http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-metroplus/voice-of-the-voiceless/article7186130.ece Rejections did not deter Anees Salim. His patience is paying off in a handsome manner The words of angstAnees SalimPhoto: K.K.Mustafah The words of angstAnees SalimPhoto: K.K.Mustafah He is widely read. He wins The Hindu prize. He stays away from the award presentation. He is too shy, too much of a recluse to come to Chennai to receive an award in front of a packed auditorium. That was all in January, 2014.
Come to 2015. His The Blind Lady’s Descendants is making waves, winning critical acclaim. The book is shortlisted for The Raymond Crossword Book Award (Indian fiction category) in Mumbai. He wins the prize again, ahead of the bright and cheery Shovon Chowdhury and quiet and self-deprecating Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar. He does not show up for the award ceremony again. Flashback to life earlier: he drops out of schools. He pens four novels, sends his manuscript to different publishers and literary agents. He is turned down each time. He does not give up, confident that eventually one of his books would be published. He surprises himself; all four books are published, two of them win awards. Welcome to the multi-layered world of Anees Salim, the new age literary hermit. No book launches, no lit fests, no award ceremonies. No television interviews. Hardly any print chats either. His published words do all the talking. And Anees, endearingly humble, incessantly brave – ironical considering he avoids being in the public eye – opens a little window to his works, his world. You are said to have written one book after another to kill the pain of rejection. Now that you seem to be winning one award after another, does it not wash away all disappointment? It reminds me of that Thums Up ad of the ’80s: first blood, sweat, tears, loneliness, then 30,000 cheers. I did not expect to be this lucky after such a long run with bad luck. Even when I was being rejected I knew one of my manuscripts would eventually make it. But all of them getting published and two of them getting awards was a bit unreal for me. These recognitions have made me unnecessarily wary and self-conscious. Since I won The Hindu prize, I must have started at least half a dozen new novels and discarded all of them. Maybe uncertainties bring the best out of a writer. With the benefit of distance in time, what could have led to some 25 rejections? You are said to have had a feeling of being discriminated against during the phase of rejection. Could you please elaborate? Looking back, I realise what a complete novice I was back then. I did not have any knack for writing query letters and synopses. Sometimes I wrote rambling mails, sometimes curt ones. My contributions to slush pile must have been really big. I lived in a small town then, I did not know anybody important from literary circles. I wrote only to successful literary agents. I should have written to struggling ones as well, who would at least have read the manuscript to the last page before turning me down. Yes, rejections made me really sour. I started to believe that they rejected me because I had neither attended any creative writing course nor gone to a foreign university. Amazingly, when this phase ended with four books coming out in a year followed by The Hindu prize, and now the Crossword award, you remained a recluse, not quite ready to come in the public eye and relate your story…. I am a bigger recluse now than I used to be at the beginning of my writing career. I don’t think awards can make me step into the public space. I don’t miss anything by staying away from all that. My son tries everything possible to make me attend literary festivals. But I don’t see him succeeding. How comfortable are you with the idea of translations? I ask this in the light of news that two of your books are being translated into Malayalam… In fact, three of my books are being translated into Malayalam, one into Marathi. The French edition of Vanity Bagh is already out. I am curious to know how they would turn out in Malayalam, because I don’t understand any other language my books are translated into. Between Vanity Bagh and The Blind Lady Descendants which of the works has greater autobiographical elements? The Blind Lady’s Descendants . It is set in my hometown. Actually, it is mostly set in the house I lived in till I ran away from my hometown. I grew up around the characters in this book, fighting with them, patching up with them, plotting against them, sometimes even fantasising about them. I sketched the blind lady in the book from my grandmother, who was blind and poor. But the story has nothing to do with the life we lived in that big house in the small town. Finally, you give multiple voices and layered narratives to your Muslim characters in the age of stereotypes. How difficult is it to voice the angst of the voiceless within the community and outside? For reasons I don’t know, the voice of angst comes easily when I write about Muslim characters. While writing the second draft of my first book, I realised that I could write decently well about Indian Muslims, their anxieties and the uncertainties they face. I will continue to write in that space because I am sure there will be more tales of anger and fear to be told. Looking back, I realise what a complete novice I was back then. I did not have any knack for writing query letters and synopses -- Avinash Shahi Doctoral student at Centre for Law and Governance JNU Register at the dedicated AccessIndia list for discussing accessibility of mobile phones / Tabs on: http://mail.accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/mobile.accessindia_accessindia.org.in Search for old postings at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ To unsubscribe send a message to [email protected] with the subject unsubscribe. 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