I heard a lot of stories about my
father and uncle and grandmother. One particular episode, when my father – he was
just seven then – left his mother and escaped to India with his elder brother
who was just fourteen, would bring tears to my eyes whenever I listened to it
from an old aunt who stayed with us. She would baby sit me and my young brother
after our school as both our parents would be out at work. She would tell me
the same stories again and again and I would insist on listening to this
particular story. It was etched in my memory as if I was there, when all these
were unfolding.
Later,
when I grew up, I felt, this part of Indian history was not well covered either
in literature or films. You get a lot of stuff about the Punjab side of the
partition. But a similarly horrific episode of our history in the eastern side,
the partition of Bengal, has been almost forgotten by the creative people. I
felt someone should write about it. I knew that it would be very tough to write
in a space filled with glorious works of the likes of Khushwant Singh and
Amrita Pritam Singh, but then I’d already decided not to make my novel another
partition saga. But the personal history indeed played a great role in the writing
of my first book.
In
fact it’s a well-known trend now a days. Many authors are taking their family
stories and real life experience to a wider audience through their books. In a
recent article in the Hindu, “Stories on Conflict”, (http://www.thehindu.com/books/literary-review/stories-on-conflict/article6274928.ece)
Jaya Bhattacharji Rose said the following:
Contemporary sub-continental
literature comprises storytellers who probably grew up listening to stories
about conflict in their regions. It is evident in the variety, vibrancy and
strength discernible in South Asian writing with distinct styles emerging from
the nations. There is something in the flavour of writing; maybe linked to the
socio-political evolution of the countries post-conflict —Partition or civil
unrest. In India, there is the emergence of fiction and non-fiction writers who
offer a sharp perspective, informed by their personal experiences, who are
recording a historical (and painful) moment. Recent examples are Rahul
Pandita’s Our Moon Has Blood Clots,
Amandeep Sandhu’s Roll of Honour, Chitrita
Banerji’s Mirror City, Sujata Massey’s The
City of Palaces, Sudipto Das’s The Ekkos Clan, Shahnaz Bashir’s The
Half Mother and Samanth Subramanian’s The Divided Land, a travelogue
about post-war Sri Lanka.
I fully agree with Jaya. Writing from personal experience
makes the story more authentic, poignant and realistic. In most cases the facts
and figures are tweaked beyond any acceptable limits by authors to fit an incident
into the realms of her literary works. But that makes the very incident look very
unrealistic and readers may be able to catch the same very easily. I felt at
ease the most while writing the chapters on Bangladesh. I almost everything, the
setting, the backdrop, the people, the trees, the rivers, the villages, the
horror in the eyes of the villagers. Incidentally most people have told me
those chapters are perhaps the best chapters in the entire book. So I myself
realized that when I write from personal experience, somewhere it becomes more
poignant, more touching.
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