Notes from the Jaipur Literature Festival – Part 1

[Random Shots: Journalist and novelist Tarun Tejpal interacting with his readers at the Jaipur Literature Festival 2013]

24 January 2013

On the first day, I attended three sessions: the Art of the Short Story, Ismat and Annie, and the Novel of the Future. I did not take any notes. I wrote down the following the next morning (from whatever I could remember). If some statements sound weird and don’t make sense to the readers, I take the blame for sloppiness and apologize in advance.

We don't tell novels, we tell short stories

The Short story: The Art of the Short Story panel had Nicholas Hogg, Richard Beard and Yiyun Li and Anjum Hasan was the moderator.

- Yiyun Li said show and tell is a wrong advice

- Bring the narrator back

- She said she represents only herself (not any group or community as a writer)

- Length in a story does not matter; she refused to reduce the length of a story just to get into The New Yorker

Anjum Hasan referred to the Chekhovian Little Man (mentioned Frank O'Connor's book on short stories)

- Why do you write short stories: The panelists said that one is able to explore other lives through short stories

- Short stories are great as a genre as they allow great room for experimentation (for example, the stories of Georges Perec)

The panelists were of the opinion that short story as a genre is not dying; it will live as long as there will be human beings. It is very natural for us—we don't tell novels, we tell short stories

Ismat and Annie

This session was about two famous Urdu fiction writers: Ismat Chughtai and Qurratulain Haider.

In this session, Javed Akhtar and Ameena Saiyid (head of OUP, Pakistan) were in conversation with Syed Shahid Mahdi.

Javed Akhtar: Both Ismat and Annie (Haider) were rebels in their own way. Annie was from an aristocratic background and was scholarly; if she was confident about something, she would put her foot down. Otherwise, she would say I don't know anything about it; tell me about it. She would quote from magazines and books. She would think in terms of centuries. 

Ismat was more from a middle class background. She was a fighter and was so dogged that even if she had said something wrong and she knew it, she would stick to her point. She thought in terms of mosaic, short stories.

In this session, Javed Saheb said some very interesting things about the Urdu and Hindi divide, which he considers an artificial divide. He said that what we commonly speak in India is Urdu or Hindustani. But what is people’s attitude? When do they think one is speaking Urdu and not Hindi? “Jab kah (baat) samajh me aaye toh who Hindi hai. Jab samajh me aana band ho jaye toh Urdu hai.” 

He exhorted people to learn Urdu if they wanted to enjoy the works of genii like Ismat and Annie. “Learning Urdu is not that difficult,” he said. “Learn the script. Don’t just look at the script and run away scared. Doosre ki galiyan hamesha tedhi medhi lagti hain.”

In the futuristic scenario, everybody is a writer, no one is reader

“The Novel of the Future” was a very interesting session. The participants were Howard Jacobson, Nadeem Aslam, Linda Grant, Zoe Heller and Lawrence Norfolk and the moderator was Anita Anand. Mohammad Hanif was supposed to be a part of the panel but he did not show up. Later on, I found out that he got his visa too late in the day and cancelled his plans to come to Jaipur.

The discussion opened with a reference to the famous Naipaulian claim that the novel is dead. Long ago Naipaul had declared that the novel is dead.

Nadeem Aslam: The novel's health is not exhausted in my study.  If you say the novel is exhausted, it means you are exhausted.

Howard Jacobson: Looking at the success of Fifty Shades (the trilogy by E L James), we are doomed. 

The problem is with readers, not novels

Everyone wants to write, not read

Meeting authors has replaced necessity to read

We need novels. It is an argument, not a single voice of dictatorship.

In the futuristic scenario, everybody is a writer, no one is reader.

Anna Karenina is a young adult novel.

Don't change your writing to suit the market; stick to your style, at any cost, and your audience will change

Zoe Heller: What is worrying is that kids are losing the art of reading long fiction; they have short attention spans.

What's happening in the US will happen in India too. The market for novels is shrinking in the US. The same will happen in India in the future even though right now the market here is expanding.

Howard: Don’t read novels for information. Novels have no information to provide.

Others

Someone asked: What about the novel in the e-form, with embedded video and all that jazz we could do with the form in a digital age? Answer: Novels will change—like a parachute, with trimmed strings. Will the parachute remain the same and will provide the same functionality if you trimmed it strings?

E-books are not same as the hard copy novels.

Nadeem: You don’t need video and music to be embedded in the novel’s pages. The words, the sentences, they should evoke the music and picture in your head.

Voices from the Jaipur Literature Festival

There was a time when India barely had any literary festivals. There were readings and book launches, there were mushairas and kavi sammelans but not literary festivals—it is a western import like the ‘novel’.

Just as there is an epidemic of novel-writing in India these days, there is also an outbreak of literary festivals in the country. Every city worth its salt has a lit fest going on and writers, publishers and readers aren’t exactly complaining. In India, when we like something, we tend to go overboard. The same is true of lit fests. But I hope we stop at the city level and don’t take literary festivals to the mohalla level. A Kirti Nagar literary festival or a Jorbagh lit fest does not sound right. A reading group would be much more appropriate at that level.

I was recently in Chennai and one of my friends told me that his daughter who is in third standard wants to become a writer. That’s great, I said. When I was in school, I could barely get my head around what was happening in the classroom, let alone think of becoming a writer. India’s new generation will take the country to another level. Who will not welcome such glad tidings about India?

On my way to the Jaipur literature festival (JLF) this January, I was pondering why was there so much growing interest in reading and writing in India now? Why so many literary festivals? While this is a welcome pandemic, there must be some robust reasons behind it.

I found the answer in one of the sessions by Javed Akhtar Saheb, who is a well-known poet, screenplay writer and Hindi film lyricist. His name has become synonymous with JLF. He and Gulzar Saheb (though the latter was absent this year or maybe I missed him at the festival) have been crowd-pulling festival regulars.

In one of his sessions, Javed Saheb had this to say about the revival of our interest in the arts: “We had abandoned language and arts in the last 30-40 years. We wanted cars and fridges. Now today's generation takes them for granted. They want something else. They want arts, and literature, and so this revival.” What he says makes sense. Perhaps it is even true. But is this view too simplistic?

I am asking this because a danger lurks around the corner of this insight. While lit fests are an endearing feature of a changing India (along with the nationwide ban on plastic bags), they could signal something else altogether and “Booker-award winning” novelist Howard Jacobson had this point to make which is equally convincing: Today, we have more writers than readers. We complain of the death of the novel. But the problem is with readers, not novels. Everyone wants to write, and no one wants to read. Meeting authors has replaced the necessity of reading.

He had made this point in one of his columns too—I remember reading it. He was, in his column, referring to a literary city like London. The point he is making it this—are literary festivals replacing the reading habit? Is meeting authors, listening to their talks and getting their autographs enough to qualify us to skip the hard work of actually reading their books?

On a panel discussion on the future of the novel, Howard Jacobson was at his cantankerous best, and I loved everything he said. Howard was among the three writers this year who drew me to the festival—the other two were Yiyun Li and Musharraf Ali Farooqi. I admire all three of them (I heard them but did not meet them in person; I did not even take their picture. I just listened to them and took mental notes).

This was my first time at JLF and the festival was as colourful and cacophonous as I had expected it to be. In its first edition years ago, it had attracted 7,000 people. This time the organizers said footfall was about 2 lakhs (Sounds like a mall, doesn’t it?). Getting a seat was always a problem at the festival but people were unfazed. They fought for seats.

While the festival attracts top writers from all over the world, one reason for its popularity is Bollywood. Members of India’s film fraternity are an integral part of the festival (Gulzar, Javed Akhtar, Prasoon Joshi, Shabana Azmi, and this year Neelesh Misra too was introduced to the public). Not satisfied with their popularity, this year the festival organisers added cricket and religion to the mix to a great effect. We had Dalai Lama and Rahul Dravid at the fest who injected a dose of spirituality and sports into the milieu in their own way.

But this was not everybody’s idea of how a lit fest should be. At the same time when Dravid’s session was going on, eminent Hindi writers like Ashok Chakradhar, Ikraam Rajasthani and Atul Kanakk were holding a session on ‘Navras’. The crowd was going hysterical on Dravid’s side (Tata Steel lawns). Ashok made us do a ‘ho ho’ too as a counterpunch to the other side’s level of enthusiasm: it was cricket vs Hindi and the audience did not let Hindi down. It was good fun.

To enter the venue, one had to go through many security checks. But this was not that unpleasant, and once inside, you were in for a treat. Colourful tents, sunshine, bookstores, art and craft shops, people with elongated lenses attached to their cameras, autograph hunters, writers, and food for thought. A lot was going on inside the barricaded Diggi Palace. Besides the chai in earthen cups and pyaaz kachodi with delicious chutney, there was a variety of food available at Diggi Palace. Unfortunately, smoking was banned on the second day but we saw many foreigners smoking away, oblivious to the promised fine of Rs 200 that had been imposed on those who smoked inside the festival venue. When my friend complained to the police, they said, “Kya Karen Saheb? Yeh toh foreigners hain.” (What to do, sir? These are foreigners). My desi friend’s cigarettes had been impounded at the entrance of the Diggi Palace and so he was angry. If JLF organizers are reading this, they should designate smoking areas at the festival venue. Smokers will smoke and if you force them to do it surreptitiously, they become fire hazards. So please, be a little more practical.

The auto wallahs had a field day during the festival. They happily overcharged us everyday from the venue (some 7 kilometers) to our hotel. They justified the overcharging by saying that the traffic is very bad because of the police bandobast. Many fellow attendees I talked to said that orgainsers should arrange bus service to hotels. Another great suggestion.

I had hoped to meet Musharraf Ali Farooqi (whose work of translation, The Adventures of Amir Hamza, I had been enjoying) at the Random House party on January 25 but unfortunately the party was moved to another day because it fell on a dry day. I had to return to Delhi the next day, so I missed the party altogether. We were, however, on the same flight from Delhi to Jaipur and that was a consoling thought.

On the way back to Delhi, I saw newsman Rajdeep Sardesai (CNN-IBN) boarding our plane. He kept to himself and after landing in Delhi, on the bus to the terminal, I got a seat right in front of him. A lady with a toddler was too excited to see him and when she could not contain her excitement, she asked the man: Are you Rajdeep Sardesai? Rajdeep politely smiled and nodded yes. The woman beamed for a while at this affirmation. Soon, we reached the airport terminal and went our separate ways.

During the festival, I did not mob anyone for autographs. I did not buy any books as I had already ordered the books that I wanted to buy through Flipkart. All I had were some good memories, and there were voices from the festival that echoed in my head. I was glad that this year the festival did not generate any controversy. I was so wrong.

The next day I read of the Ashish Nandy controversy in the papers. I had completely missed it but I could not stop smiling. JLF and controversy go hand in hand now—last time, it was Rushdie (in absentia) and this time, Nandy.