There is a profile, a closer look, but I have been told that I ought to be a bit more 'professional' about my professional been there-done that. Discussing ketchup is not professional, even though people make huge amounts of money in the industry.
As you already know, I write.
I got a book, 'A Journey Interrupted: Being Indian in Pakistan' published (HarperCollins) and there is a story there. There are stories everywhere. Here is where to find all there is to know about the book.
There are a couple of projects I am working on - and when I say a couple I mean two. One is a political biography; the other is an erotic paranormal scientific thriller (okay, this one's not quite true but anything can happen. What is germinating in my mind may get pollinated. Or polluted.). I am taking my time over them because it makes no sense to do anything until your heart beats for it. My heart tends to be a bit slow.
I read somewhere that I have some over 2000 articles to my credit. It is way over 4000. I have written for more than 25 publications. For a few years I had seven columns at a time and they were not syndicated. This means I wrote on seven different subjects – politics, society, media, gender, communalism, sexuality, film/TV analysis; even an agony aunt. The future then was a deadline.
There were several features – what are usually referred to as human interest stories – to take off from where the reports end. Or, of people who have no voice but need to be heard.
I have relished doing interviews the most. It has been a symbiotic experience to meet politicians, activists, academics, scientists, actors, pimps, commercial sex workers, child labourers…it is a long list. Suffice to say that the celebrity and the common citizen give a writer a better understanding of herself. At least, it did for me.
Publications have found me inconvenient, and it has often been a mutual feeling.
I blog because I need to say something even if no one is listening. I breathe. Can you listen? No. Yet you know I live. Understand?
Your words matter, though, because even if I think I am an island, I might need to indulge in some intellectual cannibalism.
Join the repast.
December 6, 2011
As you already know, I write.
I got a book, 'A Journey Interrupted: Being Indian in Pakistan' published (HarperCollins) and there is a story there. There are stories everywhere. Here is where to find all there is to know about the book.
There are a couple of projects I am working on - and when I say a couple I mean two. One is a political biography; the other is an erotic paranormal scientific thriller (okay, this one's not quite true but anything can happen. What is germinating in my mind may get pollinated. Or polluted.). I am taking my time over them because it makes no sense to do anything until your heart beats for it. My heart tends to be a bit slow.
I read somewhere that I have some over 2000 articles to my credit. It is way over 4000. I have written for more than 25 publications. For a few years I had seven columns at a time and they were not syndicated. This means I wrote on seven different subjects – politics, society, media, gender, communalism, sexuality, film/TV analysis; even an agony aunt. The future then was a deadline.
There were several features – what are usually referred to as human interest stories – to take off from where the reports end. Or, of people who have no voice but need to be heard.
I have relished doing interviews the most. It has been a symbiotic experience to meet politicians, activists, academics, scientists, actors, pimps, commercial sex workers, child labourers…it is a long list. Suffice to say that the celebrity and the common citizen give a writer a better understanding of herself. At least, it did for me.
Publications have found me inconvenient, and it has often been a mutual feeling.
I blog because I need to say something even if no one is listening. I breathe. Can you listen? No. Yet you know I live. Understand?
Your words matter, though, because even if I think I am an island, I might need to indulge in some intellectual cannibalism.
Join the repast.
December 6, 2011
19 comments:
There is a intellectual rage within you, the world has no appetite for such sublime emotions as they whet on simplistic notions & primal urges.
"Rage" and "sublime" go together? Thank you! I always knew it...I have nothing against primal urges, though.
PS: Since this page is new, I did not check about comment posting here. This page needs to be updated. Appreciate your words.
FV,
Been through these portals after ages and love the new tabs - speecially the page that speaks ... and 'Blind'!
TE/SDV
Hello!
Remember, this was your farmaaish! Thank you.
If I may suggest slight dilution of the background red.
I am sure there is an artistic reason for it but reds sprinkled on the main page seems fine but one splattered across the background feels gloomy to me.
I am more of a green grass kinda guy :)
I've done green & blue. Red is passion, so how does it make you gloomy? Maybe when I have a new layout. For now, ignore the background. Am willing to lend my blinkers :-)
>> Red is passion
Sure and it is also blood and sacrifice. I guess it is eye-of-the-beholder sorta thing.
In any case, content has always been very colorful so ... :)
from the looks of it , I have to say that you LOVE to write and write a lot, never seen a blogger who writes so much with so much alacrity and impatience. Some of your reasoning pertaining to the day to day affairs is great- would love to read all your writing in times to come.
Thank you, Rizwan. Indeed, I do LOVE to write, but here must admit that as blogger I also upload my articles. Luckily, there is no conflict of interest!
And, yes, this is the stuff I put up. What I write is, shall we say, a bit more?
Hitesh:
Hello, in all colours of the prism. Planning a change, but cannot decide. This red is just so beguiling for me...I get excited just looking at my own page :)
About me: It's been there for ages now, and I often asked myself how intriguing one can write this and I believed I saw it all, until I came here. Refreshing!
Ankeet:
Thank you! We do see it all from one perspective, and then see it again from another.
Took up "a journey interrupted" just by chance yesterday. i found it so engrossing that its difficult to put it down just like a dan brown novel. i have always been interested in pakistan. my friends make fun of me for it but i want to visit this country which was just a couple of generations back a part of us. what to make of it? it seems emotions there operate at two levels. at the national level the pakistanis find it difficult to reconcile to anything Indian but at the personal level things are much more cosy or so i have heard. i read naipaul's account of it but dealt with a pakistan which no longer exists today. i read taseer's book which was magnificent but at least he had some emotional connection with that land and he did not have to encounter which you may have. so your journey is something i can connect to. of course i am a non-muslim but does that really matter once you are there. or does it?
Sahir:
Well, thank you, but Dan Brown? Okay, I'll take it, if only for his vast reach...
It's good that you have read a variety of books on Pakistan, and you are right that I'd probably be your best bet!
As for being a non-Muslim, you'd be better taken care of there. Indian Muslims are seen as baggage in some quarters.
Hope you can make the trip some day.
For my dear readers. As you can see, I've changed the look of the blog, as I do every year or so. Feedback welcome. If you ask me, it looks kickass ;-)
Also, there has been a long break and I will probably be writing in spurts...
Hope you have been 'virtually' involved in wonderful things, if not real ones!
I have updated this page, or rather altered it a bit...it still needs to be filled up, but I am watching the calories...
"intellectual cannibalism"
Very strange pick of words, from all the flowery niceties in English! How odd!
I'm sure you enjoyed the movies about Dr. Hannibal Lecter, I thoroughly did.
In your article "Leave the Indian muslims out of this", It is not utter Hogwash to leave the Indian muslims out. Anytime the muslims somewhere has an issue they come out like mad dogs destroying public property. The recent case of the so called anti prophet film and we saw what happened in chennai and other cities. Riots in Myanmar and we saw the reaction of the so called secular Indian muslims. You may / may not be a believer but you are surely that cultural muslim who dreams of the caliphite. You dont need to publish this, this is for your information
Dhanus Menon:
Wonder why you did not post it on the relevant piece. I've published it because it reveals a mindset other than mine. It reveals a judgement that wishes to pigeonhole a person despite assuming to know something. It tells me more about you than about me. And it's nice to knwo other people too...
---
Amitabha:
Since I am here (although you are not, at least not visible), let me reiterate what should have been obvious: I don;t do "niceties". Hope you are well...
FV,
QUOTE: "Wonder why you did not post it on the relevant piece."
Perhaps because (s)he saw that the last comment there had gone unanswered...?
Post a Comment