Bookmark A fascinating lesson to write Organiser February 26, 2006 Get Published! A Handbook for writers in India; Usha Rajagopalan; Oxford University Press, Delhi; pp 213; Rs 295.00
What a fascinating book for a young aspiring writer to read! Or, for that matter, even an old one! Down the ages the young, the old, the middle-aged have all-too-often aspired to be writers. Some have succeeded; many have failed. Some have succeeded while still very young; the late Dom Moraes is a shining example. He became a celebrity of sorts while still in his late teens. Many have had to struggle for years. Some have had their manuscripts rejected by several publishers. If R.K.Narayan were alive or, for that matter, Mulk Raj Anand, one would surely have learnt a great deal on how not only to write but get one's manuscript published. Moraes first came into prominence as a poet. It was only much later that his interests widened. There are, of course, writers and writers. Some are content to write articles for newspapers; some opt for short stories; some others with limited talent would rather work on translations, though translating a work from one language to another is no mean task. Some are most at home writing for children. Then there are playwrights like Girish Karnad. Some write because of a deep inner craze for writing; others want to make a career out of it. The late Nissim Ezekiel made his name as a poet. Some are content to review books. A very small number, mostly academicians, are happy if they can get their works published by scholarly journals like, for example, The Economic and Political Weekly. Not everybody can write about Harry Potter. What Usha Rajagopalan has done is to write a handbook for writers in English. One suspects it is a different story if one writes in Bengali, Hindi or Tamil. Then there are travel writers; theirs is a specialised field but apparently they are willing to take risks. In recent years there has been a growing demand for 'feminist' writing, howsoever defined. After all, Femina published by Bennett Coleman & Co certainly commanded a large female readership and, one suspects, a surreptitious male readership too. What Usha Rajagopalan has done is to help prospective writers to get on with the job. Some write instinctively. Many newspapers would rather prefer contributions from known writers than from unknown ones, though there are exceptions like Gomantak Times from Goa which has overnight turned into a mouthpiece for strictly Goan writers. It has a point. The paper wants to reflect Goan thinking. Writing poetry, one suspects, is a sheer waste of time for who really wants to read poetry these days? Feminist writing has a limited readership and it is somewhat sad to accept the fact that our national newspapers have no space for short stories. The Statesman of Kolkata accepts short stories for its Sunday edition but it is an exception. Short stories are getting out of fashion, at least in our English language newspapers. Sex, shockingly enough, sells. So does gossip. Ask Shobhe De. There are two basic types of publishers and there is nothing common between them. The first type consists of newspapers and magazines. Not many newspapers pay their contributors well. Some do not pay at all. And one can't make a livelihood writing 'middles'. Magazine writing is not a very paying proposition either. Then how can one make a living out of writing? An Arundhati Roy is a rarity. As Gurcharan Das has been quoted as saying: "A first-time writer cannot hope to live off his or her earnings a la Arundhati Roy, but what can a newcomer do to the field except in terms of monetary returns from a play? Almost nothing". Gurcharan Das should know. He was a business executive; writing to him was a hobby though, in the long run, he made it pay. Playwrights, too, have their heartbreaks. Not everyone is a Girish Karnad. As Dina Mehta writes: "The returns are extremely meagre for the playwright. A royalty fee of Rs 100 per show", not enough to take a friend out for a cup of tea at a five-star hotel. Mehta concedes that All India Radio does pay around Rs 1,000 for use of a script. But how many script writers can survive on such payment? Script writers for films perhaps do better, but there aren't too many of them. Besides, it is a highly professionalised job and competition is very severe. Strangely enough Usha Rajagopalan makes no reference to Anant Pai's famous publication Tinkle meant for children. At least three generations of children have grown up reading Tinkle which has introduced to them stories not only from Indian mythology but from a variety of other sources. If there is one authority on writing for children, surely it is Uncle Pai. Writing for children is a highly specialised art. Smt. Rajagopalan quotes Paro Anand, editor, National Centre for Children's Literature, and himself a writer, as saying: "I would love to write for children, only I don't know if I have the guts". That is being honest. Actually, writing in Indian regional languages attracts a larger readership and, one suspects better payment as well. Says Smt. Rajagopalan: "The apparently insatiable demand from publishing houses and readers indicates the gold mine in regional language literature." And Prof Satchidanandan, Secretary of the Sahitya Akademi is quoted as saying: "Indian English writing alone cannot cater to the needs of the book market in India nor satisfy the sensibility of the Indian readers of books in English. There is also an increasing awareness of the literary value of writing in the languages that reflects Indian life in its real depth and variety." Well said. Let this be said in the end: The best-known writers are not those who have been taught to write... Creative-writing in an in-born skill. You either have it or you don't." That does not mean that one should not try to write, And those who want to, cannot possibly find a better guide than Usha Rajagopalan. Was it Einstein who said that genius is one per cent inspiration and ninety nine per cent perspiration? We may not all be Shivaram Karanths, but surely, there is nothing preventing us from trying to be one? And this is where Get Published! helps. ~(^^)~ Avelino
