Indian Writing in English

A discussion of Indian Writing in English (IWE) in all its aspects, with a view to creating some structure and organization in this body of writing.

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Sunday, December 04, 2005

Who's the most authentic of them all? - II

It's perfectly all right to write about people who are not the norm in the society they are placed. One of the thumbrules of good fiction writing is to make interesting things happen to interesting people. Usually, in the effort to make a character interesting, he also becomes unusual (though the real skill of the writer comes out when he makes the usual interesting).

But, but...

With the growing body of IWE writers, one would naturally expect that the subject of writing follows a normal scattered distribution. If some writers are not comfortable using typical characters and settings and rely on the uncommon, then there should be some who should be comfortable. But in actuality, statistics appear to be skewed in favour of the uncommon.
What I mean is that most books by IWE writers are about people who might be interesting as individuals, but do not strike the reader as being typical of a class of people. The character is not representative.

Or at best, he or she may be representative of a niche class. Say, books about bored or repressed housewives: about an individual who can be seen as a symbol for group of people in similar conditions. But there would be few novels dealing with, say, the masses below the poverty line. If at all, the protagonist would be looking at the situation from the outside in. A story seen and told by a person belonging to that strata, facing the problems and concerns that people in that strata face, would be a rarity (I would be glad if someone apprised me of exceptions to this).

Even more so in modern times. Earlier, a Mulk Raj Anand could write a Coolie, or an Untouchable (though there are criticisms that even they weren't truly authentic). These days, hardly anyone even attempts--either due to the lack of a market, or because IWE writers are not capable of writing from such a character's viewpoint.

It is this point which lends maximum credence to M. Prabha's thesis of IWE being the waffle of the toffs. A major reason behind this (as has been discussed before) is that English is not the lingua franca of the country; it is not the language of the masses. This automatically implies their exclusion from IWE, or the absence of authentic IWE writing about the hoi polloi from within.

Another aspect of authenticity to be considered is the bone of contention between the native and the NRI IWE writers. When the NRI tries to be authentic by typifying his Indian setting, he is accused of exoticising. (Vikram Chandra has devoted an essay to this debate.) Writers from both sides need to have a balanced perspective. If a writer describes a cuckoo singing, or the process of making dal, it doesn't necessarily mean he is exoticising. He could honestly be laying out an Indian scene.

At the same time, when Indian keywords like mangoes, curries, tamarind, sarees, and so on populate the titles themselves, the charge of exoticising doesn't sound baseless.
As is the practice, we will not conclude without reaching a conclusion. The question we were grappling with: is Indian Writing in English authentic?

One of our conclusions was authenticity does not depend on numbers. Say, I am an abstruse poet and you are a ragpicker. My problem is not finding the right level of symbolism to portray in my blank verses, and your problem is not finding enough glass bottles in the grabage given the prevalence of plastic these days. I have a problem in my life and so do you. Mine is as real as yours. (Seriousness? Ah, that's another matter. Perhaps the soldier on the Kashmir border has more serious problems than the ragpicker's or the poet's.)

Now if I am the only poet, and there are a ninety-nine other ragpickers, does it make my problem less authentic and the ragpicker's, more? My reality and authenticity is as real and authentic as yours.

Are numbers to be simply ignored, then? Not quite. Consider another analogy. There's a big box. It is divided into two sections, one of them ten times as large as the other. Both the sections are filled with multi-coloured balls. The IWE writer delves into the smaller section and picks out ball after ball, examining and describing each in detail, reching deeper and deeper. The contents of the small section become well known to all.

The big section, ten times bigger, lies untouched and unknown... The IWE writer doesn't reach into it.

The full answer: the IWE writer is authentic in a limited setting.

15 Comments:

Blogger Maryann Taylor said...

Hey just went through your blog on IWE. Found it rather interesting. I personally am a voracious reader of IWE. I find it extremely interesting and easy to relate to.

Mon Jan 22, 01:41:00 am GMT-8  
Blogger Smarak said...

true today no one writes pieces like mulk raj anand...but reason for that isn't bcoz ppl can't create such; its more bcoz such writing doesn't have international audience

Tue May 01, 09:40:00 pm GMT-7  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Your meaning of "authentic" here is congruous to "realist". Does writing HAVE to be realist to be "authentic". Isn't it better to read the newspaper then?

Every human being interprets whatever he sees and whatever happens in his own way. Who's to judge which is a "better" inerpretation? Considering the fact that the "judge" himself is a human and hence carries a baggage and biases due to his own experiences.

I think people should not "judge" writing, merely say how it MADE THEM FEEL and be done with it. There should be writers and there should be readers - the critics and snobs should get a job

Tue Jan 29, 12:17:00 am GMT-8  
Blogger Vaishnavi said...

isn't india turning itself inside-out onto the globe? the diasporic iwe writer will not write only about india.

Tue Apr 22, 07:51:00 pm GMT-7  
Blogger Silvia Merialdo said...

Have you read Nectar in a sieve? Do you think it can be similar to Untouchable in its attempt to describe the masses?

Tue Jun 24, 12:01:00 pm GMT-7  
Blogger Silvia Merialdo said...

I think all the world literature has never been able to describe the life of peasants (with some little exceptions, maybe). Simply because peasants don't write.
Was Shakespeare not authentical when he wrote in English about Italian merchants or Danish kings?
Maybe he was not. But still, his works are masterpieces...

In the end, can you tell me a novel written in a regional language that you think is really good?
I do sympatize with regional writers!

Tue Jun 24, 12:12:00 pm GMT-7  
Blogger Awesome Figo said...

Have you read Himani Dalmia's debut novel'Life is Perfect'? It was released earlier this month. A hugely thought-provoking book. It does write about one slice of society but it examines it so closely. Jane Austen famously said that she works on a little piece of ivory with a fine brush. Himani Dalmia's novel does just that. It looks at Delhi high society and one family in particular but the relationships and ideas about life are examined with such a sharp eye! And she doesn't write for any particular audience. India is not exoticised - as a land of elephants and poverty. It's just such a breath of fresh air in the IWE scene.

Sun Feb 01, 10:44:00 pm GMT-8  
Blogger Bipasha Banerjee said...

You are partly true .... IWE do try to delve into minute unnecessary details , like process of dal making, or drawing a detailed picture of a ceremony , but we must all admit that " TRUTH IS STRANGER THAN FICTION" and that is I do walk with IWE at ease. I agree with Silvia on the point that we have every authority to doubt if all the character portrayal of Italian merchants by the bard are authentic.... yet it matters little as far as they remain all time favourites with lovers of literature.

Fri Apr 06, 04:00:00 am GMT-7  
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