Malsawmi Jacob cried while writing her first novel but saw it through anyway. Seema Rajpal finds out how and why
It’s been more than 55 years since the brutal days of the Mizoram insurgency of 1961. However, it’s consequences continue to wreak havoc on the present generation. It is this anguish that author Malsawmi Jacob tried to pen down in what turns out to be not only her first novel, but also the first English novel by a Mizo writer — Zorami. “Though some Mizo women have written young adult novels, nothing like Zorami has been penned in English,” the 63-year-old is quick to clarify.
Though new to writing a novel, the author who shifted from Mizoram when she was eight-years-old, is not knew to publishing. Her previous work includes poems, short stories, stories for children and more — both in her mother tongue Mizo and English. So was drifting away from the genre she was familiar with easy? “Poems and short stories are written more on an impulse, while writing a novel requires prolonged discipline,” she says. But it wasn’t only this that made the writing taxing, it took a toll on the author emotionally as well, because the research required her to talk to underground activist who had strived during the troubled times. “I had started this research way back in 2005, but when I sat down to write, I would keep crying. I realised that just listening to the recordings of my conversation was so painful, I just couldn’t write,” she says. Jacob discovered that despite the tragedy, Mizos had learnt to see humour in every situation, “Once I was talking to a citizen and he told me that every time his family and he heard a gunshot, they would run to the neighbours house, though it wouldn’t be any safer there. That way they would make you laugh, trying to find humour even in the midst of tragedy.”
This novel, layered with Mizo culture, folklore, tradition and songs composed during that time, follows a non-linear pattern. Zorami, the protagonist of the novel, is at the centre of all the turmoil, “In many ways, she represents what the whole of Mizoram was going through,” the author explains.
Though the process of writing the novel was gruelling and the novel deals with trauma and pain, it’s more about healing. “I want to show the way of hope in the midst of darkness,” she said. After ten drafts, thanks to her editor, she saw the novel through last year.
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