DELHI: Apart from being an author, poet, librettist and musician, Jeet Thayil knows well how to keep an audience captivated. We met Thayil at Quill And Canvas Bookshop Art Gallery, Gurugram, where he spent an evening reading his poems to a room full of spell-bound poetry enthusiasts. Inundated with requests by the literati for quick chats while he was busy signing books, Thayil asked us if we’d be okay with a telephonic conversation. Days later, we speak to the author about writing, poetry in the time of Instagram, and more.
Excerpts from an edited interview:
A number of your books delve into personal experiences. How easy or difficult is that for you to do so?
I’ve done that a lot — used personal experiences in autobiographical details. Of course, you use personal experiences, but eventually, you add imagination and elements of fiction to it. But there are poems that I might have written a while ago that are so deeply personal, I find it difficult to read them. Strangely, when I wrote them, it wasn’t that difficult, because it really is of that moment and you’re trying to discover something about what happened, or about yourself, or about someone else. And you’re caught up in the craft of it, so it doesn’t seem like such a raw thing to do. But later when I read it, it still feels very raw and sometimes I’m surprised that I wrote it in the first place and put it out there for anyone to read.
Many writers want their readers to know them in a certain way. When you write something so personal, you give the reader a lot of information — both about you as a writer and as a person. Have you ever worried about that?
I wrote a book called Narcopolis (2012), and so I don’t think anyone can perceive me in any more of a derogatory fashion than they already have (laughs), because that’s a book that deals with all kinds of things normal society would not have any do with, right? So that’s not something that’s ever bothered me much. I also know that that is something that bothers Indian writers more than it bothers other writers, because we’re (Indians) always worried about what our aunts, uncles, and long-lost second cousins will think. I think it’s just unfortunate, it’s an unnecessary burden to place on yourself. Because writing is a burden enough. On top of that, if you’re trying to live up to your relatives’ expectations, I think you’re pretty much dead in the water.
You mentioned that after turning 40, you’ve become more disciplined when it comes to writing. Is that more therapeutic or is it a way to make sure your deadlines are on track?
It’s absolutely therapeutic. I just find it’s a way of grounding myself and providing some sense of continuity in my life because otherwise I have very little of those things — I don’t feel a sense of continuity, I don’t feel centred. When I work on one thing every day, even if it’s just for a couple of hours, it changes everything and calms me down… I feel anchored, I feel better about myself and better about the world. And if that isn’t therapy, I don’t know what it is. Other than the therapeutic aspect of it, when you’re working on something, for example, a novel that requires structure and characters that live on the page, it becomes something that you have to live with every day. Only when you’re living inside that imaginative world every day, does it grow and become something that you could never have envisioned when you began work on it.
Your research on The Penguin Book of Indian Poets (2022), an anthology you edited, which comprises works by poets from India and the Indian diaspora, must have been extensive and spans across mediums like books and Instagram. Did you always read poems on Instagram?
No! In fact, that was a pandemic thing. Around 2021, I began to look at poetry on Instagram and online in a way that I never had previously. I discovered some amazing poets just through Instagram. It’s something that poets of my generation could never have imagined because we wrote poems and all we could do was show them to our friends, all two and a half of them. There was never a question of writing a poem and it is read by hundreds or thousands of people and having an immediate response to that. In that sense, Instagram is a wonderful thing because poets, in any case, are isolated beings who live and work alone and are full of doubt, fear, and confusion. It’s an isolating life. So, something like Instagram where you can put a poem out there for people to see and they respond immediately, I think that can help a lot. Although I don’t do it, and I won’t ever do it.
In an interview, you mentioned that, in a way, this anthology is like the history of India. Can you elaborate on that for me?
The book begins with Nissim Ezekiel, who published his first book in 1952 (A Time to Change), which is five years after Indian independence. So, immediately that sets it up as a history of India that begins with Indian independence and continues through the 20th Century. This anthology is very political in some ways; there are poems throughout that refer to what was happening at the time of composition in this country and particularly in the poet’s consciousness. So, if you were to read this anthology as a kind of a historical statement, if you were to look for the historical references in the poems, if you were to look for the events that were happening in India at the time the poem was written, you will find it. And it’s possible to construct an alternate history of India written by the poets, right up to the poems that have been written in 2021. That’s (from 1952 to 2021) a large chunk of Indian history, and because this is a history told by poets, it’s, in my opinion — historians might disagree with me — a far more profound version of Indian history than you will receive from a history book.
With Tumblr and Instagram, poetry is reaching the masses. The same is with the concept of open mics that provides a stage for poets to express their thoughts to an audience. Do you think good writing and poetry can get lost in the noise?
I think the house of poetry is an enormous, inclusive mansion with a thousand rooms. And there are rooms for everyone — new poets, Instagram poets, poets who only appear on stage, poets who only appear on the page, poets who never leave their house, poets who have no house, all are welcome. There’s room for everyone.
Is there another book/book of poems we can expect from you soon?
I’ve just finished a novel. At the moment, I’m writing poems for the first time since 2008, which was when These Errors are Correct appeared, which has been reissued by Penguin. Since then, this is the first book of poems I’ll be working on. I had been working on novels all these years and this is the first time I’m back to working on a book of poems. I have to say it’s just a kind of joy and liberation to work on poetry rather than prose.