of view comes from a country where there's very little work in speculative fiction or comics going on, it seems to me that while earlier there was much concern about speculative fiction not being given enough respect in literary circles, or not being considered serious enough, now the speculative fiction/comics fields are so evolved that they've become separate worlds altogether, with enough popularity and critical acclaim to set their own standards, administer their own awards, and be content within themselves, while obviously both drawing from and contributing to mainstream literary fiction. Is this correct? If not, do people in the spec-fic world feel any need for 'literary' validation?

A: Whatever they feel, the so-called "speculative fiction" (a very awkward term indeed) belongs to the great family of literature. Any attempt to ghettoized it will only result in its eventual disappearance. There is no other validation for a work of literature but literary.

Q: In your opinion, what are the most significant events in the world of speculative fiction publishing over the last decade, and what would they imply for the future?

A: Speculative fiction is sadly dominated by the publishing industry, with very few exceptions. As long as it is so, it will remain only "a product", not an art.

Q: One fallout of the spec-fic world becoming so vast, vibrant and self-sustaining is this; the rest of the world is more left out than ever. Writers working in SF and fantasy from India, say, find it even harder to get their work read, because the SFF publishing market is hugely different from the mainstream literary one, with a wholly separate set of publishers and agents—which means that if there's any glamour left to the whole 'Indian writing' phenomenon, with India being the theme for major lit fairs like the Frankfurt Book Fair and the London Book Fair, it doesn't apply in these markets. Besides, most SFF writers currently breaking through abroad go through the short stories in magazines/meeting people at conferences routine before they managed to get signed up. Exactly how important are conferences in the world of spec-fic? Given that Indians don't have access to conferences abroad, do you think that these inequalities are just things that Indian SFF writers looking to get published internationally will just have to take in their stride, or is there anything that they can do to help their work get seen?

A: I very rarely attended any conference, and yet I managed to be published throughout the world. So, they are not essential, although contacts with the rest of the world are crucial. But fortunately there is Internet...

Q: In recent years, there's been a lot of talk about the New Weird, about speculative fiction writers blurring genre borders. Given that India doesn't have a history of SFF publishing, or a growth curve through magazines and anthologies as seen in more developed spec-fic markets, do you think that the way ahead for South Asian SFF lies in blending speculative fiction with literary traditions that are more associated with South Asian writing? Is there any particular tradition of South Asian writing that you'd like to see married to speculative fiction?

A: I am not sure about this, but there is an imperative requirement if you want to find your proper place on the world literary map. You have to identify your own specific literary voice and make other people want to listen to it. Never imitate what's currently popular in other countries. An imitator never really achieves anything...

Q: While acknowledging that spec-fic isn't monolithic and there are a hundred different directions it's growing in at any time, what do you feel are the most exciting fields of work in contemporary science fiction and fantasy? What area would you like to see more work in? And what do you think new writers should avoid?

A: I was never interested in what's currently fashionable. Literary fashion is another obscure invention of the publishing industry. New writers should by all means try to avoid being identified as other writer's fans, although it's impossible to avoid various influences, of course.

Q: Do you feel that practically speaking, writers from countries not normally associated with spec-fic markets need to emphasize on their own countries' myths/folklore in order to provide some kind of diversity and succeed in the international marketplace?

A: I personally didn't rely at all on my country's myths/folklore, so I can't recommend that approach, although it's legitimate.

Sarnath Banerjee interview

2006-07-03T08:48:00.000-07:00

Sarnath Banerjee is a writer (first novel, Corridor, a graphic novel, Penguin India 2004), artist, and co-founder of Phantomville, a comics publishing house

Q: A common misconception in countries that haven't been exposed to good
comics is that people need less imagination to read comics than plain
text. Comment.

A: Development organisation and funding agencies clearly illustrates this vision, comics is for the challenged .

In preparing some of their advocacy materials they have turned their gaze upon comics, the new kid in the block.- a follow-up from the era of joyless puppetry and community radio. Now that these two sentinels of development communication are done to death, even by their standards, why not give comics a bash to inform middle India about enormous strides in the field of reproductive technology.

This is an error in Judgement, because comics requires a more complex (if not complicating) mode of reading. For example, the text and the image often run independent of each other, sometimes they even conflict or contradict the other, in some of the best of comics the text and the pictures are locked in some kind of creative tension, this I feel is very much the grammar of comics.

In comics the words and the pictures together create units of meanings that neither can by themselves. Then there is the gutter space that exists between panels, which is where the comics creator relies a great deal on the comprehension of the reader. In short the reader must participate in an active manner to read comics.

Therefore when someone says, "What do I read first, text or the image?" you know it is a lost case.

Having said that, I feel that comics have a great deal to contribute in the field of education. Comics can fit in a lot of complex ideas in a single page, it can create atmosphere and psychological states, a theme can be explored in all its facets and point of views. This is particularly relevant in discussing history, sociology, anthropology, natural sciences and emerging technologies, reproductive or otherwise.

Informed minds have to come together and collaborate creatively to get to this phase. "Let's do comics because it has simple funny pictures that will instruct simple people on simple principles of watershed management is merely one way of looking at things.

Q: There doesn't seem to be too much of a market for comics in India.
What do you think it'll take to change that?

A: Unfortunately, I feel we have to wait till it gets filtered down from the western, particularly the American market. As Phantomville, we are trying several approaches to sell a larger number of books without resorting to violence- multiple distributors, presentations in Universities, word of mouth, keeping the price of book embarrassingly low etc. yet the progress is very slow. In France the first print run of comics is 10,000 copies even for a beginner, in India 5,000 copies is the magic number, it means you are a bestseller.

This embodies the whole phenomenon of the book trade. India is an emerging power with a vast middle class, a growing consumer economy, but not for books. Whether comics or otherwise. However I am told that self-help and management books are doing well.

Q: It's strange that while speculative fiction (SF, fantasy, horror) is
marginalized in literary terms in mainstream literary circles abroad,
like most comics, within the field of comics 'mainstream' refers to
fiction that is broadly speculative (superheroes, etc) and literary
comics are the marginal ones. Why is this?

A: That is changing, historically comics reading population was quite narrow-minded, people could make an acute demographic profile of an average comic book reader. However that profile has changed already, at least in the west. It has become a cultural phenomenon since the last ten years, a lucky number of absolutely brilliant graphic novelists and a vacuumed in the reading market created this. Pundits says it is here to say, that is why the top three publishers in the world have developed their own graphic line, I am talking of Penguin, Random house and Gallimard. Other powerful words-only publishing houses have joined the band wagon. Corporations are putting money. The comics form is crossing over to Cinema and advertising. In short these are exciting times for comics.

Q: Tell me about Phantomville and its aims.

A: Mainstream publication houses work under many restrictions, one of which is the profit motive.

One Corridor is not going to change the outlook to comics. To build a comics culture in the country a lot of investments have to be made. Capital has to be spent on training and shaping comics illustrators, which is a specialised art. As you are aware that although there is no dearth of good writers is the country comics illustrators are almost insignificant. I know many talented writers including you, given an opportunity will want to do and have the capacity to do brilliant comics, but somehow are crippled by lack of visionary illustrators. In our endeavours, my partner Anindya Roy and myself have identified some brilliant visual storytellers namely Saurabh Singh and Partho Sengupta, there are more to be discovered. Our aim is to train them and publish their books.

In a royalty-oriented publishing house this is almost impossible to achieve, because the charges of a good illustrator is almost astronomical, and they tend to charge by panels. Under no circumstances would the book recover the money spent on creating it. These are the problems faced by my peers such as Rajesh Devraj, who conceived this idea of converting the Tamil cowboy, Quickgun Murugan, into comics, but couldn't justify the capital to be paid to the illustrators. I feel your trilogy has great possibility to crossover into comics, but who will support a project of that scale? These are questions that bother us. Where will the money come from? Which marketing department will accept a proposal like that? Etc.

Q: When creating your comics, do you feel any pressure to be
distinctively 'Indian' in some sense?

A: As a publisher, yes. We are commissioning only Indian writers at this point with plans to branch out to other writers from the subcontinent.

One of our illustrators Partho Sengupta brings in an illustrative style which is unmistakably Indian, almost classically so. However this approach of using familiar pictures is somewhat deceptive, because his storyboarding method is contemporary and it often reflects a deep understanding of cinematic techniques.

On the other hand, Saurabh Singh, who is working on a comics based in Kashmir, has an international style. His work has echoes of Joe Sacco (Palestine), but at the same time he is fiercely individualistic and an amazing craftsman. Apart from his strong line-work and colouring he has a very intuitive undertanding of page layout and rare feeling for the tone of the narrative. (Andy will provide you with the pix).

His book is published by Phantomville end of July.

As far as my work is concerned, thematically I don't feel pressured to be Indian, for example my next book, Barn Owl's wondrous Capers although based in 18th Century Calcutta borrows its narrative theme from the myth of Cartaphallus, the wandering Jew who is cursed to eternally roam the face of earth till Judgement Day.

Although the sensibilities by default are Indian, and the visual culture I lean upon is Indian, but it is not my thematic concern.

Q: What comics would you like to see coming out of India? And what
should Indian comics writers/artists avoid?

A: Although clearly it can't be avoided, speculatively there should be a five-year ban on any thing on Hanuman, for the sake of Hanuman. And while you are at it Mahabharata and Jatakas, only for five years. Let us explore some other stories. I feel these tales have done what cricket has done to hockey and what Bollywood has done to other cultural forms that could have come out of India.

Jaya Bhattacharji Interview

2006-07-03T07:50:00.000-07:00

Jaya Bhattacharji edits books for Zubaan, an imprint of Kali for Women. Young Zubaan is Zubaan's children's/young adult imprint. Jaya is also guest editor, children's and young adult literature, at The Book Review.

Q: You recently published a fantasy novel aimed at children/young adults. What was the crucial factor in deciding to publish this now? Is there a market for speculative fiction already, or is it a potential market?

A: During the World Book Fair, New Delhi 2006, Young Zubaan released A Shadow in Eternity. It was not a “crucial” decision, but I guess the time was right to publish something like this. By time, I mean that the market was ready to receive a book of this genre.
Pottermania has contributed a great deal to the surge in this form of writing. Given that the Rowling phenomena has been pivotal in encouraging reading, irrespective of the size of the book, I think, a lot of children’s writers, feel that since this is probably the genre that is selling, it is the one to emulate.
There certainly is a market in India for this kind of fiction. I am certainly all for any genre that encourages reading and releasing the imagination. But the Indian market has to evolve its own signature/stamp of fantasy fiction. We cannot rely totally on imitating fiction that is necessarily based on a Western/Christian tradition or of even trying to yoke the two systems together. A lot of the fantasy fiction that comes from the West is in the classic form of Good vs Evil; or in the Romance tradition of being on a Quest; or in search of the Holy Grail, whatever it may be; or reliance on Greek mythology. In India, we have a huge amount of influences to rely upon, which don’t necessarily encompass the idea of a quest or the Holy Grail. Sure, we do have a strong sense of Right and Wrong; Good vs Evil, but it is tempered by the cultural melting pot that we live in, where a lot of traditions are being intermingled. So, if fantasy has to emerge in India, it has to develop its own distinctive identity.
The other kind of fantasy could be good Science Fiction, but I am not sure whether we have a strong tradition in this, except for maybe in Bengali literature.

Q: Do you feel SF/fantasy (speculative fiction) has a future in India? Why, either way?

A: Well, personally speaking, I think speculative/imaginative/slipstream/fantastic/science-fiction or what-you-will-genre has huge potential in India. But, it has to be a story well told and not necessarily a mish mash of all that is to offer. Sure, it can be a genre that transports one into an imaginative world, but it has to be a world that is well created, detailed and to some extent logical. It may not be logic as we know it, but it is perfectly rational in the parallel world that is being created.

Q: Internationally, a lot of speculative fiction aimed at the age group you're looking at ends up being part of a cross-media franchise – TV, books, merchandise. There's no history of this in India, but do you think it's possible eventually, or are the worlds of TV/film and books in India too isolated for this to happen unless something fundamental changes about the markets in question?

A: I don’t think you should consider the marketing blitzkrieg surrounding some of the recent Hollywood blockbusters based upon books/comic characters like Harry Potter, Superman, Spideman, as being a model that needs to be emulated lock, stock and barrel in India. This cross-media franchise is marketing gimmickry and sure, to some extent brings in the money, but except for a few in India, I don’t think most people will be able to afford it even if the youngsters fall for it. There may not be any history of this, but there is only a very thin line between the film and the book world in India. It has seen some cross-pollination, but maybe not in the same way as is evident in the West. (Or in the East? I don’t know!)
Having said this, it maybe possible some way in the near future, but such a huge market control depends upon a great deal of accurate monitoring of IPR, and ensuring that there is no piracy of the products. At the moment, even if it were possible, financially speaking, to hire spin-doctors in India for a film based on a book or a good film rights agent to hawk a good book to a film-maker, it would prove near impossible to stem the leaks in the system. It is a very tough call to monitor cross-media franchise. It requires a lot of efficient and corruption free systems to be installed. Funnily enough, India may not have a history of cross-media franchise, but many of our garment sweatshops/factories in Coimbatore are mass producing “movie” franchise clothes for kids solely for the export market! And these are sold at the exclusive retail stores of movie giants like Disney, Time and Warner. Surprisingly poor imitations of these garments have not necessarily entered the local market in the numbers expected, so may be there is hope for cross-media franchise in the Indian future.
The only fundamental thing that has to change in both the industries, in order for such cross-media franchise to be viable is a close monitoring of the © and stemming the leaks in the piracy market. Also, the Indian market is not one, homogenised market as is noticed in most countries abroad. So, a marketing model that may have been adopted and at least cost applied across the country may not work in India. We are many markets in one, in terms of languages, communities, literature, regional characteristics and tastes. So, in order for cross-media franchise to be successful, it would require huge amounts of direct investment and I don’t think any publisher or film distributor or literary/film agency or even the creator/author would be willing to take such a risk!

Q: Do you get a large number of SF/fantasy submissions, given the overwhelming popularity of crossover/YA speculative fiction abroad?

A: Well strangely enough not too many. But the trickle that we get is talented. Yet, I have my reservations about it. Indian fantasy has to break its shackles from the West and really learn to come into its own, otherwise it is going to just generate a great deal of confusion in the young reader’s mind.

Q: In fiction aimed at adults, SF/fantasy tend to be seen as low-caste, but in the world of children's publishing, the most popular books in recent times always seem to contain speculative elements. Do you think this is because children are seen to be more accepting of non-identifiably-real-world situations, or because the children’s' book market is now large enough for it to have its own rules – or is it something different entirely?

A: Speculative fiction is such a convenient and oh, so modern a term for the plain and simple use of imagination in literature for children. The number of categories or kind of titles that this category subsumes is of those books that are very difficult to categorise in any other way. Also, this kind of fiction has existed from whenever literature began to be written down with the young reader in mind. It is not necessarily a recent fashion.
It is not a case of being low-caste, as SF/Fantasy has always had a steady following. It is just that it is now clearly visible as it has been dominating markets recently. Also visibility of this genre has to be linked to the access to information. Today, more and more of the children and young adults have a direct say in their reading tastes and to some extent have the purchasing power as well. So, it is not being mediated by the parent/educationist/teacher. There is direct marketing of books in schools. Spaces have opened for youngsters to hang out, like coffee shops which also have bookstores in them. There is also the Internet where it gives one access to blogs, author websites, online bookstores, reviews, fan fiction sites etc. Children/YA are better informed and to a large extent know what they want.
Children’s publishing has always accommodated a variety of genres, I believe it is the only place where one has the space to experiment and fine tune different genres. So, if you are interested in SF, then you have the freedom to explore the limits of technology, science, etc. Sure, this reader audience is far more discerning than an adult reader, but they can be equally critical and damning.
The book market for children is completely unpredictable, so the current flavour of the decade is fantasy as it has a reading public, hence sales. Given the huge investments required in children’s publishing, most publishers, authors, literary agents will want/ten to be conservative and capitalise on a winning formula rather than take a risk. It is pure economic sense to promote fantasy and hence, its noticeable dominance of the market.
Children and young adults are actually reading a wide-range of stuff. A visit to any local bookshop will confirm that. In fact, as I said earlier, there is a sense of inverted snobbery being noticed in the younger generation today of what and how much they have read. Interestingly enough, it is a greed/thirst for anything that can be read. They will devour anything but very honest in their opinions. Most of the time, it seems that their opinions are not necessarily formed by what is dominating the review pages of newspapers, but their gut feel. Hence, an extremely difficult market to gauge and monitor. It is quite unpredictable.

Q: What sort of children's fantasy/SF would you like to see coming out of India? And what do you think writers in the genre in this country would do best to avoid?

A: Fantasy for children in India, can be set in any context, time zone etc, but it has to be well written. In the sense, that there should be good, cohesive logic to the universe that is being created. There should be details of the environment and the people and certainly not a cacophony of voices, which really don’t do much for the characters. Each character should have a distinct voice. If different traditions are to be mixed (and frankly, I am all for experimentation in literature), then it has to be done cleverly, treated lightly and presented in an interesting manner. By clever, I mean that the author should not be “showing off” their immense reading and familiarity with these other traditions, but create multi-layers and echoes in the story, that will prompt the young reader to submerge, discover and be totally entranced by the new literary creation. At the end of the day, it has to be a GOOD STORY. Also, a story well told will live for a very long time to come and not necessarily be written and created with “a” single market, fixed in time. In fact, it will then be read for many generations to come.

World Cup XI, semis

2006-06-29T06:20:00.000-07:00

Just.

Buffon, Lahm, Terry, Cannavaro, Miguel, J. Cole, Zidane, Pirlo, Zambrotta, Klose, Robinho

Reserves: Ricardo, Ribery, Lennon, Torres, Odonkor

Manager: Klinsmann

World Cup XI, semis:

Buffon, Lahm, Terry, Cannavaro, Miguel, J. Cole, Zidane, Pirlo, Odonkor, Klose, Robinho

Reserves: Ricardo, Ribery, Lennon, Torres, Zambrotta

Manager: Hiddink

World Cup XI, quarters:

Ricardo, Lahm, Terry, Cannavaro, Miguel, J. Cole, Zidane, Zambrotta, Figo, Robinho, Klose

Reserves: Hilsop, Ribery, Lennon, Torres, Gattuso

Manager: Scolari

World Cup XI, pre-quarters:

Hilsop, Lahm, Terry, Cannavaro, Cafu, J. Cole, Riquelme, Kaka, Van Persie, Klose, Torres

Reserves: Kawaguchi, Ronaldinho, Robinho, Robben, Huth

Manager: Hiddink

If JKR can,,,

2006-06-28T04:41:00.000-07:00

HUGE revelation in this post.

At least TWO MAJOR CHARACTERS in my NEXT BOOK are going to DIE!!!!

Yeah.
Oh, but you knew that. Or dont care.
Fine. I'll go quietly.
Gah.

Da Vinci Code in five lines

2006-06-03T08:20:00.000-07:00

Paul Bettany: (subtitles) This movie is a giant conspiracy by the Church to make sure no one believes the book. This is why I must cut myself and show you my buttocks now. This sucks. They even cut my sex scene with Alfred Molina.

Tom Hanks: Oooh, stuff lights up when I look at it. This is because I fell down a well and met Jesus.

Audrey Tatou: My grandfather gets more action than I do, and this pisses me off. And if Hanks thinks he's getting into my Jesus-was-my-pa pants, he has another think coming. Gross. I dont care if it's in the book.

Ian McKellen: I'm having fun, but I keep reminding myself of the pizza guy in There's Something About Mary, which makes me giggle. Watch X3 instead. I dont giggle there at all. And Rebecca Romijn does hurt/betrayed much better than Tom Hanks and that butler chap, plus she's naked. Earl Grey?

Jean Reno: I feel used.

Know thyself

2006-06-02T06:06:00.000-07:00

Discover everyone you've met online, and yourself, at this wonderful site
Flame Warriors
Apologies if everyone's already seen it, and thanks to HB for telling me.

All you can say is 'Aaahhh!'

2006-05-23T10:43:00.000-07:00

Come On Friends, Join Me!

After the immortal classic that was If You Come Today, Will You Permit Me to Personally present another Rajkumar classic - Love Me or Hate me

Ani - for the link, Million Times Beating My Heart. Much gratitude. Everybody...Come On, Clap!

Now, bugger off, all of you. Malati Wants To Talk To Me Personally.

Ahem

2006-05-17T02:28:00.000-07:00

Will be reading this at the Metrospective event tomorrow. Jeet Thayil, Samrat Chowdhury and Vivek Narayanan will also be reading. So I guess I shouldn't have posted it today, but I had fun writing it, and coudn't resist. See you if you're there.

A Hymn to New Him
(by Samit Basu, with apologies to Alan Jay Lerner)

What on god’s green earth is metrosexuality,
Do modern men admit to lacking balls?
What could have repressed them?
What could have compressed them?
I cannot understand this thing at all.

Now we’re metrosexuals, that's all there is to that!
Our heads are full of flowers, style and spice!
We're nothing now but thinking-feeling, never-stealing,
even-keeling, no-glass-ceiling, single-dealing,
sex-appealing, self-healing nice guys!

(Willing lady) ____________, why can't a new man be more like a man?

(Hmm?)

Yes...
Why can't a new man be more like a man?
Men were so simple, so thoroughly square;
Eternally dirty, covered with hair;
Who, when you won, would never give your cheek a kiss.
Well, why can't a new man be like this?
Why does he have to have expensive hairstyles?
Why must he now learn how to use his head?
Why are mothers teaching their sons their styles?
Why don't boys grow up- well, like their fathers instead?
Why can't a new man take after a man?
Men were unpleasant, always ill-at-ease;
When you were with them, you did as you pleased.
Would you be slighted if they watched the television?

(Of course not!)

Would you be livid if they ignored the morning dew?

(Nonsense.)

Would you be offended by the occasional emission?

(Never.)

Well, why can't a new man be like you?
One man in a million might have cared a bit.
Now and then they knew their own defects;
Some, perhaps, when drunk would go and share a bit.
But by and large we were a marvelous sex!
Why can't a new man take after like a man?
Men were unfriendly, ill-natured, unkind.
Made sure their blood-flows never reached their minds

If they forgot to kiss your mummy, would you bellow?

(Of course not! )

If they were all unwaxed, would you fuss?

(Nonsense)

Would you cry unless they wore pink, red or yellow?

(Never)

Well, why can't a new man be like us?

(To nearest metrosexual)
You there, you're a metrosexual...
Why can't a new man be more like a man?
Men were so smelly, they’d burp and they’d fart.
They were never ever interested in art.
They'd bite you if you touched them on the bum.
Why can't a new man be that dumb?
Why is stinking something new men never do?
Why is scratching never even tried?
Working on their abs is all they ever do.
Why don't they work out the mess that's inside?
Why can't a new man behave like a man?
If I was a new man, so much in the news,
Full of sighs, wise thoughts, words and views;
Would I start hogging all the media attention?
And pretend my grandpa never lived in trees?
Would I shave body parts I shouldn’t even mention?
Well, why can't a new man be like me?

from the EVIL FORCES of...

2006-05-10T11:42:00.000-07:00

If there was ever a point of time in your life when Sunday mornings meant waiting through endless Rasna ads for He-Man to show up on DD, if you still remember all the words of the intro (I'm Adam, Prince of Eternia, defender of the secrets of Castle Greyskull..etc, etc) and if you made early forays into metrosexuality some time in the mid-80s by playing with the Leo-Mattel dolls (my favourite was Roboto, a gift from my aunt from Ireland - he had three detachable arm weapons, an axe, a gun and a claw, and his heart rotated in the middle of his transparent body), then you should definitely see this.
PS: Teela was hot

Update: Jai has a wonderful piece on He-man here, and thanks to his international lifestyle clearly had a better collection than I did (I wonder where those toys are now? In some loft in Calcutta...will look for them when I go home next) It's a shame, really, when I think how much joy those figures that Twisted For Power Punch!!! gave me, they really need to be given a new lease of life.

Thought bubble

2006-05-05T19:36:00.000-07:00

It's Free Comic Book Day.
Which is lovely, except that there arent't any comic book stores here.
Grah.

On Monarchy: HT

2006-05-05T17:23:00.000-07:00

God’s been saving the Queen, all right. Remarkably well-preserved at 80, the world’s best-known reigning monarch (the King of Pop has clearly abdicated) celebrated her birthday recently with much pomp and splendour. The media were warm and fuzzy as usual, reporting extensively on such thrilling moments as the Queen’s lunch with 99 ‘exact twins’, people born on the same day as her. The high point of the day was provided by one Mr. Bertie Huckleby who, rendered wobbly by the excitement of meeting his monarch, fell down the stairs leading to the Palace but rose again, like the phoenix, and partied on bravely, ultimately going home gushing in a wheelchair with plaster on his nose. Touching tributes to Her Royal Highness were also made by her son, Prince Charles Or Possibly George, who talks to plants and sings to seals, and grandsons William (notorious binge-drinker) and Harry (strip-club aficionado).

Elsewhere in the world, other royals are living it up as well. In Nepal, King Gyanendra was finally coerced into promising to give power back to the people, a transition which will hopefully happen without involving too much bloodshed. In Hyderabad, the last Nizam’s ex-Miss-Turkey ex-wife wants Rs. 21 crores and a few palaces as a decade-delayed divorce settlement. Monaco's Prince Albert (the human being, not the piercing device) recently went to the North Pole to spread awareness of global warming, which seems a bit confusing to me – he didn’t fall through the ice or anything, so shouldn’t he have gone a place that was, well, warm? In Spain and Denmark, they’re having babies, that time-honoured royal entertainment tradition, and a Japanese heir is also due in a few months courtesy Princess Kiko. Meanwhile, in Uganda, the world’s youngest monarch, King Oyo Nyimba Kadamba-Iguru, revealed recently that he hated being king and wished he could live the life of a normal 14-year-old. This is no doubt because he’s not in a position to have as much fun as Africa's sole remaining absolute monarch and biggest party boy King Mswati III of Swaziland, who last September selected his 13th wife from among thousands of bare-breasted dancing girls performing the annual Reed Dance ceremony, and previously removed the AIDS-discovering ban on under-18s having sex (to assuage his guilt, he fined himself a cow). Other royals haven’t been in the international news much – but no doubt they’ve been doing the royal thing in their respective countries, attending openings, marrying one another, having children and waving at people.

Which brings us to the somewhat relevant question – what on earth is the point? Monarchies have had their time. Now they’re just sad, ridiculous relics of a thankfully finished era. The dinosaurs are dead. Electricity has been around for a while. Smallpox is no more. Why do we still have monarchies?

The arguments for monarchies in previous millennia were as follows. They provided long-lasting, stable government. They actually had the power to kill you if you didn’t want to preserve them. Or they gave people something to look up to, some sort of national example – for example, British royals were either bland and dull, like British food, or entertaining in a slightly insane way, like British tabloids. None of these arguments hold any longer, at least in so-called ‘advanced’ nations where monarchs are symbolic heads of state and can’t really switch into full-time Evil Tyrant mode, or in other words, countries that cling on to monarchies through sheer inertia. The British monarchy has survived calls for abolition for four centuries by standing on two pillars: One, you have to have something to entertain the elderly with. Two, removing the monarchy would involve a lot of paperwork.

The only real achievement of the British monarchy in recent years has been this – they have proved, in Diana’s absence, that it’s possible for ugly people to be entertaining in this glamour-obsessed world, if they’re rich enough and have powerful ancestors. Sure, centuries ago, kings and queens were the only Page 3 people worth your time. Celebrities are, of course, what we all live for, and monarchs are born into celebrity. But most other celebrities have to do something to earn the fame and the attention. True, there are other people who are famous merely because they’re rich, which is very wrong – but we only have to look at the pretty ones, the young, anorexic ones with sex tapes and Chihuahuas, which is not so much of a problem. Why are royals worthy of our attention? Because their ancestors were better at killing large numbers of people than ours? That doesn’t make sense. Because they provide harmless entertainment? There are thousands of people to gape at if we so desire – talented, successful, brilliant, attractive people, as seen in newspapers, TV and the Internet every second of every single day. Because they’re uniformly weird and have circus freak value? Not always, and in any case one can just watch pro wrestling if one’s tastes run in that direction. Because of questions like ‘What would England be without the Queen?’ A lot richer, that’s what.

There can be only one explanation – deep down inside, we are an irretrievably silly species. Which is not such a bad thing to be. And we are also a nostalgic species, firm in our belief that the past was better, implacable in our denial of the fact that things were always bad. Keeping monarchies alive is our way of placating our ancient guilt for killing the dodo, the passenger pigeon and the VHS tape. But perhaps our preservation instincts could be used more fruitfully? If we want to save things that are unique and precious, perhaps we should save rainforests? Endangered animals? Non-celebrity human beings? But that’s unlikely to happen, and the reasons behind that are rather depressing. They don’t sell expensive products, except by dying. And they don’t make good TV. Monarchs, apparently, do.

Clarification

2006-05-04T23:58:00.000-07:00

The following passage appeared in a recent Tehelka story on Kaavya Vishwanathan.

Author Samit Basu rises to her defence, “If you wanted to steal from someone’s work, why would you pick obscure stuff?” The plot’s fairly original, but some paragraphs definitely seem a copy. Says he, “There are also speculations that maybe someone at the publishing house inserted these passages last minute! It could’ve also been an authorial breakdown, since she had to write the book in two months — there was a great deal of pressure. She’s really young and one can never really tell whether the copying was intentional or not.”

1) At no point did I defend KV's actions, so the 'rises to her defence' would seem, to put it mildly, incorrect. I told the Tehelka reporter it clearly looked like plagiarism, given the passages on the Net, and that while she should clearly be punished if she'd copied other writers' work, I felt sorry for her, because of a few reasons, mostly listed, and was waiting to see the rest of the story unfold - and was also in no position to say whether the copying was intentional or not, given that I hadn't read the books. The quote was taken, as far as I remember, after KV's apology. In any case, there was no question of defending Kaavya Vishwanathan, though I tried to balance the condemnation with a degree of sympathy, because the poor girl must be going through hell right now.

2)“If you wanted to steal from someone’s work, why would you pick obscure stuff?”
This makes no sense. But perhaps more importantly, I didnt say it. What I did say was I thought it was a shame that she'd chosen to copy such silly passages, and that if she really wanted to plagiarise, it was really stupid of her not to pick more obscure writers.

3) The speculations I spoke of related not to her publishers, but to the book packagers she was working with. Clearly the reporter wasnt aware of the distinction.

Anyway, the reason I'm even bothering to blog about this (I've been misquoted before, it's no big deal, and Tehelka is a nice paper, so I didnt write to anyone or anything, and there were no hard feelings) is that today I've discovered a Wall Street Journal article which misquotes from the misquoted Tehelka piece, and make things even sillier.

Says Salil Tripathi somewhere in the middle of this silly article, "More remarkably, Samit Basu, author of two fantasy novels published by Penguin India, has vigorously defended Ms. Viswanathan in the popular Tehelka newspaper, saying: "There are also speculations ... and one can never really tell whether the copying was intentional or not."

So now 'rises to her defence' has become 'vigorously defended' for no reason other than that it helps the author of the article reach the conclusion that "There's nothing wrong with a little national pride over a young star living out the Indian-American dream. But wouldn't it be nice if at least once in a while, the Indian media could admit it was wrong."

It would also be nice if ignorant commentators on the Indian media would stop indulging in lazy journalism.

"Last week, when her book was pulled from shelves on charges of plagiarism, some Indian commentators continued to defend Ms. Viswanathan." --says Mr Tripathi, while qisquoting misquotes that were taken well before her book was pulled from the shelves, when it was too early to say anything definite.

Perhaps Mr. Tripathi has heard of things like clarifications? Of actually getting off his ass and asking people direct questions, instead of reading late articles even later and then drawing silly conclusions? Perhaps he should learn that it's more important to get your facts straight than it is to throw together some sloppy assumptions to draw an incredibly sloppy conclusion and meet a deadline? Well, I don't really care whether Mr. Tripathi learns how to write articles for newspapers in his lifetime or not, but his unprofessionalism makes me look like an idiot in the Wall Street Journal, which is always something I can do without.

Gushfest #2

2006-04-30T18:06:00.000-07:00

Well, just spent another weekend with my nephew, so...

Will try not to do this every time I meet him.

Grah

2006-04-28T11:46:00.000-07:00

Misquoted. Annoyed.

All hail Rehan

2006-04-25T11:59:00.000-07:00

Cregiau crimes

2006-04-24T18:57:00.000-07:00

Fascists.

Books 1, Life 0

2006-04-24T02:01:00.000-07:00

Ruchir Joshi once told me that the biggest problem he had with writers who wrote their first books in their early twenties, or earlier, was that they'd seen nothing of life; how were they qualified to write? A very valid argument, despite the undeniable fact that I'm very unlikely to physically experience most of the things I write about no matter how old I get. In any case, now that I'm doing the all-out writing thing I have no life anyway, and I meet nothing except deadlines, so the whole living life thing is not happening - and all the people I know around my age who do have exciting lives obviously never have the time to write. Which means that having written your first book, you're kind of stuck in a no-life situation, which of course perpetuates the problem.
Anyway, I digress. At the time, I think I pointed out that while I did not live, I did read, and watch other people's lives, real or imaginary. Which meant that anything I wrote was likely to be inspired by books, films, TV, the media, friends, and voyeurism of other kinds - which is more or less exactly what happened. The problem there is, obviously, that your work ends up being a reflection of what you read, which lead me to discover my Golden Rule for Young Writers - if your own experiences interest no one except your family and friends, and you're taking stuff from other books, make sure your references are clear and obvious, because otherwise you might have to face situations like this. If references are inevitable, stick them in the reader's faces - your worst problem will merely be manic hate mail from not very bright people who think they're the only ones who spotted it, which is fun at the worst of times.
Having said that, looking at the extracts quoted in the article, it looks pretty bleak, and it's disappointing, given what a dream run Kaavya Vishwanathan seemed to be having. But who knows, maybe new information will surface that changes things. And there still was the very faint chance that it happened unconsciously. The Opal Mehta story should be a really interesting one to follow. What will happen to her? How will she fight this? What happens to her next book? What drama, what suspense. I need to go lie down.
And now I want half a million dollars. Quick.

Update: She says sorry, it was unintentional

Have loads of work to do

2006-04-22T22:40:00.000-07:00

Since morning, all I've gone is
a) finished Viriconium
b) played Reign of Chaos
c) discussed ex-classmates' sex lives online
d) read more Ellis
e) egosurfed friends - here's to you Momo, Ani, Antara, Stoob, Loony Toons, Sunay, Nilanjana, Bini, Broto
I love the Internet.
gah. will work now, I swear.

Why did the duck...

2006-04-22T22:09:00.000-07:00

...cross the road?
Thanks for the link, Ranajit

Thus spake Zarazigga

2006-04-20T08:31:00.000-07:00

Hearken, lowly mortals! Specifically, writer/aspiring-writer type lowly mortals in Calcutta! Thus spake the mighty Zig

Caferati is (finally!) getting an active local chapter going in Cal.
The details for the first first read-meet are up at
http://www.ryze.com/ed.a?eventid=27759.
The basics:
Sun Apr 23, 2006 3:30 pm
The Calcutta Punjab Club
21, Ballygunge Circular Road

The two people who are doing the hard work getting the group going are:
Anurag Mathur: anuragmathur@rediffmail.com, Anurag +919830983797;
Ravi Bagaria: +919339794884
Do get in touch with them or subscribe to
http://groups.google.com/group/Caferati-Calcutta which is the
newsgroup that will coordinate venues, locations, meet moderators and
suchlike for the city.

(Bashful, private types who'd rather not be physically present, but
would still like to network and workshop with writers in other parts
of the world are welcome to check out our online forum at Ryze,
http://bwc-network.ryze.com/ To join Ryze and Caferati, please go to
http://www.ryze.com/signup.php?r=0&networkname=bwc. )

For those who'd like to find out more, please see
http://www.caferati.com (and particularly
http://www.caferati.com/FAQs.htm). We also have a blog at
http://caferati.blogspot.com/

On moderation

2006-04-17T12:52:00.000-07:00

I'm not rejecting comments. The new template seems to be doing it on its own. And I don't know enough HTML to fix it. So when you have stuff to say, just mail me, yes?

Happy 1413

2006-04-15T08:38:00.000-07:00

Its not quite 1602, but its almost there.
Shubho nababorsho to you, if you're still hanging out at this sadly unfashionable corner of the blogosphere.
Look, I got my blog new clothes and everything.

On thinness-related disorders: Hindustan Times

2006-04-12T19:36:00.000-07:00

JK Rowling recently won more points among parents and children worldwide when she spoke out angrily on her website about the widespread idolization of ‘empty-headed, self-obsessed, emaciated clones’ with ‘oversized handbags and rat-sized dogs’ – no, not rival authors, but models and other celebrities with fake fast metabolisms and real eating disorders, the patron saints of a thinness-obsessed world. ‘Is ‘fat’ really the worst thing a human being can be?,’ Rowling asked. ‘Is ‘fat’ worse than ‘vindictive’, ‘jealous’, ‘shallow’, ‘vain’, ‘boring’ or ‘cruel’?’

I was a little taken aback by the question, because the most noticeably fat people in Rowling’s books – Harry Potter’s uncle Vernon and cousin Dudley – also deserve all the other epithets in that last sentence. But Harry Potter is, after all, fiction, and Rowling has her views on thinness and its discontents pretty well figured out in real life. ‘I'd rather they (her own children) were independent, interesting, idealistic, kind, opinionated, original, funny, a thousand things, before thin.’ she said. A meaningful and mind-improving statement; more power to Rowling, and more introspection for fashionable people with thinness-related disorders.
Speaking of which, an interesting thinness-related disorder has been making waves over the Indian airwaves over the last few days. It’s called the WMD, or Wardrobe Malfunction Disorder. Here are the facts: Carol Gracias loses her top at the Lakme Fashion Week, but recovers and gets on with her life. But instead of saying gracias, Carol, and getting on with their own lives, the media and the politicians leaped into the fray with alacrity, displaying an interest in exposed flesh usually associated with other sorts of sharks. Publicity stunt, they clamoured, and suddenly there was blood in the water. Yes, sure. The politicians and ‘social’ organizations shouting themselves hoarse weren’t seeking publicity at all. And as for the media, the scale on which the incident was covered had nothing to do with the fact that the woman whose clothes well off just happened to be beautiful, successful and well known in her field. No doubt they would have displayed equal virtuousness if an elderly male politician’s dhoti had slipped at a rally, making his manifesto clear to one and all.

Actually, come to think about it, they probably would. Clothes falling off is good viewing, across cultures, across times. But let’s get this straight. Fashion events, specially major fashion events like Fashion Weeks, don’t need any more publicity. There’s no way they could get any more publicity. Editors give fashion every square millimeter they possibly can, because pretty people in or out of pretty clothes make for pretty papers, which sell. If there was any way papers could give fashion more coverage and get away with not looking like idiots, they would. Who is this publicity stunt in aid of, then? Carol Gracias, who for years now will be known as the girl whose top fell off? Doubtful. The event, or Indian fashion in general, because it underlined the fact that they can’t put a flawless show or a flawless dress together, which will no doubt endear them greatly to the international buyers for whose eyes this whole extravaganza is trotted out? Still doubtful. The only person who actually wanted more publicity from the whole thing was designer Benu Sehgal, who I read hung up the offending dress at her stall, which was the equivalent of saying ‘Look, ma! I’m a designer, but I can’t make a dress that stays on in public!’ And that’s just plain weird.

But even weirder is the much-abused term Wardrobe Malfunction. Journalists, beware! Are you aware that when you blithely include this phrase in your articles you are paying homage to the atrocious boy-band N-Sync, whose former lead singer made the phrase famous? Yes, it might be the Global Language Monitor’s most influential Hollywood-inspired phrase of 2004, but it’s the silliest euphemism in the world when it’s not used tongue-in-cheek, and so articles on how the Maharashtra CM has ordered an inquiry into the growing threat of the all-destroying social evil of Wardrobe Malfunctions look even sillier than they are. And, face it, these are stories that don’t need any help looking silly. Is this what our police need to spend time on? Should a special police taskforce be set up to investigate clothes falling off all over the nation? More importantly, what qualifications does one require to apply to be a part of this crack team? Because I’d like to apply.

Wait, actually, I wouldn’t. Because it’s potentially embarrassing. What on earth do you inquire about someone’s clothes falling off?

Detective: Did you drop your clothes on purpose? Carol Gracias: No. Detective. Damn. I see you are a tough nut to crack. All right, then. Who made you drop your clothes? Carol: No one. Detective: So why did you do it? Carol: I didn’t do it. Watch the bloody footage. My top unfastened accidentally. I picked my top up and walked on. Detective: Accidentally? Ha! I believe there are no accidents. Carol: That’s your problem. My top fell on its own, and no one alive was responsible for it. Detective: Are you suggesting that an evil, malignant supernatural entity, as seen in Bhoot and other such movies, unfastened your top? Carol: No. Detective: Then what caused your top to fall? Carol: It’s called gravity, you blithering idiot.

Perhaps its time we all realized that the situation lacks gravity in every other sense, picked up our own tops and walked on. Because if we don’t, we stand to be in danger of succumbing to another thinness-related disorder – the most thin-skinned among us are likely to also be the most fat-headed.

Man from U.N.C.L.E

2006-04-12T08:31:00.000-07:00

I now have a nephew. He is pink, squealy and called Rehan. He looks far less like Winston Churchill than most babies. He also has quite an evolved sense of humour - for example, after soiling his first diaper, he waited patiently till it had been removed before peeing on everyone around him.
My sister is the new Queen of Labour. Apparently she joked bravely throughout,and has got offers to star in pregnancy workshop videos. Paul is now wearing a Proud Father look in the midst of such tribulations as my mother and me campaigning to name the baby Poltu (as in, Paul II), and is secretly planning to force mother and child (who weighs in at 3.5 kgs, a natural heavyweight) to join gyms tomorrow and eventually star in workout videos.
On the day of my birth, an elderly aunt had grabbed my sister in a paroxysm of joy (or an assassination attempt) and banged her head hard against a wall. This time, we took the precaution of not informing any elderly aunts until it was too late to do any headbanging. Though there was no subsequent lack of madness on the great-aunt front, with people calling us back to ask if we had heard the news.
In a fit of avuncular joy, and as a tribute to changed lives, moving forward, families, the month Rehan was almost born in and the office where the parents met, I will now go watch March of the Penguins.

Feeling Loki?

2006-03-29T18:07:00.000-08:00

The ancient Vikings used to play this game, in between sailing and skullduggery. Now you can too. Hnefatafl online

On sporting injuries: HT

2006-03-27T18:46:00.000-08:00

As soon as the news of Sachin Tendulkar’s shoulder injury hit the airwaves, I got a phone call from a friend, an ardent cricket fan and conspiracy theorist. ‘It’s all a conspiracy,’ he declared, predictably. ‘It’s because they booed him in Bombay. There’s no injury. This is some image consultant’s doing. He needs to lie low, let the Indian team lose matches and return at some point when no one’s questioning his place in the team.’ I pointed out that Tendulkar had hit many lean patches over the the last decade and a half; that someone of his stature would never fake an injury, or need to. ‘Rubbish!’ he exclaimed. ‘Everyone’s faking injuries. Shoaib did it. Ganguly did it.’ I pointed out this was all conjecture, and that since he was a person who thought all cricket matches were rigged but professional wrestling shows weren’t, his opinion was of no consequence whatsoever.
At this point, if it isn’t clear enough, let me state for the record that I do not think Tendulkar is faking his injury, and am hoping desperately he will get his shoulder fixed and return to his usual magnificent form soon and silence his critics yet again. Because if he doesn’t, some lame-brained selector might decide to drop him, and that would be a sad day indeed.
Besides, if Tendulkar needed an excuse for bad form, he needn’t have gone through the complicated process of faking an injury. The annals of sports history are full of glittering examples of outrageous excuses used to justify failures in every possible sport – and an adoring public are often willing to believe anything their idols tell them. The BBC and the Observer both have lists of the world’s worst sporting excuses, ranging from the Sri Lankan cricket team’s innovative explanation of their loss to Pakistan in the 2001 ICC Champion’s Trophy (their clothes were too tight. 'We had to add extensions to the trousers and the shirts looked more like tight-fitting women's blouses,’ – Sanath Jayasuriya) to Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson’s range of excuses for his team’s losses (not enough penalty time, players couldn’t identify teammates because they were dressed in grey, too much rugby played on the same pitch, biased referees, too many international fixtures). And there are some truly bizarre ones – Carol Gaudie, an Australian netball player tested positive for testosterone in 2002 and claimed her drink was spiked at a nightclub, presumably by someone who thought she was too womanly. And Shane Warne, who claimed his mother had fed him Moduretic to make him look thinner on TV, a noble effort which got him a year-long ban. F1 legend Nigel Mansell once stopped on the last lap of the Canadian GP and lost his lead, because he shut down the ignition while waving to fans on the home stretch. His excuse? The car was too small.
The Athens Olympics were a particularly epic period for self-excusing heroes. The Finnish finished nowhere, for a variety of reasons – a javelin thrower was surprised at the size of the stadium, a 5000m runner was traumatized by an unfamiliar masseuse and a sailor had a malevolent bag stuck in her boat. The same Olympics saw award-winning excuses from a nation whose citizens are internationally renowned masters in the fine art of buck-passing – India. The hockey team complained of bad umpiring, Karnam Malleswari had a last-minute back pain problem, Anju Bobby George found the air in Greece polluted and nausea-inducing after the clean skies of her home nation, markswoman Anjali Bhagwat had stiff muscles, middle-distance runner KM Binu put the wrong spikes on and crack shot Suma Shirur cracked up because she was flabbergasted by the scale of the event she was participating in. I wonder what our nation’s weightlifters will say caused their positive drug tests in the current Commonwealth Games – I just hope they’re not too doped out to think of something.
But the Oscar for Best Supporting Excuse goes, without question, to Zambian tennis player Lighton Ndefwayl, who explained his loss to compatriot Musumba Bwayla in 1992 thus: 'Bwayla is a stupid man and a hopeless player. He has a huge nose and is cross-eyed. Girls hate him. He beat me because my jockstrap was too tight and because when he serves he farts, and that made me lose my concentration, for which I am famous throughout Zambia.'
That said, at this point Tendulkar needs no excuses, because by and large the nation, Lata Mangeshkar downwards, is behind him loudly and enthusiastically and he has no shortage of shoulders to lean on. Every time he racks up an injury, and he has a fairly impressive collection by now, a billion people feel his pain. Which is a luxury sports stars enjoy – there’s often a genuinely tangible reason for their shortcomings. No other profession is as conducive to forgiveness and forgetfulness – yes, politicians come up with many more feeble excuses than sportspeople do, but no one likes politicians or expects them to perform or tell the truth in any case. But take, for example, people in creative fields – a writer can’t blame an aching index finger for a terrible book and is left with unconvincing things like ‘It doesn’t matter whether my last novel sucked, because the novel is dead.’ Actors can’t blame lactic acid accumulation in their facial muscles for wooden performances and have to take refuge in the relatively weak ‘I couldn’t concentrate because I was busy killing endangered animals/calling press conferences/avoiding sting operations/dancing at criminals’ weddings.’ No one feels any sympathy for doctors, lawyers, businessmen and teachers with nagging rotator cuff injuries. It’s so unfair.
On the other hand, the rest of us might not have easy-to-understand-and-sympathize-with explanations for our failures, but we don’t have a billion people breathing down our necks, analyzing our every step, mimicking our voice and walk, bitching about the lack of our productivity and the lavishness of our product endorsements (possibly because we don’t have product endorsements, but that’s not the point), predicting our downfall, doom and destruction all the time either. Sachin might not be interested in retirement, but the rest of us are. In his retirement, that is. Which can’t be pleasant for him, to say the least. But even his harshest critic must recognize that if there’s anyone capable of coming back and stunning us all, it’s Tendulkar. And I’m sure not even the batsman padding up to take his place in the side wants to see an Indian cricket team sans Sachin just yet.

Quoth the Griffin

2006-03-24T08:27:00.000-08:00

PG: Gah.
Me: Do not gah.
PG: When you've got to gah, you've got to gah.

Chaos Theory: Hindustan Times

2006-03-19T22:51:00.000-08:00

Last week, Neil Clark, curator of paleontology at the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow, put forward a startling theory to the British press – that the Loch Ness monster, best loved and most merchandised of all the world’s mysterious monsters, was actually a submerged, bathing Indian circus elephant, a performer from Bertram Mills’ travelling circus, which was touring the area when Nessie was first sighted in the early 30s.

Needless to say, this was an extremely unpopular claim, and scientists, monster-hunters and romantics all over the world have rubbished it, citing the evidence of various sightings to prove Nessie’s continued existence. And you have to feel a degree of sympathy for people who believe in the Loch Ness monster. Not just because it’s an important source of tourist revenue, but because people need mysteries and myths to survive – if nothing is unexplained, nothing is greater than we are, then the world becomes a much less wonderful place.

Over the last few weeks, those of us with no lives, too much time on our hands or simply overcome by our love for glamour have been glued to our television sets, watching in vicarious exultation as film fraternities in the West and at home have been handing out awards to their favourite children. Oscars, Baftas, Golden Globes, Filmfares, Zee Cines and various other statuettes of various shapes in various degrees of nudity have been presented by gushing presenters to overwhelmed, overdressed winners. But if you watched this year’s Oscars, you must have noticed, as I did, that amidst all the trophies and tuxedos, one thing was missing – larger-than life, magnificent movie stars. Sure, they were present, but they weren’t competing. The people in the running for awards were, of course, famous, wonderful actors, but consider the nominees for Best Actor – not a single huge star (box-office appeal, critical acclaim, huge paycheck, awe-inspiring persona) among them. The Hollywood matinee idol seems to be an awe-inspiring beast of the past – from T-Rexes Erroll Flynn, Clark Gable and Marlene Dietrich to pale, washed-out mastodons Tom Hanks, Russell Crowe and Julia Roberts, the stars have had their time. And it’s not just the star-gazers who think so - Christopher Lee, Hollywood’s most bankable actor, recently called the new generation of stars ‘disposable pretty faces’. The mighty have fallen. But they haven’t fallen everywhere.

Consider Bollywood. If you’ve watched any of the glittering, garrulous Indian awards shows over the last month, you will have realized that Hollywood may have better, more expensive movies, better actors, better technicians, and even better award shows, but there’s one vital ingredient of big-time cinema Hollywood has lost, and Bollywood retains in spades – stars. Old-world glamour. Movie magic.

Of course, larger-than-life Hollywood actors still exist. But they’re overexposed to the point of exhaustion, their lives and failures laid bare by pesky paparazzi. They’re not stars any more – they’re just celebrities, and an eager public knows all about their underwear, their drug problems and their grandmothers. They spend their whole lives on camera, and have reached a stage where they’re acting all the time. Tom Cruise has to jump up and down on talk show couches to sell his films. And in the process, they’ve been completely demystified – they’re now down there at the level of socialites, ordinary billionaires, sports champs and (shudder) reality TV contestants. In sharp contrast, the big players in Bollywood manage to keep the media right where they want them, fawning on them and eating out of their occasionally generous hands in furious fan-frenzy. They keep their audiences at a distance, and in doing so, make it possible for their fans to raise them on a pedestal. And in doing so, they maintain their golden auras while Western stars give in to smog. At this point, there’s no Hollywood actor who has the kind of slavish following within and outside the industry that Amitabh Bachchan commands. And a sympathetic media make it possible for Shah Rukh and Aamir Khan to do and say things pretty much as they please.

Looking for stars in Bollywood? We have a galaxy – you can’t throw popcorn in Bombay without hitting a star. There are stars you’ve seen grow up, stars you’ve never heard of, stars you’re still trying to forget cavorting on that giant stage at awards shows with 40 other, equally perfectly sculpted bodies cavorting right along. You don’t need to have won an award, or had a single successful film, or have the right family, or even have the ability to act to be a star. You just need to be a part of that magical fraternity, that occasionally-talented, ever-smiling, navel-baring, navel-gazing fraternity of twice-blessed tinseltown. You will be worshipped, screamed at, superbly paid – and the best part of it all is, once you’ve made the cut, you can make flop after flop, throw tantrum after tantrum, but as long as your face is up there on the posters, the audience’s love is unconditional. Of course, just like in the hospitality industry, there’s a hierarchy of stars, from the groan-inducing Emraan Hashmi who, like Texas, is a lone-star state, to the seven-star Big B, who’s reduced the whole industry to a point where it’s All About Loving The Big Daddy, but they’re all there somewhere, twinkling away merrily.

But the days of Bollywood stars might be numbered too. Because we’re seeing far too much of them, both in flesh-inches and frequency, in the media every day. And the same sort of celebrity-culture marketing that brought stars crashing down in Hollywood is slowly creeping in here as well – personal relationships used to publicize movies, an endless stream of pointless information about the most minute details of our stars’ lives, and the slow process of celebrity democratization and demystification where every music-contest winner and designer of the day competes with the marquee-monarchs for eyeballs. In a sense, of course, too much information is a good thing – it keeps stars from turning completely megalomaniacal, and will ensure fewer Salman Khans in the years to come (thus saving lives both human and animal), but in the process something is lost – the element of mystery and magic which cinema used to have, where big-screen stars were demigods, role models, icons, when heroes were remote, unapproachable, and (possibly therefore) ultimately heroic.

I still is

2006-03-19T22:31:00.000-08:00

Thanks everyone who asked - yes, I am alive, well, still at large in Delhi. Trying very hard to meet a suddenly staggering workload, which is very difficult if you've done no work in the last three months. But the HT column should be back soon, have short stories to write for about five anthologies, am way behind on the Sarai project, and yes, I havent forgotten, I have a book to write.
But the good news is that I've just been commissioned to write a graphic novel series, which is something I've always wanted to do. Am trying to focus on that aspect of things, not the more work angle.
Life has been uniformly entertaining. Sarnath's left for Germany, where he is living in a casle surrounded by forests, attending opera classes and pretending to write, Broto is back from his honeymoon, and has lost 6 kgs, the shameless pig, one can only wonder how much weight his wife has lost. Stoob has been picked up by the police for the 18th time. We're moving house in a couple of weeks. Holi was magenta and blurry. Had Kettle Chips (Salsa with Mesquite) (sp?) again (massive London nostalgia trip happened. Saw Sherpa again, leaping from roof to roof. The sister was visited (she has baby 1 next month) and glamorous women have been passing by.
Things are ok, actually.
Wont promise to blog regularly, but will sidle in and blog whenever I can.
It feels nice, blogging. I'd almost forgotten.

Sprang the trappist

2006-02-23T01:16:00.000-08:00

Yes, I know, prolonged silence yet again. In Cal now, have been for the last five days, leaving for Delhi in a couple of hours. Broto got married. So did Debanjana. Was there with video camera to capture key moments. Much fun. Might be moving to Bangalore in a few days.
Yeah. More later.

Bufo Biffers

2006-02-09T18:17:00.000-08:00

If youve got nothing better to do, and chances are you havent, go and read about Raj Comics' Fighter Toads (Foursome Mutant Mob)

Day of the Girl

2006-02-09T18:04:00.000-08:00

If you're in Bombay, don't forget to go for the launch of Sonia Faleiro's The Girl, at 630 pm, Oxford Bookstore, Churchgate.There's a reading with Gregory David Roberts.
Read more about The Girl here. And there's an extract online here.

Judge rules

2006-02-01T20:09:00.001-08:00

Am on the jury for the Oxford e-author contest. And the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival Flash Fiction contest.
Do write. I don't think they'll give me a big placard with 'JUDGE' written on it as they did for the HT City fest (I got to tell Leila Seth that evening, with great glee, that I had now joined the ranks of judge-authors) but it should be fun.

Return of service

2006-02-01T18:24:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I havent blogged for ages. Been travelling, been ill, been staring at blank screens and so on. Also been reading a fair bit - finally did Transmetropolitan, Alan Moore's Swamp thing, a few others. Still waiting - for big work breaks, life-alterting phone calls, genies in bottles and so on. The unread Bloglines links pile up, as do emails and deadlines. Getting back in is never really fun.
A few links, since I have nothing particularly fun to say -
"The world is not against you. It's indifferent." - Vikram Seth.
Reading lists for kids
GreatBong on the Calcutta Book Fair
Will try to blog regularly now. promise.

The Manticore's Secret: TimeOut Mumbai review

2006-01-23T19:59:00.000-08:00

by Rahul Srivastava

The equel to India's first science fiction and fantasy thriller, The Simoqin Prophecies, works remarkably well. Here is Samit Basu again, wildly imaginative and totally in control. This time he frequently allows his cinematic eye to take centre-stage, creating some mesmerising scenes that punctuate the racy narrative - rich descriptions of forested landscapes, ethereal journeys in the sky and a breathtaking climax in the form of a deadly duel in a ruined temple that is actually a portal to another world.
The delicate coalition between Vamans and Humans in threatened by the dramatic, Matrix-inspired entry of three Ravians, representatives of a superior, purity-obsessed race with a dark plan for dominating the entire galaxy. Kirin, Asvin and Maya, all vulnerable, cantankerous heroes of sorts, try to sabotage this plan even as they remain unaware of its dangerous details.
There are twists and turns fuelled by unexpected bouts of self-doubt and astonishing betrayals. A host of characters and creatures inhabit this magical world but the star is undoubtedly the couplet-spouting, rhyme-obsessed, half-man, half-lion Manticore himself.
In spite of all its charmingly reckless and seriousness-denying humour, this is also a novel guided by a sharp and informed vision of history. Basu writes as much with an eye on thrills as with an awareness of the many dimensions of his characters. He resolutely avoids good versus evil binaries that frequently cripple narratives of this genre.
In a referential nod to literary traditions that go beyond Terry Pratchett, the characters thankfully remain human, even when they are asuras, celestial beings, animals or the great gods themselves. In a familiar mythological twist, he frames the story with a meta-narrative, where these great gods are the real power-mongers who control every breath of the tragic heroes who in turn are of course, just pawns in the celestial "GamwWorld".
Thorougly enjoyable.

...from TimeOut Mumbai, Jan 13-26, 2006. pg. 47

Fishwrap: HT

2006-01-23T19:53:00.000-08:00

On the 1st of January this year, the Sunday Times revealed the results of an (excuse the bad pun) undercover operation – they sent typedmanuscripts of the opening chapters of two Booker-winning novels to leading publishers and agents in the UK disguised as works by unknown, aspiring authors, and writhed in glee as one after another, the publishers and agents rejected these books – Holiday by Stanley Middleton and, wait for it, In a Free State by our very own Grand Old Man, Sir Vidia S Naipaul. This drew attention, they said, to concerns
that the publishing industry, already swamped down by the number of new books coming in every day and accused by critics of becoming obsessed with celebrity authors, had become 'incapable of spotting genuine literary talent.'
The writers were suitably outraged, and berated the present generation, like classical music composers sounding off on hip-hop. "People don't seem to know what a good novel is nowadays," said Middleton. "To see that something is well written and appetizingly written takes a lot of talent and there is not a great deal of that around," said Naipaul, never a man famous for Zen-like calm, ""With
all the other forms of entertainment today there are very few people around who would understand what a good paragraph is."
While watching elderly gentlemen get annoyed while secretly wondering whether their great novels are out of date three decades down the line might be very entertaining, the implications of the exercise are felt deeply by every English-spouting Indian with a keyboard and a great idea, looking to Western publishing markets for acceptance and survival. On the one hand, it makes writers with an ever-growing and impressive array of rejection slips (like me, for instance) feel less depressed about everyday existence. On the other, it raises the troubling question, 'Will I never get published even if I write a really good book?'

It’s an interesting question – despite the emergence of a generation of writers, artists and filmmakers in India who are perfectly content creating work for a growing and engaged audience without ‘explaining India’ being an overriding consideration, we still look to the West for validation, and not just in monetary terms. How justified is this outward-looking approach if the West is so insecure about its own ability to appreciate literature and the arts? For every Rupa Bajwa and Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi racking up impressive advances and literary awards worldwide, how many quality works of Indian literature are consigned to dustbins every time publishers and agents decide to clear up the slushpile? How many masterpieces never see the light of day because their writers aren’t sexy enough? How long will we have to wait before any art form (except film and music) finds a large enough market within the country for the sad state of affairs abroad not to be a factor in the lives of the artists concerned? When can we stop having our own literary scene messed up for us by people abroad and, instead, mess it up ourselves in our own special Indian way?

It must be said, though, that perhaps it’s not time for us to weep and wail and beat our breasts just yet, if that’s what you were thinking of doing after reading the previous paragraph. The response from the publishing industry to the Sunday Times’ article has been swift and fairly deadly. They’ve pointed out numerous obvious flaws in the allegations, which they don’t think are particularly serious anyway because somehow literature has survived despite the fact that identical exercises have been carried out before – The Sunday Mirror did it with Ben Elton’s bestselling Popcorn in 1996, a freelance writer named Chuck Ross did it with Jerry Kosinski’s Steps in 1969, the Casablanca film script was circulated in major Hollywood studios in the 80s, under its original title Everybody Comes to Rick’s. And Dorris Lessing once submitted her own book under a pseudonym and was rejected even by her own publisher. All these stings had identical swellings – universal rejection, with several possible causes.

First, these submissions didn’t meet submission guidelines, which have become military in their strictness nowadays – there weren’t enough chapters, and in all probability at least some of the agents and publishers simply didn’t deal with that particular branch of fiction.

Second, and most convincingly, there’s this – any editor who recognized these chapters as what they were wouldn’t bother with responding to whatever idiot sent out plagiarized copies of Booker-winning novels, they’d simply send out a standard, pre-formatted rejection.

Third, there’s simply the matter of overcrowding, with most top agents and publishers receiving about 50 books a day. Publishers usually have a limited number of slots open and are waiting for the books they want to come and fill them. It’s a well-known fact that many of literature’s finest classics were rejected repeatedly until they found the right publisher, and so were most bestsellers – think of the 11 editors who turned down Harry Potter.

To sum up the publishers’ viewpoint, here’s Tor Books editor Patrick Nielsen Hayden’s dismissal of the Times’ charges, as posted on his website in response to the controversy – “We're not in the business of generating lightweight thumb-sucking feature stories about the scandalous state of literacy today. We just do the best job we can of publishing the best books we can find. The Fourth Estate is safe for now. Since we also don't have the time or resources to find out how many of the journalists who pull these stunts are frustrated at having had books rejected by publishing houses, the Fourth Estate is doubly safe. Yoo-hoo, London Times? Fishwrap. That's all I've got to say to you: fishwrap.”

The controversy generated by the Times’ article is already dead, but we’re still left with the sad, but true, realization that a book has to be a lot more than good, or even great, to ever see the light of day. It has to be right, and it has to be lucky. The right author has to write the right book at the right time and send it to the right agent, who has to have the right lunch at the right time with the right publisher. And too many rights, as we all know, usually make a wrong.

Events

2006-01-11T11:29:00.000-08:00

Bombay 13 January - 7 pm - Crossword, Kemp's corner - in conversation with Sonia Faleiro

Hyderabad - 18 Jan - Odyssey, Amrutha Hills, Panjagutta - 7 pm

Chennai - 19 Jan - Odyssey, Dev Regency, 6, First Main Road, Gandhi Nagar, Adyar - 7 pm

Bangalore - 20 jan - Landmark, The Forum, 21 Hosur Road, Koramangala - 7 pm

Weird news 2005: HT

2006-01-03T07:31:00.000-08:00

Another year ends, and as usual, everyone is depressed, or drunk, or both. And those who aren’t still idealistic enough to make New Year resolutions lists are busy making Last Year recollections lists. While 2005 has been a particularly sad year, full of calamities natural and man-made, there’s always room for both hope and happy memories; in that spirit, here is a collection of the most inane, insane and insignificant things that happened this year. The little bits of information crammed into unfilled corners of your newspaper, which, brought together, should make a little jigsaw that shows you how weird, wonderful and worth living life is.

The year got off to a fairly conventional start. In January, Swiss businessmen launched Queer Beer, aimed at gay people and a toilet paper roll refused by the Beatles was auctioned.

Things got a little stranger in February, when Ramesh Kumar from Coimbatore made a Guinness book bid by eating 50 cockroaches in a minute, a German zoo decided to allow same-sex civil unions among penguins after attempts to tempt male German gay penguins by importing luscious Swedish females failed, a German thug got knocked out trying to mug an 88-year-old boxing champion and Tom Jones asked female fans to remove price tags before throwing underwear at him.

In March, Nazir Mohammad threw a slipper at a judge in a Baroda court, and the judge replied with a paperweight. Savita from Jaunsur Babar gor married to a clay pot, and an Austrian-Arab company started making camel milk chocolates. In April, a merman was spotted in the Caspian Sea, a Darth Vader impersonator was arrested in the UK for not wearing a seatbelt, and thousands of toads exploded spectacularly and mysteriously in Hamburg parks. A woman gave birth as part of a German art exhibition, and Rajesh from Latki, Jharkhand, spent two days in a well to persuade his parents to find him a bride.

In May, a chicken with four working legs was born in Romania, a Colombian city introduced a law which made gossiping a crime and Gopal Singh, a police constable, was caught picking pockets at an elephant’s rest-house inauguration ceremony in Jaipur.

In June, things got serious. Orangutan-drawn paintings became a craze in Austria, the Dalai Lama complained about not being able to kill mosquitoes, the Queen bought an iPod, Christina Aguilera’s music was used to break down an al Qaeda suspect in Guantanamo Bay, and an exorcist was called in after a ceiling landed on the head of Romania’s agriculture minister.

July was the strangest month. A toothless man stole toothbrushes in Brazil, an Austrian museum offered free entry to naked people, a statue of the Virgin Mary started to dance in Naples, a British cat turned up for its own funeral, 200 porn movie viewers in Balasore, Orissa, had to do sit-ups publicly and promise never to see porn again, GP Vijaya Kumar, a yoga teacher from Tamil Nadu, attempted to enter record books by swallowing fish and blowing them out of his nose, a young Dutch actress driving to the South Pole on a tractor had her tractor confiscated, a naked German man was arrested for shouting at trees (as advised by his marriage counsellor) and a Russian man impersonating his sister for an examination got expelled because his breasts were too big.

In August, a Brazilian billy-goat gave milk, a 16-year-old British boy invented a hamster-powered mobile phone charger, Superman was spotted flying around in Serbia, comedian Ali G appeared out of the sea on an inflatable turtle and rugby-tackled Pamela Anderson, thus rudely interrupting her dogs’ wedding, a cow was jailed in Colombia for causing a road accident, police in South Africa caught 20 criminals by inviting them to a party, and students of a school in Jambura, near Agartala, locked up lazy teachers for a day.

In September, those Germans invented a thinking beer mat, which calls for a refill when your pint is almost empty and a device for making diesel out of dead cats. A Dutch witch won her battle to make brooms and magic lessons tax-deductible, a Croatian zoo locked up visitors in cages, a parrot that used to shout “Long Live Laloo” at rallies switched sides and rooted for Nitish Kumar, UP resident Barsaatu Lal annoyed his neighbours by eating their mud and a bribe rate chart was found in the Kolkata Police Gazette.

And in October, a Japanese artist was paid £5,000 to drink 48 bottles of beer and fall off a wooden beam. A Japanese women buried herself in a pit in Gwalior to bring about world peace. A hind-leg-walking Japanese poodle was honoured for road safety efforts. A nine-year-old Polish boy brought a live grenade to show and tell and two Bengali brothers were fined huge sums by their village council for keeping a pet ghost.

November. Four police cars took over an hour to catch a teen gang on a donkey cart in Greece. A trial in the UK was abandoned because of a smelly juror. A giant toy penguin held up a German train. A Russian scientist invented remote controlled spy turtles. A lemur was named after John Cleese. And an asteroid was named after a transvestite Bulgarian folk singer.

And in December, a Brazilian town’s mayor tried to ban death, Turkmenistan’s president decided to build a lavish desert zoo to house penguins, a bank robber in Austria was referred to a different counter, Serbian activists were sued for unrolling a 60-foot condom on a monument to promote safe sex, and an escaped prisoner in the US was caught returning to jail with four MacDonald’s burgers.

People complain about the information overload, but I’ve always found that too much information can be a source of great joy if you know how to process it the right way. There are many ways of dealing with too much data - spam filters, remote controls, simple using of the head, and sheer denial. The devil might lie in the details, but so does delight, and if times are dark, there’s nothing like a little absurdity to keep the lights burning. To the people who do strange things, the journalists who find out about them, and the tireless souls at places like the Fortean Times, home of everything paranormal, BoingBoing, the world’s most popular trivia blog, and Ananova, the world’s most bizarre news source, who bring scattered reports together for seekers of the strange, thank you. Happy New Year, everyone, and may things around you get ever weirder.

Extract

2006-01-01T05:06:00.000-08:00

The good folks at the Indian Express, Mumbai, have carried a short extract from The Manticore's secret here.

Happy New Year

2005-12-31T21:10:00.000-08:00

to all of you. Keep smiling, and keep reading, says Rana in the HT.

Muhahaha

2005-12-28T22:11:00.000-08:00

or Bwahaha if you're a Dilbert fan

Hanging

2005-12-27T18:39:00.000-08:00

For those who've been asking, I havent stopped writing the Telegraph column...as in, Im raring to go, but they dont want me right now, because they have all these nice ads coming in. So I will be back at some point, I think. I have to say Im quite enjoying the break, though now I never know which day it is any more.
Since Im feeling too lazy to start a new post, this one will also have to serve as a plug for the Puffin Book of Funny Stories, which is a very nice children's book with a story called Beast and the Beauty, which chronicles in gory detail the time that stoob, baby rana and the rest of us sang in a music contest by mistake. Its almost completely a true story, except I stuck in a romance angle to sex it up.
Have been having the nicest time in Calcutta and meeting tons of people. Might be here for a bit longer than originally planned.

Capital Letters: Outlook City Limits

2005-12-23T13:11:00.000-08:00

this was for the Capital Letters section in Outlook City Limits' new issue

In A Dream of a Thousand Cats, Neil Gaiman wrote that cats ruled the
worlds before humans did, and could dream themselves back into power –
if only a thousand cats could dream of the same world at the same
time. Cats being cats, this is unlikely to happen in the near future,
but it is a commonly known fact that cats live in a parallel
dimension. They see more than we do, their goals and ambitions are
completely distinct from ours, and possibly much more evolved.
Cities, too, have souls; they are complex organisms of steel and
concrete and plastic and blood, evolving messily towards heavens knows
what future. And as they grow and mutate, their essence leaks into
their denizens – humans, by and large, are excellent indicators of
their cities' evolution, but if you really want to understand the soul
of a city, you need to look further. Not much further, though, because
an answer to all your queries is found in that most sophisticated of
sentient urban life-forms – the not-so-humble domestic cat.
In Calcutta, I was owned by a cat named Ao. Ao was a gentle
rice-eater, slothful, beautiful and utterly loveable. Summers she
spent in the garden, casting coquettish looks at bumbling, earnest
neighbourhood toms. Winters she was found curled up on blankets and
voltage stabilizers, purring Rabindrasangeet and only stirring a
muscle when offered fish.
I was recently acquired by a kitten in Delhi. A tiny, helpless,
grey-black striped bundle who won my heart completely by chewing
gently on my finger within a minute of getting to know me. Since
then, she's driven me completely mad. Now about two months old, Sherpa
(climber of all, daughter of tiger, biter of foot) is cocky, brash,
violent and greedy. She's noisy, dirty and unfazed by cold water,
yells or dogs. My entire flat, myself included, has been chewed to
bits. My guests have been assaulted, my newspaper articles defecated
on, and my flatmate's family-creating potential possibly destroyed.
And yet Sherpa remains the most adorable kitten I've ever seen – she's
graceful, bright-eyed, wild and utterly lovely, and now I can't
imagine what life would be like without her. As I write this, she's
toying with the remote, changing channels and waiting for the
opportune moment to take a flying leap and land on my keyboard.
What would she type, if I let her?
I'm Delhi, she would say. Deal with it.
It's not much of a theory, as theories go, but there's something to
it. The only Bombay cat I know is pure Bollywood. He's called Mithun
and is the essence of all things disco – he's glamorous, promiscuous
and clearly has underworld connections. There's really no end to
discovering cities, or cats, both smug in their infinite complexity,
both sublimely aware that you need them more than they need you. If
you're thinking of changing cities, visit in advance and spend a few
days observing cats – they might choose to tell you everything you
need to know.

Chaos Theory 1: Hindustan Times

2005-12-23T13:01:00.000-08:00

This was the first HT column, came out some days ago in Delhi under the headline Wake Up and Smell the Copy on the HT edit page.

"Sed quis custodiet ipsos custodes?(Subtitle: Who will watch the
watchmen)" asked the Roman poet Juvenal with some asperity, sometime
around the second century AD. This was, of course, before the Internet
answered that question: The answer: Anyone with broadband.

The media is supposed to be our nation's watchdog – the filter through
which we see our government, our legal system, our culture. It's a
sacred relationship, and one that's easily broken. We might still go
on reading our favourite papers for entertainment, or for
advertisements, but if our trust is lost once, it's lost permanently.
And thanks to the Internet, that vast ocean of information and
entertainment, if a journalist breaks our trust, we are now in a
position to find out.

The Internet is a journalist's best friend. Any amount of information
from anywhere in the world is available at their fingertips through
one small visit to the altar of the Great God Google, and a journalist
is now in a position to write well-informed, up-to-date articles on
any issue with less effort than ever before. Add blogs, wikis,
newsfeeds and broadcast media, and there's really no excuse for sloppy
reporting any more. Critics who aren't sure their own viewpoints pass
muster now have access to other people's views from all over the
world, neatly arranged in relative degrees of appreciation. As
readers, we think this is a good thing – research always adds value,
but not at the cost of integrity. All we ask is honesty, and a degree
of intelligence. Because the Internet makes the same information
available to everyone. And when we find shoddy, recycled, hastily
rephrased cut-paste jobs from foreign websites happily paraded in
front of us with new bylines attached, it's annoying, to say the
least. Not only is it ethically wrong to steal someone else's work and
pretend it's your own, but it's also an insult to your reader's
collective intelligence.

A number of leading Indian newspapers have faced accusations of
plagiarism in recent years. Editors have resigned; other editors have
turned a blind eye to cut-and-paste senior critics. But over the last
few days, no fewer than three popular and respected dailies have been
caught lifting content from the Internet – we're talking direct
copy-paste jobs here, not skilled plagiarism but Juvenal delinquency.
When tales of their misdeeds were circulated, one paper apologized
promptly and gracefully to the cricket website concerned, one glossed
over the incident with a clarification as vague as the controversy
itself and the third still hasn't publicly reprimanded the veteran
film critic concerned. The issue might die down soon; the public
attention span is notoriously small.
The journalists were uncovered by independent watchmen who happened to
be well-informed readers and had read the original articles as well;
media bloggers who then publicized the issue across the Net on sites
like Amit Varma's indiauncut.blogspot.com.

Plagiarism and copyright are knotty issues, especially when applied to
news media. It's difficult to draw the line, certainly, because there
are only so many ways you can tell a story, and the facts are the same
everywhere. And there's just so much information floating around on
the Internet that you're likely to find at least three articles
telling the same story in the same way. For reviewers as well, there
are only so many things you can say about a film or a book, but one
thing is clear: Even if you're using someone else's ideas, the very
least you can do is not quote them verbatim without attribution, and
not try to escape detection by substituting synonyms in your
copy-pasted sentence. If the computer is your weapon and your refuge,
the Input-Process-Output model should inspire you; the very least you
can do is put your own spin on things. To assume that your readers
will not be able to tell if you stick in a complete sentence here and
there from material available online, and paraphrase the rest of your
review, is, to put it mildly, lazy, arrogant and stupid.

In 2003, the New York Times, having found Jayson Blair, one of its
reporters, guilty of plagiarism, published a 10-page special report to
apologize to readers for reaching the lowest point in its 152-year
history. "For all of the falsifications and plagiarism, The Times
apologizes to its readers in the first instance, and to those who have
figured in improper coverage. It apologizes, too, to those whose work
was purloined and to all conscientious journalists whose professional
trust has been betrayed by this episode," they said over 7,500 words.
This was more than a self-flagellation exercise – the whole point was
retaining their readers' trust. Our newspapers are making a grave
mistake by pretending plagiarism never happens. When it's brought to
public attention, the only possible thing to do is to apologize
instantly – not only is it morally right, but it ensures that readers
know that it's not within the newspaper's agenda to steal, and that it
was the fault of the individual journalist, hopefully duly
reprimanded. In a time where newspapers are already under fire for
excessive navel-gazing, and with television and the Internet (marginal
now in India, but wait and watch) already making inroads into
readership, pretending in the face of hightly available facts that
plagiarism never happened is irresponsible, and not only undermines
the credibility of the newspaper in particular, but of the medium as a
whole.

There is another aspect to consider, though: If you're plagiarizing,
you're in good company. Consider this who's who of plagiarists:
William Shakespeare, George Harrison, Alex Haley, Martin Luther King.
TS Eliot wrote "Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal."

The previous paragraph was more or less completely stolen from The
Guardian. Long live the Internet.

Comeback

2005-12-23T12:34:00.000-08:00

I think the book is now available. So get it, yes?
The last week has been a bit of a blur. Will not attempt a recap at this point, its past 2am and am very sleepy. But thanks everyone who came for the Cal reading (and yes, we filled the room, without Tollywood stars roped in to launch the book or anything) and apologies for not coming up with any clever inscriptions. The date for the Bombay reading is more or less fixed on the 13th of Jan, will update events post when I know all the details.
Oh, and I also just got a Sarai Independent Fellowship, and will be writing about potential speculative fiction coming out of India. More details to follow.

King Kong in five lines

2005-12-23T12:32:00.000-08:00

KK: ARRRRRRRRRRRR!
AD: EEEEEEEEEEEEE!
KK: arrrrrrrrrr
AD: eee?
KK: ARRRRRRRsplgh (dies)

Apologies

2005-12-17T04:12:00.000-08:00

If youve been to bookstores looking for The Manticore's Secret, all I can do is say sorry - its not out yet, for reasons I cant fathom. Should be out in Delhi by Monday, and in stores in the rest of the country by the end of next week. Copies will, of course, be available at the Cal reading next Tuesday.
What can I say - things move slowly. Please do get the book, though :)

million times beating my heart

2005-12-14T18:45:00.000-08:00

Thanks everyone who came to the reading, especially Nilanjana, who carried the entire evening, Sarnath, Jeet and Shakti, masterminds of the birthday cake surprise onstage attack, and Ravi, who gave me the kindest introduction Ive ever had. But everyone who was present yesterday was staggeringly nice; I had the best time, and I hope you enjoyed yourself too.

Drumroll

2005-12-13T04:00:00.000-08:00

The Manticore's Secret page at the Penguin Books India website

Thanks, Jai

2005-12-13T03:24:00.000-08:00

Am sheepish and joyful, because Jai likes Manticore.
Thanks very much, Jai.

The Manticore's Secret: Cover

2005-12-13T02:25:00.000-08:00

Events

2005-12-13T02:17:00.000-08:00

Confirmed so far:

Delhi, 14th December, 630 pm, Gulmohar Audi., India Habitat Centre. Launch, reading, conversation with Nilanjana S. Roy

Calcutta, 20th December, 630 pm, Crossword Bookstore, reading.

Update

Am also planning to visit Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad and Bangalore in January. Will post exact dates later in the week

The Simoqin Prophecies - new cover

2005-12-13T00:48:00.000-08:00

OBC, RIP

2005-12-04T20:47:00.000-08:00

Sarnath Banerjee (pointing at self and me, referring to disussions we've had on literary pecking orders): We are the OBCs of Indian literature
Urvashi Butalia: Which one? Young people? Bengalis? Men?

Oh crap

2005-12-04T20:14:00.000-08:00

So I come back home, after a lovely afternoon and bitterly cold evening at Lodhi gardens, to find the cat crapping on me. To be more specific, on the only copy of the review of the only play I acted in that got reviewed, which starred an actress who's now in the US shooting a film about call centres - the review was written by an award-winning actress too, and so should have been preserved in crystal casing and all of that. Instead, it was lining Sherpa's litterbox, because the mighty maid had chosen to remove a large pile of newspapers/magazines (my articles, reviews etc) from my bookshelf to the kitchen, where old newspapers are kept. Managed to rescue the rest of the pile, but...the cat's been crapping on me for four days now.
I'm wondering if this bodes well for Manticore's reviews.

Chaos Theory

2005-12-02T09:07:00.000-08:00

is the tentative name of the edit-page column I'm starting for the Hindustan Times soon. Sent off the first piece today, it should be out sometime. Fortnightly in Bombay, and monthly in Delhi. Hope you like.

I feel like a proud parent

2005-12-02T09:00:00.000-08:00

And this has nothing to do with the book...its because one of the people I sent the If You Come Today video to was a Bombay media hotshot, and now the song is going to air on GO92.5 FM in Bombay. I also know its travelling around the globe even as you read this. Quiet pride. This is going to be a revolution, and a lot of you read about it here first.
Mwahahahaha, etc.

Lunar Park: TOI

2005-11-27T12:50:00.000-08:00

“Regardless of how horrible the events described here might seem,” writes Bret Easton Ellis, author and protagonist, in the first chapter of his new novel, Lunar Park, “there’s one thing you must remember as you hold this book in your hands: all of it really happened, every word is true.” And the book starts off as an autobiography, describing Ellis’ rock-star lifestyle as part of the Brat Pack of American novelists, full of sex, drugs, alcohol, fast cars, book tours, - an endless party full of people he wrote about in his previous novels, the "wealthy, alienated, sexually ambiguous" generation of the Reagan era. Well, something like an autobiography, anyway – he has a relationship with a famous Hollywood star named Jayne Dennis, and his father is abusive. And if these characters aren’t fictitious enough for you, later on in the book there’s a toy bird that comes alive and turns murderous, a furniture rearranging demon, a homicidal hairball with teeth and Patrick Bateman, the serial killer from Ellis’ masterwork in violence, American Psycho. And the author himself becomes two people at one point – one, the fear-crazed, obsessive, alcoholic narrator, the victim of the terrible events unfolding around him, and ‘the writer’, a cold, dispassionate voice driven only by the plot and its requirements.
This is where the story begins: As his youth begins to wear away and the drug-laden celebrity lifestyle begins to take its toll, Ellis decides to change skins, move to the suburbs and lead a ‘normal life’. He teaches creative writing, marries Jayne and tries, with increasing desperation, to be a father to their son and his daughter. This turns out to be difficult – within four months he’s bored of the routine, has a drug dealer and is lusting after a student – but things suddenly turn seriously dysfunctional, in a brilliantly written if somewhat disjointed mixture of a gore-fest Stephen King horror novel and a comic, observant, savagely satirical look at American values. Shadows in the woods, strangers in the window and serial killers blend in with counseling sessions, parent-teacher meets, pill-popping, celebrity-obsessed children and movie multiplexes. Ellis writes ‘Bret’ as a character losing all faith in himself, a lost, self-obsessed, fading loser no one else respects or believes, haunted by his father and haunting his son, a son he begins to realize he is in danger of losing - in the middle of the general turmoil there’s also a disturbing side-plot about disappearing boys. If ‘Bret’ is to have any chance of rescuing his relationship with his son, he must first understand and deal with the ghosts in his life – his father, his work, his past.
The device of having a writer as a character in a work of fiction has been used before, by writers from Norman Mailer and Philip Roth to Grant Morrison. But what is Ellis really writing about? The creation of an alternate identity by the media? The real/unreal nature of celebrity? Lunar Park leaves a lot of questions unanswered – the supernatural elements are never explained and the author’s honesty is highly suspect, hidden under a dense cloud of self-indulgence and style. The plot is both convoluted and self-parodying, and cheesy horror-movie plot twists and special effects don’t really mix well with intense brooding on the nature of parent-child relationships. In isolation, each of the elements in this novel is treated brilliantly - but when they come together, they produce something that meanders, stutters, shuffles but somehow always manages to disturb and entertain. And that, one suspects, is exactly what Bret Eason Ellis wanted to achieve with this book.

The hermit crab routine

2005-11-25T03:33:00.000-08:00

is not working. But much fun is being had. Off to Gurgaon in a bit for sister's birthday party. If you know her, wish her quick.

Post-mirror-look reflections

2005-11-22T07:08:00.000-08:00

The Hippopotamus, by Ogden Nash

Behold the hippopotamus!
We laugh at how he looks to us,
And yet in moments dank and grim,
I wonder how we look to him.
Peace, peace, thou hippopotamus!
We really look all right to us,
As you no doubt delight the eye
Of other hippopotami.

Operation Diamond Racket

2005-11-20T21:58:00.000-08:00

I have now seen the 'If you come today...' video about 400 times, and am completely in love. Such exquisite coolness...have mailed the video to lots of people, so by the six forwards of separation rule you should get it soon.

One little duck went out to play

2005-11-19T12:08:00.000-08:00

The Duck of Destiny turns one today.
I suppose I should say something profound.

Hmm. Nope. Sorry. Try these links instead.
Why a Duck?
Am I a duck?