Kollengode S Venkataraman Written in 1999
What do Rabindranath Tagore? RK Narayan. And Arundhati Roy. Have in common. Answer. First, they all are well known Indian writers. Secondly, and more importantly, all had to get Akali first in the West before they became legitimate in India. Even Ravindranath Tagore stated in Bengal I understand was elevated only after he got the Nobel Prize for literature. So deep is the effect of European colonial rule in the Anglicized Indians collective consciousness on how they perceive themselves.
This attitude seems to be changing for the better. If the Train reported in New York New York Times, October 15, 1998, story. Spreads it is the story on Shobha de. A popular Indian fiction writer in English. Older Indians may recall that Shobhaa De used to chatter in her column Nita’s Natal. In an in a glamorous Tinseltown magazine from Bombay recently. They an unknown in the West east on the Indian bestseller circuit with their book selective memories, stories of my life.
From the New York Times story, one can glean on what it takes to become bestseller. Woman in English, writer in India, an upper middle-class upbringing, no variety, a social background, having wide connections and titillating stories sprinkled with racy scenes. Or you also need another important component, as De herself is quoted in the story: a wealthy husband to subsidise her writing talents.
What makes Shobha de unique is that her celebrity status is homegrown. All her novels are published in India, and their storyline reflects life in India. The publisher does not have to describe them.
It is another matter of shame that all these and 1000 other native words that are routinely used, recognised, and appreciated by millions of Anglicized Indians may not be found in the English Dictionary published in India for the Indian Brown Sahib children. These dictionaries may list and describe burritos, not masala dosa, tortilla not naan, corset not oddiyanam, libretto not sahitya. Banjos not sarangi, obo not nadaswaram bongo, not pakhavaj, steeples, not gopuram. And bar mitzvah not upanayanam.
New paragraph India, with at least 10% of angry field population, has nearly 100 million people who read English. Therefore, one would think that an English bestseller in India would mean sales in the millions, as it happens routinely here. Can you guess what it takes to make it to the best seller in India? Paraphrasing information, it is not 1,000,000 copies, not 505, 100,000 copies, not 100,000 copies, not 50,000, not 40,000, not even 35,000 copies. In India, with a nationwide English afflicted population running into millions, a piddling 30,000 copies gives you celebrity status. With this number, you can become the talk show and talk show guest. Unselected, uh, cocktail circuit among the wealthy, the powerful, and the influential.
That’s what happened to Shoba Dey with a titillating novel appealing to the middle class, middle-aged readers who have disposable money to buy books.
Is there any wonder why Indian English writers prefer to publish their works from England and US? Even when they write on the burning problems of contemporary India, publishing in the West gives them prestige and better visibility among their peers. And money is good too because the book sales is far better in the West with its network of taxpayer funded subsidized libraries in universities and communities.
In this Indian backdrop, Shobha De is a titillating trailblazer. She earned her celebrity status on the Indian soil. One hopes that more writers of all kinds will follow her. Silk. Follow her Silk Pallu.
In a society that boasts of literature at least 3500 years old, Indian languages have extensive collections of literary work. Yet, the book buying habit of Indians is abysmally pitiful the Tamil language that I am familiar with for reaching that readers, even the best novelists. Believe me, some of them are as good as it ever gets anywhere. Depend on weekly masala magazines that serialize their words.
Further, Writers cannot make a decent living using their craft alone. Therefore, even leading novelists have financial financially secured jobs as bank officials, college and school teachers, engineers and writing in their spare time. Or if they are women writers, they follow Shobha de in expecting their resourceful husbands to subsidize their creative instincts. This is the situation in other Indian languages except perhaps in Bengali, Malayalam, and Marathi
The only bright spot in this dismal picture is that if the novel is serialized over a 2 year. In a weekly magazine, the authors name appears in large fancy flowing fonts 104 times and writers get an unintended publicity by the repetition that no publicist can ever match.
Contrast this with Europe. Last October, world’s largest annual book fair was held in Frankfurt. Over 6500 published shares from 104 countries came to the fair Andover 300,000 visitors browse through the books and songs. Many of you would say, “Don’t compare Western book publishing with the publishing industry in Asia.” Agreed.
but consider how the Frankfurt exhibition started 5 decades ago. In 1949, Germany, a country with a long tradition of printing, was in ruins after the Second World War. The book fair began modestly in 1949 in a church with hardly 200 publishers and participating in 5 decades the exhibition. The exhibition grew to become the largest book show of mankind, so anything is possible if only the social trend settles. Decide on what facets of life are worth nursery.
The following stat. On the annual spending in U.S. dollars per person on books will make you feel even worse.
Norway. $137
Germany $122
Belgium $117
Switzerland $114
Austria $101
USA $97.
Source, USA TODAY, November 1996.
The population of each linguistic group in India is comparable to the population of European countries. The population of Germany may be comparable to that in West Bengal and Bangladesh, France to Andhra Pradesh, Spain with its Latin American reach to the combined population of the Hindi belt. Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, and Haryana.
Looking at the rupee equivalent of dollar amount is absurd. But if people in the organised sector in India — at 30% of the population, this is 300 million people — spend say ₹100 per head per year on books, the value of the publishing business is a whopping 30 billion rupees — 3000 crores nationwide. This is hundreds of millions of rupees in book publishing in each language.
With the size of business, India easily can support writers very well so that they can make a decent living on their creative instincts alone. These independently self-sustaining writers will not only energize society with their ideas, but also spawned thousands of beautiful jobs in printing, paper manufacturing, bookstores, software, and for layout artists and illustrators.
it is. It is not that the middle-class Indians do not have money for leisure and entertainment. Look at the time, the money people spend on glossy masala magazines, cable TV, and the masala films on videotapes. But books simply are not their priority.
What we see in terms of books in Indian homes are mostly paperbacks of British and US novels and on religious, spiritual themes. If the books are on Indian language, there are only a few, generally classics. Also, why is that while every Indian middle-class home has a good Indian dictionary, only very few have dictionaries of the living Indian languages, Sanskrit or Poly?
Therefore, next time when visiting India, you can buy to your horse content all the handicrafts, silks, jewelry, Pickles, pappads, and canned rosgollas. But please. Also, deliberately spend some time and some money in Indian bookstores and help the fledgling Indian publishing industry even if you spend, say, $100. You will be amazed at how many books you can buy and how well the shopkeeper treats you. Next paragraph.
Even if the title is unconventional as the Telugu book Ramayanam Vishavrksham, that is Ramayanam, a poisonous tree by the firebrand Ranganayakamma, or a Dalit Kancha Ilyas’ Why I am not a Hindu? A poor imitation of Bertrand Russel’s Why I am not a Christian? buy and read them. It will either reinforce your beliefs or help you to see things differently; either way, you stand to grow.
Better still, plead with your powerful, influential friends in India the need for taxpayer-subsidized public libraries within easy walking distance of every community. After making your case, also tell them to pay their taxes. According to 2-year-old Indian Income Tax Department statistics, in a country of 1000 million people, only 12 million people file income tax, and only 12,000 people earn over ₹1,000,000.
Remember, the Frankfurt bookstore today is with 6500 boots and 300,000 visitors. Started 50 years ago with barely 200 publishers participating, with only a few 100,000. With a few 1000 people reading the books.