- 8 hours ago
Writer and Journalist Amitava Kumar joins Outlook Editor Chinki Sinha for an in-depth conversation on writing, memory, identity, and Indian trains. In this episode of Outlook’s podcast series, 'Our Lovely Friends', Amitava Kumar discusses his latest book, 'The Social Life of Indian Trains', and how trains shape India’s social, political, and emotional life.
Speaking about his writing process, Amitava Kumar reveals why he carries five different notebooks for five different purposes, how observation feeds literature, and what nostalgia means to him as a writer rooted in Bihar but living across in-between places. The conversation also touches on Indian literature, journalism, migration, belonging, and how everyday travel becomes an archive of stories.
This wide-ranging interview explores:
* The Social Life of Indian Trains by Amitava Kumar
* Indian trains as social and cultural spaces
* Writing habits, notebooks, and the craft of nonfiction
* Identity, roots, and Amitava Kumar’s love for Bihar
* Memory, nostalgia, and living between places
Watch this episode for a thoughtful discussion on Indian writing, travel, literature, and contemporary nonfiction, featuring one of India’s most important literary voices.
Speaking about his writing process, Amitava Kumar reveals why he carries five different notebooks for five different purposes, how observation feeds literature, and what nostalgia means to him as a writer rooted in Bihar but living across in-between places. The conversation also touches on Indian literature, journalism, migration, belonging, and how everyday travel becomes an archive of stories.
This wide-ranging interview explores:
* The Social Life of Indian Trains by Amitava Kumar
* Indian trains as social and cultural spaces
* Writing habits, notebooks, and the craft of nonfiction
* Identity, roots, and Amitava Kumar’s love for Bihar
* Memory, nostalgia, and living between places
Watch this episode for a thoughtful discussion on Indian writing, travel, literature, and contemporary nonfiction, featuring one of India’s most important literary voices.
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FunTranscript
00:00Welcome to Outlook's new podcast series called Our Lovely Friends.
00:11Today we start with our great friend Amitav Kumar and also he's here in Delhi for his book launch
00:20which is called The Social Life of Indian Trains brought out by Aleph.
00:24I have known Amitav for a very long time and he's a writer. He's also a professor of English at Vassar College
00:33and also he's from Bihar and that was the first point of connection because very few writers have
00:40written about Bihar the way he has written. I mean there's this famous book called The Matter of Rats
00:44which is very interesting. It's a biography of Patna and Bihar in terms of how he looks at the city.
00:52I remember I read his book The Husband of a Fanatic when I was in college and I was like oh my god
00:58I have to meet this writer and in fact I met him at the New Jersey airport at the baggage counter.
01:04Yeah you didn't want to talk to me but yes.
01:07No.
01:08I was like I didn't know how to react that there's this writer standing in front of me at the baggage counter.
01:14So yeah so for years and years you know we've been in touch. He's written for Outlook before
01:18and he has very fond memories of being in Outlook.
01:24Yes yes. It was a great dream of mine particularly when I was younger.
01:28I'll write it too. I'll do a little reporting. Also to do book reviews.
01:34Vinod Mehta was the editor at that time then Krishna Prasad etc.
01:37So I've cherished Outlook and it's wonderful to be here.
01:41Yeah but thank you so much for taking the time out.
01:44And now we'll start I mean we have so much to ask but we'll start with this Indian trains.
01:50And it's very interesting because you know the first memories for me also is taking the train
01:55out of Bihar. You know the flights were kind of out of reach back then.
02:00Exactly same with me.
02:01You know the train like you know and the trains were eternally late.
02:04You know this passenger train and all of that. So if you can talk a little bit about
02:08like how did you come up with this idea. It's a very unique idea and the cover is very beautiful
02:11actually. And why the trains?
02:14Well the commission came from Aleph. David Devidar asked me would you write a longer book
02:20because he had read a piece I wrote for the New Yorker.
02:23Yeah.
02:23I get on it in Kashmir and I travel across the length of India from the northernmost station
02:31in India to the southernmost station in India. I get down in Kanyakumari.
02:35And I wrote, I asked, I had watched a documentary in which someone had said, the documentary
02:43came out in 1967 whose film ka naam tha, I am 20. India was 20 and the people in the
02:50film are 20. And one guy in the film says he would like to go up and down the country
02:54with a notebook in hand. So that's what I did. I also wanted to ask people whom I met
02:59in the journey, that where is India going? Where are you going? What are you doing in
03:05your life? And that account was what I published in the New Yorker. And then David said, maybe
03:10you could do a book for us.
03:12It's quite a beautiful concept actually. You know, it reminds me of this other book I had
03:17read. I don't know if you've read it, Jenny Diskey, Strangers on a Train.
03:21Yes, yes, yes. Very sharp writer. I admire her a lot.
03:25She gets on this Amtrak and travels and she also meets people on the train. Very beautifully
03:30written. The other thing I wanted to actually ask and I've always wanted to ask, what is
03:35you know, Patna to you, especially Bihar? Because you keep going back. And there was
03:40a piece that I was reading in the New Yorker by James Wood, you know, where he kind of talks
03:46about this book, The House of Mr. Biswas by V.S. Naipal. And there's a sentence, no, where
03:52his life is so unaccounted for. And so this thing that it will not make for a historical account,
03:58but a novelistic form is more forgiving. And then he comes to your book, My Beloved Life.
04:03My Beloved Life. How do you look at places, people, novel, history?
04:08It's a very long question, but yes. I know.
04:12What is Patna to me? While my parents were alive, you know, my father died a year and a half ago
04:17or two years ago. While my parents were alive, that was the place of return.
04:22Where you always go back.
04:25Where you came from, and you went around the world, but that is where you had to come back.
04:31After my parents' death, my sister is there and she will be unhappy if she hears this.
04:36But it seems like something has been lost, you know, the connection.
04:40In the case of Naipal's book, the man, you know, here are people who are immigrants, basically.
04:48Because here are people from Trinidad, children of indentured labourers, they are poor.
04:55This man, Mr. Biswas doesn't have a house. And by the time, when the book ends, that line that Wood would have quoted says that,
05:04what would it have been like if they had been unaccommodated, unhoused?
05:09Yeah.
05:10It is good to have a house to return.
05:12That idea of the home is what is important in the novel.
05:16And perhaps for Wood, Patna is what it is for me.
05:20Yeah.
05:21But I have to say, I have been abroad for 40 years, India is where my material is.
05:30But the real home is in language.
05:32Yeah.
05:33I don't understand.
05:34Yes.
05:35To find a home in language and a language of one's own devising.
05:43Yeah.
05:44Maybe a shared language, but a language that is so particular that makes you think that you are at home.
05:49In one of the books, in fact, you wrote a sentence which I have quoted many, many times.
05:53In fact, that's my one place is home, the other the world, right?
05:56And that, I think, contains a lot of conflict, a lot of sadness, a lot of hope, and a lot of clarity in terms of, you know, the world is elsewhere.
06:07And that what you say is that it is a home.
06:11But look, when I talk to someone like you, I feel that I know so little about this country.
06:19No, I think you know a lot.
06:21No, I feel like that.
06:24Because, because, because this podcast is called, you know, has friends in the book.
06:28I asked you about so many friends and you knew so many secrets about them, which I have no idea.
06:32Completely.
06:33You also knew two, three secrets, but that's okay.
06:35But I feel like that you are in this finding home, but one needs more and more intimacy with so many more friends to be a little bit more anchored in what is the lived reality of our friends.
06:48That's true. I think friends are very important in life and with them you like can be yourself, right?
06:53So we thought that we'll do this whole discussion with friends who have been there for us and who inspire us like in terms of writing.
07:01In fact, we were last week, we were reading your Matter of Rats again.
07:05And whenever we talk about Patna, in fact, so many connected people, Ruchira, you know, all of these people.
07:11And then you wrote a very lovely piece for our upcoming issue and you wrote it in one night.
07:16I mean, and then I was telling somebody this is what friendship is, you know, this, he just wrote it and sent it and you sent us three drawings.
07:23And then you sent us three drawings.
07:24How do you say it now?
07:26Yes.
07:27You asked, you asked, you asked, you asked, you asked, we gave it with your heart.
07:30It was very good and beautiful because the idea was a very complex one to talk about landscapes which are fictional and then how to connect the reality with it.
07:42Because, you know, this whole thing.
07:43And I feel that in your books and in your writing, that is one thing because cities also exist in memory, right?
07:48Because the Patna that you left and the Patna that there is now, it has changed a lot.
07:54So how do you as a writer look at…
07:56I was watching a BBC documentary and the man goes to Patna.
08:01And he says that Patna was more glorious.
08:05I don't remember all the words, but he says something, he compares it to ancient Rome.
08:11And he says that all these, there was so much glory here.
08:14And I thought that any common person watching it, if they were from Patna, they would feel a great deal of pride.
08:21And maybe that was not most important for me.
08:25I thought that landscape was important because I connected it with the declining health of my parents.
08:30That made it real for me.
08:33That landscape and its forgotten glory, hidden history was important, but it was not vital.
08:40Yeah.
08:41What was vital, what stuck like a knife in my heart was that my father is now, what is their health?
08:49When will I have to come back?
08:51Yeah.
08:52And what will be the news that will bring me back?
08:54Yeah.
08:55Fear has happened too.
08:56So you inhabit a landscape of fear and anticipation.
09:00Sometimes with hope and optimism.
09:02And I think you also fear losing that one bond.
09:08Yes, of course.
09:09That has been there.
09:10In fact, I think in 2014 or 2015, remember there was a Patna Literature Festival.
09:15Of course.
09:16And you had written to me a note from in between flights saying that I think I missed the deadline.
09:22That was the time when your mom passed away.
09:23Yes.
09:24Yes.
09:25And it was a long note and I think it was later published in English place.
09:28It was.
09:29In Granta actually also.
09:30Yes.
09:31Yes.
09:32It was a very beautiful note.
09:33And I remember another…
09:34I remember a lot of things.
09:35I remember a lot of things.
09:36I think I have like an elephant memory.
09:37And you know, soon after, in fact, I received another note like that from our actor friend again,
09:44Vinay Pathar.
09:45Sure.
09:46Who lost his father.
09:47Sure.
09:48And he was also in between the journey and there was something about…
09:50I don't know what is it about people from Bihar who are writing while either on train
09:56or in flight or something.
09:57Yeah.
09:58We were talking about what we were talking about in the election.
10:01This incessant migration is a part of our reality.
10:04Yeah.
10:05And you and us, why don't we get to study abroad if there were institutions in that way
10:12as they were for our parents.
10:13When our parents went to Patna College or Science College…
10:16And they were so proud of it.
10:17They were proud of it.
10:18Those were institutions of learning.
10:19Yeah.
10:20By the time we came, what was it?
10:21It was nothing.
10:22You know.
10:23You yourself have written about times, for example, about…
10:26City of eternal waiting.
10:27That's right.
10:28You know.
10:29Wait he kar te re ker.
10:31But also, I thought we will also ask you about the very…
10:35As in the house of Mr. Priswas.
10:38I mean, he says unaccustomed, right?
10:40And I was writing in my notes in the morning to ask this question from you.
10:44The unaccounted for people.
10:46And I think that term kind of suits or maybe fits with this Bihari thing that we are so unaccounted
10:54for.
10:55Look at the migrant labourers.
10:56Look at what happened to them during Covid.
10:58And it's heartbreaking.
10:59You know, as a reporter, I was there.
11:01And I don't know how…
11:03I mean, I kind of…
11:04I mean, I had a breakdown after a point and I had to go to therapy.
11:08But I don't know how you deal with this day in and day out kind of travelling, kind
11:13of looking at people.
11:14You know, in matter of rats, you kind of look at it.
11:17How do you do that?
11:18In this book…
11:19How do I do that is mainly because writing offers you relief.
11:23In this book, I tell the story, for example, very early in my journey.
11:27So, Chinkee Ji, I'm on page 13, which is the start of this part called Kashmir to Kanyakumarit.
11:34I met a migrant labourer from Bihar.
11:37And I asked him,
11:39Hey, Babu, we have to talk a little bit.
11:41Two, four questions.
11:42Yes.
11:43So, he said to me, before we started talking, he said,
11:45If you write this number, you have to write this number in my hand.
11:48It was a two phone number.
11:49Yes.
11:50He's travelling across the country.
11:52He's going to Indonesia.
11:53Okay?
11:54His only connection to that, with that city, is written here, in pen, where a contractor
12:00has a number written.
12:01Right.
12:02He's going to get there.
12:03So, he had a notebook that I had.
12:05Yes.
12:06That's what I was talking about.
12:07I sent it quickly and sent it.
12:08I sent it quickly.
12:09I sent it quickly.
12:10I sent it quickly.
12:11And I remained struck by his courage, by his ambition.
12:14If we and you are going somewhere, we have to save our phones.
12:17We have to keep an email.
12:19We have to keep an email.
12:20We have to keep an email.
12:21We have to keep an email.
12:22We have to keep an email.
12:23He had nothing.
12:24It is just the courage of those who have nothing else.
12:26Yeah.
12:27But their courage and their hope.
12:28That slender thread of optimism.
12:31How beautifully you put it.
12:33No.
12:34Then I asked him.
12:35His name was Ganesh Rajwar.
12:37I asked him.
12:38Hey, Baba.
12:39All of us are going.
12:41If this train doesn't go.
12:43If you can't go.
12:45What would happen?
12:46Yeah.
12:47Then he says that the country will stop.
12:49If we don't work.
12:51If we don't go.
12:52Then the country will stop.
12:53And that is a statement about these unaccounted lives.
12:57Yeah.
12:58These people who are invisible.
12:59Yeah.
13:00If you are a mani.
13:01If you are a mani.
13:02You will have to be married.
13:03You will have to be married.
13:04The son of a marriage.
13:05You will have to take care of the whole world.
13:06And to be able to acknowledge the whole world.
13:08Yeah.
13:09But how we are living our lives.
13:11We never encounter it.
13:12Exactly.
13:13So I am privileged to travel, find a great resource in trying to attend to the realities of these lives, which would otherwise go unnoticed and unhoused.
13:25Completely, because you know the novelistic form allows you to do that.
13:29And you know we have always kind of believed in, I studied literature.
13:33I don't know, I mean I just feel that there is something to confront all this, right?
13:37And as a writer…
13:39When you studied literature, did you find a book or something that told this story or did you find a home there also?
13:46Many. In fact, when I was growing up I read a lot of Russian books in Bihar, Radhunga Press and People's Press.
13:53Sure, sure, sure.
13:54Beautiful heart covers and I collected my nana.
13:58Oh, yes, I have seen those posts.
13:59Yeah.
14:00In fact, I had a lot of excitement for many days that you called Fernando Pessoa.
14:05Yeah, Fernando Pessoa.
14:06When I was given a book, I thought that I didn't study it.
14:11So then I have read him too, so now…
14:12The book of Disquiet.
14:12The book of Disquiet.
14:13What a disturbing book.
14:14The book of Disquiet.
14:15The book of Disquiet.
14:16The book of Disquiet.
14:17I thought that literature basically shapes a lot of your political thought and for a long time in Outlook and that's why we also started this podcast series to kind of look at people who are, I mean, to be more inclusive, like why shouldn't journalism include any of this and we've done poetry issues and all of that and you have written for us.
14:38You have written for us, so I just wanted to also ask you because you also call yourself a journalist and you're a writer, how do you navigate both the worlds and how does one feed the other and the other feeds the other?
14:50Well, I'll give you a little bit of a question that if you're an Indian walking on the street of New York City and you're talking about something in Hindi, then if someone else says, you're in America, speak in English, then you can say, no, this is also a part of my identity.
15:11Yes.
15:12So the first thing is that as an immigrant, you're made up of different languages and you're of different realities.
15:18Yes.
15:19In that way, any human being is made up of very many parts.
15:24So many things.
15:25And for me, I have never tried to think that one should be a language of specialization or expertise in a trap.
15:32You should be a writer, a photographer, a journalist, a poet.
15:39And now you're painting also.
15:40Yes.
15:41So, that's what we started with the pandemic.
15:42It's like the old Faiz, he has been a little bit of pride, he has done some love, some work and then we have done some love and other things.
15:50So we have done some love and work too.
15:52No, but that's a very interesting approach because, you know, in fact, when we look at your work, it's very inclusive.
15:58You mean, you take everything and take it.
16:01There's a landscape of India and its critique.
16:03Yes.
16:04And in a very subtle way because we are dealing with so much censorship.
16:07That's right.
16:08I think one of the ways is, that's why when we were doing this thing, you thought that we have already got so much resource, why do we use it?
16:17Say.
16:18Say.
16:19In fact, the piece that you have written is a highly political piece.
16:22Yes.
16:23You talk about…
16:24But it has three paintings also.
16:25Yeah.
16:26It has three paintings.
16:27You talk about memory, you don't name the names and yet you say that, you know, how will you forgive yourself for not taking that name?
16:34Yes.
16:35Yes.
16:36Wow.
16:37But how do you like…
16:38Clearly, I've studied.
16:39But also, I just wanted to ask you that same question because I, when we go out on the field, right?
16:46I mean, we went to do this mental asylum.
16:48It's very difficult for us to handle that.
16:51You know, people think reporters or writers like that.
16:53That's right.
16:54So, the process of your writing is, how do you write and think about it?
16:59Yes.
17:00You know, writing is more therapeutic than it, but it's a bit of a little sorrowful.
17:09It informs you about your work, but in that time, how do you deal with it?
17:14First of all, you have to enter a space, let's say it's the space of the asylum or you enter somewhere else.
17:22What do you do as a writer?
17:25Where I study at Vassar College, I tell you that you have to keep a journal.
17:31So, I want to show those who are watching this that I have got five journals for this journey.
17:39And all different colors.
17:41All different kinds.
17:42Different colors.
17:43This is what always needs to be in a jacket pocket.
17:46It's a very journalistic thing.
17:48So, I always say to my students also that you should have a journal to quickly take.
17:53Now, I was married to Bangalore.
17:56A student who had given their own money, didn't put money.
18:01And someone else was bearing the expenses entirely.
18:04So, I thought that I was a writer who should confront him.
18:07So, when I talked to them, they said that we are a master.
18:10My father said that in terms of money and in terms of money,
18:15it should be a right thing.
18:18So, I thought that you should write quickly.
18:20And after that, I didn't write it, madam.
18:23Then I said that,
18:25Hey, boss.
18:26If you said that, you should notice that.
18:28His father used to say,
18:30Hesab and Prisab should be both right.
18:32Anyway.
18:33So, for the small things,
18:34I tell my students about 50 words.
18:37This is a small thing.
18:38It's a small thing.
18:39This is a travel journey.
18:40It's a long way to write something.
18:42So, every morning, I try to make a drawing.
18:50Yeah.
18:51It's a long way to write.
18:52Yeah.
18:53It's a long way to write.
18:54Yeah.
18:55It's a long way to write.
18:56Okay.
18:57Morning pages.
18:58So, I'll show you three things.
19:01I want to show you a great thing.
19:03Five year diary.
19:05Oh.
19:06So, on one page, madam,
19:09I'll show you five years of the day.
19:12Oh.
19:13So, five.
19:15Yeah.
19:16On one page,
19:17on every page, you can find five days.
19:19The same day in different years.
19:20Yes.
19:21Wow.
19:22And then that will remind you.
19:23Now, you know.
19:26But, if you're full now,
19:28how do you remember?
19:29Leave it.
19:30What do you remember?
19:31What do you remember?
19:32What's your name?
19:33Chinki.
19:34Oh.
19:35So, now,
19:36etc.
19:37What do you remember?
19:38You're writing on this.
19:40So, next year,
19:41on November 26th,
19:42I'll make an entry here.
19:43Okay.
19:44Next year, I'll make it here.
19:45Next year, I'll make it here.
19:46So, on this day,
19:47November 26th,
19:48what happened in the past five years?
19:50We have a whole list.
19:51So, I'll show you four.
19:53For longer interviews,
19:55It's a lot easier.
19:57So, I'll keep this notebook.
19:59It's a good notebook.
20:00Line one.
20:01Line one.
20:02So, when I'm talking,
20:03I'll contribute.
20:04So, these five,
20:05what I'm trying to say is,
20:07you're not a writer,
20:08if you don't have a notebook.
20:09That is true.
20:10If you don't carry a notebook.
20:11So, that is the way,
20:12the entry into the process of creation.
20:14And then,
20:15people say that,
20:16someone said,
20:18my friend Teju Cole said,
20:19if journalism is the first draft of history,
20:23then a journal,
20:24is the first draft of literature.
20:26That is true.
20:27If you read in the journal,
20:28then you can do some literary work.
20:30Yes.
20:31Your question was also,
20:33that once you have documented,
20:34what is sorrowful,
20:35or what is disturbing,
20:37or even for that matter,
20:38what is ecstatic,
20:39how do you deal with that emotion?
20:41Yes.
20:42Many people don't talk about this.
20:44Yes.
20:45I don't do that deal with it.
20:46I don't do that deal with it.
20:47My hair will be red.
20:48It looks good.
20:49It looks good.
20:50It looks good.
20:52But,
20:53that's why I'm talking about this podcast
20:54with friends,
20:55so that you can assure them,
20:56that your life is good.
20:57Yes.
20:58Of course.
20:59There was a writer,
21:00a South African writer.
21:05He was a white South African,
21:07Breton, Breton, Bach.
21:08He was in jail during apartheid,
21:11because he was interested in,
21:13involved in struggles to free the blacks.
21:15Yeah.
21:16So,
21:17when he was in jail,
21:18the journalist asked,
21:20how did you survive prison?
21:22Yeah.
21:23So,
21:24he said,
21:25I did not survive.
21:26So,
21:27I think it's true.
21:29We perform our duty,
21:31by in some ways,
21:32being sensitive to,
21:33alert to,
21:34attentive to,
21:35all the sorrows of the world.
21:37And,
21:38I don't think you've ever escaped it entirely.
21:40Survive it.
21:41Or like the world that we live in now,
21:43is all about,
21:44either here,
21:45or moving on.
21:46That in-between space,
21:47I think,
21:48is what writers and artists inhibit.
21:50Ah,
21:51Inhabit.
21:52I feel,
21:53I mean,
21:54because you are,
21:55I feel like you are there,
21:56in that space.
21:57That's good.
21:58That's right.
21:59You're not letting go in your life.
22:00Yes.
22:01You're not moving on.
22:02You don't want to also.
22:03We don't get nirvana.
22:05We don't have salvation.
22:06We don't need it.
22:07We don't need it.
22:08We don't need it.
22:09We don't need it.
22:10We don't need it.
22:11But,
22:12we don't need it.
22:13We don't need it.
22:14We don't need it.
22:15Yes.
22:16So,
22:17if you are to describe your life,
22:18because you know,
22:19you have been abroad for 40 years,
22:20right?
22:21And,
22:22your subject matter remains here.
22:23They are now from Bihar.
22:24Yes,
22:25There are no action back.
22:26No, no, no.
22:27Both people come too.
22:28Bihar people especially come too.
22:29In the first days,
22:30people order pizza,
22:31they sound different.
22:32But,
22:33we don't want it.
22:34Yes.
22:35So,
22:36how do you,
22:37as a writer,
22:38as a person,
22:39as a person,
22:40who also has to connect deeply,
22:41with a place like Patna,
22:43which is also not like Delhi,
22:44or Cosmopolitan,
22:45for many years.
22:46It's not that way.
22:47It's not that way.
22:48It's provincial Cosmopolitanism.
22:49And then,
22:50you are in New York,
22:51right?
22:52How do you look at identity?
22:53And you have written about this.
22:54Yes.
22:55How do you navigate that?
22:56Because,
22:57when you were at Delhi University,
22:58you had such a moment
22:59that Bihar people
23:00have a lot of fun.
23:01Yes,
23:02the first day,
23:03there was a ragging.
23:04There was a book
23:05in my book,
23:06Orwell,
23:07and they also had fun
23:08that you can understand
23:09that you are Bihari.
23:10So,
23:11I thought,
23:12how do I navigate that?
23:14Look,
23:15in the upstate New York,
23:16where I have a house,
23:17and where you want to come
23:18and you haven't come.
23:19What do you think?
23:20There is a cemetery.
23:21There is a cemetery.
23:23and there is a cemetery.
23:24If you go to the cemetery,
23:26there is a cemetery where you go.
23:27There is a cemetery where the cemetery is.
23:31The cemetery of Hinduism.
23:35Oh.
23:36The name is Privat Devi.
23:37I have heard about it and of itsrinting.
23:39Where is Poonne from?
23:41This is the first drinking doctor of India.
23:43Oh.
23:48What is a Christian family in Pennsylvania,
23:52in Pennsylvania, they gave a donation to America, and in Pennsylvania, they got a degree
24:02and they came back to their marriage. Two years later, they had a childbirth from TV.
24:09But after cremation, the ashes of their family, which was their sponsoring family,
24:15they had buried them in their honor.
24:19I'm listening to this story. I forgot one thing.
24:22Venus, all the craters are named after women.
24:29Oh, I didn't know that.
24:30Yes, because Venus, as you know, is considered the feminine planet.
24:34And in this place, a crater also has a name.
24:37So, I want to say that small beginnings, but you end up in Antiriksh.
24:42So, for me, the question of identity is that of travel.
24:46Where do you feel at home then? Where do you return to?
24:58I was just saying that my home is not really, has been only a part of it, I think of it as home.
25:09I am, I return to the page. The written page or the printed page.
25:14That's your home.
25:15That is my home.
25:16I am, I am, I am, I am, I am, I am, I am, I am, I am connecting here.
25:24Now, I am able to take a breath here.
25:25Does that sound alright to you?
25:27Completely.
25:28Like, I feel very…
25:29Does this mean that you will send it one day?
25:30Yes.
25:34And the question of identity, because you know, an immigrant is an identity.
25:38In Bihar, it was an immigrant identity.
25:40There were the Girmitians, the Bihar, everything.
25:43In fact, a few days ago, I met some of these granddaughters, great granddaughters, who had come to look for home.
25:50Home, yeah.
25:51And there was this…
25:52They came from the Caribbean or something?
25:53Yes.
25:54And they are still, they are living in the Netherlands.
25:56So, Bihar Museum, I think, there was this fantastic artist, and Sarojini Lewis.
26:02So, he had a gown.
26:03Okay, okay.
26:04Now, one gown was found somewhere.
26:05Wow.
26:06But the other gown was found somewhere.
26:07The other gown was not found somewhere.
26:09The accounts that her great grandfather, Trinidad Tobago, after that.
26:15How did he reconstruct it?
26:17Somehow, I feel that…
26:18In my case, I have a gown here.
26:20A half a gown is in Patna.
26:21Right.
26:22You know, I mean, I feel homeless almost, you know.
26:24So, that identity is reconstruction.
26:27How do you reconstruct?
26:29And how do you look at facts as an immigrant?
26:32If you are writing about Patna,
26:34in Patna, there is a lot of changes.
26:36If you go to Patna, there is a lot of changes.
26:39I don't know what the question is.
26:40Yes, but I don't understand.
26:42Because I always think about this.
26:44So, I have some thoughts to share on that matter.
26:47Some years ago, I went to the Caribbean.
26:51And my experience in Trinidad was that I, as a writer, had been much influenced by V.S. Naipaul.
26:57Yeah.
26:58V.S. Naipaul was looking at his home.
27:01He came here.
27:02And the area of darkness came out of his great disappointment with the land.
27:05Yeah.
27:06I thought I could do a journey in reverse, so I went to Trinidad.
27:09And I also found a film.
27:10If people are interested, they can watch this documentary called Pure Chutney.
27:16I found names.
27:19I found faces that one finds only in deep Sahabad.
27:23Because that peasantry was taken there and they stayed there.
27:29So, I am very interested in the travel that has produced a sense both of difference and something that has remained as a residual of your past.
27:39Yeah.
27:40And to account that is my job.
27:43For example, one quick instance about that experience.
27:47In Trinidad and Caribbean, Indian music and black music mingled to produce what is now called chutney music.
27:55Oh, I didn't know that is chutney music.
27:57Yes.
27:58Yes.
27:59If you tell her at a store, CD store or whatever, give me the new chutney music, so they will give it to you.
28:06But how did that happen?
28:08Indian parents, conservative, wanting to police the sexuality of their daughters, were not interested in them being exposed to black music and going to parties.
28:19So, instead, it was this music that was produced to be played at Indian Shadis and Indian things and Indian parties.
28:26And it became both a way of mixing, but also a way of controlling identity.
28:31So, yeh kahani likhna is, I think, my job.
28:34And that is that tracking, I think, is precisely where migrant writers need to invest their histories.
28:43Not so much in nostalgia, though there can be affection.
28:47Not so much in celebrating only solitude, though there can be that too.
28:51But instead in tracking, what kinds of changes have brought us to that place?
28:55How does someone like Mamdani arise?
28:57Yeah.
28:58So, the other question I wanted to ask was,
29:02This is a moment of great churning.
29:05In India, elsewhere, across the world, there are wars happening.
29:09There are all kinds of things happening.
29:11Things that we probably are even shocked to accept.
29:15And that is very apparent in your writing also.
29:18Very beautiful, subtle sentences.
29:20You actually challenge a lot of these things, right?
29:23So, how do you look at yourself as an Indian now?
29:26Or do you look at yourself as an Indian?
29:28Do you think, you know, you said a migrant writer.
29:31Now, is a migrant writer rooted here?
29:36Or rooted in the train?
29:38Or rooted there?
29:39I don't know.
29:40Yeah.
29:41A very strange thing is that if I come,
29:43like if I come to the market,
29:45and if there is a temple in Kunea,
29:47if there is a temple in Kunea,
29:49Gopal Bhagavan Ji.
29:50In that temple,
29:52there are a lot of things that someone will say,
29:54Sir, you want to sell dollars?
29:56Because he thinks that I have come from abroad.
29:58He is seeing something.
29:59Yeah.
30:00So, you come to the house,
30:01but you are seen as a foreigner.
30:02Yeah.
30:03If I go outside,
30:04if I step into a hall,
30:06or a public space in England,
30:08in America or England,
30:09I am seen as the Indian, right?
30:11Yeah.
30:12That Indian man over there.
30:13Yeah.
30:14Then where are you?
30:15No.
30:16I am the one who sees that,
30:17I am there.
30:18I am there.
30:19I am there.
30:20Yeah.
30:21And exploring,
30:22how to define oneself,
30:23and how to say something,
30:25this is who I am.
30:28So,
30:29it's a strange place.
30:31And as I said,
30:32I feel that,
30:33when I grasp language,
30:35and I am able to produce a story,
30:36or a narrative,
30:37that is where I really come home to it.
30:39Yeah.
30:40But that aside,
30:42because I have said that before,
30:44I want to say,
30:45when I see someone,
30:47who is doing the right thing,
30:49or who is creating,
30:50because this podcast is also about creating something,
30:52that is inspiring.
30:53Yeah.
30:54When I think someone is doing something wonderful,
30:57and they are from India,
30:58then I am Indian.
30:59Hmm.
31:00When I also see,
31:01on the other hand,
31:02that someone is talking with someone,
31:05or someone is preaching communalism,
31:09or hatred,
31:10someone is giving someone's house,
31:13so I feel,
31:14as an Indian,
31:15also feel like protesting.
31:16Hmm.
31:17Hmm.
31:18So I am...
31:19How do you protest?
31:20Mostly in my writing.
31:21Hmm.
31:22Hmm.
31:23Hmm.
31:24Hmm.
31:25Hmm.
31:26Hmm.
31:27Hmm.
31:28Hmm.
31:29Hmm.
31:30Indeed.
31:31That's not something,
31:32or…
31:33Ah,
31:34let me first say,
31:35That as a writer,
31:36I do not feel like it is my main job
31:37is to join a procession,
31:38or to write a petition.
31:39Yeah.
31:40I do not feel like it.
31:41Yeah.
31:42I rather would like to think,
31:43Whare what can I do something that has not been said before?
31:44Hmm.
31:45And how can I do something that addresses the complexity of a situation?
31:48situation what and should i use non-fiction should i use journalism or should i use fiction so many
31:53mediums to think in deeply original ways rather than to do something that simply satisfies an
32:03impulse towards righteousness or also as a prescribed thing you know today morning in
32:09fact i had shared something about zady smith right something about being a woman and
32:14and pat comes and reply i mean i shared something that i identified with her views on how women
32:20feel and then somebody said oh by the way do you know her have you read about her views on
32:24and i'm like this cancel culture it's a bit much like why everybody is supposed to go by prescription
32:32like i may like something that you have written yes and i mean not and you may dislike something
32:36else that you haven't written and even among friends yeah there should be a certain kind of
32:42acknowledgement of a range of complexity and difference you know yeah otherwise it becomes
32:47very boring huh life has to be life is rich life is messy yeah life is pure chutney and one question
32:56that i've always wanted to ask you about nostalgia you know this is so much about nostalgia spoken
33:03felt uh people say it's like rose colored glasses when you look at the past uh lot of people have
33:10talked about memory as landscape memory as imagination memory as a very selective kind of you know how
33:16does the brain work right and i think the writer a writer like you especially who's relying heavily
33:22on memory now in order to explore and kind of move forward from there right like so for example
33:28matter of rats where you look at you know you know patna right so it's a nostalgia
33:32also there's a dismantling also there's a dismantling also there's a dismantling
33:34absolutely absolutely what is nostalgia how do you
33:37by john didion yeah
33:43yeah
33:45in which she's trying to remember her youth
33:48when she had to sit on a train and journey to burcliffe from sacramento and she can remember what
33:58she calls the rancidity of the butter and she called the rancidity of the butter and she
34:01called the butter of the cat taste yeah okay so when i read the passage i remember that when i
34:07went to the park and used to cross the steamer on the steamer and made the steamer on coal and fire
34:22and then we used to put butter on the butter on the other side of the nut and then we kept it
34:25so i remember the taste of the taste that i remember that i remember that 50 or 55 years ago
34:28so it was to remember that it was also a nostalgia too
34:31But I also have a different feeling about nostalgia, because I have a line in Bombay, London, New York, that in diaspora, the soft emotion of nostalgia has been turned into the hard emotion of fundamentalism.
34:45Exactly.
34:46So people say, you are nostalgic for an old India, but you are using that affection or that imagined affection to turn into something brutal and violent against those who represent indifference.
35:01No, I also think there is a great nostalgia for this glorious India, which was in a lifetime, which can also be transferred to a memory, or is it not?
35:09Yes. And it's often delusional, often based on something unreal. So how to at once have an effective sense of the past, the affective past, which affects you, but yet be skeptical of it, I think it's the place to be.
35:23How do you do it?
35:25I often actually do not, I succumb to nostalgia. I also think about the woman I loved when I was in Hindu college, you know, so I'm shaken to the core.
35:35Is that the same?
35:37Yes, it happens. It happens to me.
35:39People say, it's embarrassing to have boyfriends, really.
35:44No, brother. We have done everything.
35:48I actually wrote to the woman, you know, nothing happened between us, but we used to write a lot of letters at that time.
35:52Oh, yeah, those were.
35:53When I was a student in Hindu.
35:55So, so many years later, I wrote to her. You know, she's a well-known academic, and I said, do you remember me?
36:01She said, I would love to get together again, 40 years later, and ask how little we knew.
36:07You know, just talk about it. She said, I will do it. But it hasn't happened until now.
36:11But it's a nice, beautiful thing. I also feel that Biharis, they are experts at waiting. I mean, the first time Bihar is a transformer.
36:26You know, the language itself is so innocent. And so matter-of-fact, you know, my house is here, but let me open the TV.
36:35But he started to dismantle the TV. I said, let me open the TV. I mean, let me open it.
36:40No, no, no, we are experts at waiting because we are connoisseurs of suffering.
36:45Yeah, why?
36:46And because there are things that happen, there are things that happen, so sit here, brother.
36:49And the train doesn't come. The train doesn't come.
36:52Then sit here, where is it? One day.
36:53No, this is a political context, like the elections in Bihar. And you have observed the elections. A lot of our friends observed.
37:00I mean, as Bihari people, we had that. Even though we may vote here. I mean, I voted there.
37:06But, you know, the one discussion was that, okay, academics are writing, reportage is also doing.
37:12But Bihar's soul is the soul that we had written for writing.
37:16You have written that. So, we thought that in this podcast, we will answer that.
37:20What is the soul? Why do we understand that? What is the soul? Why do we understand that?
37:25What is the soul? I mean, we never saw that, like when we went to Covid,
37:29so, you know, what is the mistake of Modi or Niti?
37:33And I went through all that migrant corridor.
37:36So, we have to understand that, like if we look at the other places,
37:40there is an ambition, there is a lot of things.
37:42It is good, but it is very strange.
37:44Yes, right.
37:45Why? What is the soul?
37:47Because you have the advantage of observing from the outside also.
37:51Now, you talked about Covid.
37:54So, there was a very strange story.
37:57There is a person who has a child who has had his father's father,
38:01who is maybe a child or a child,
38:02and he is sitting on a cycle and sitting on a cycle.
38:04The soul.
38:05The soul.
38:06The soul.
38:07The soul of the soul.
38:08The soul.
38:09The soul of the soul.
38:10She crossed the whole breadth of the country.
38:11Exactly.
38:12Drawing her father on a bicycle.
38:13And then.
38:14The soul of the soul.
38:15Yes.
38:16And after this achievement,
38:17I read a news that in America,
38:19I was there that night.
38:20And Trump's daughter also put something on Twitter.
38:21Yes.
38:22Yes.
38:23And then, another migrant, during Covid, during lockdown,
38:24left a note saying that,
38:26I am going to take your cycle.
38:28I am going to take your cycle.
38:30I have a child who cannot go.
38:45It cannot go.
38:46It cannot go.
38:47It is necessary.
38:48It is necessary.
38:49If it is possible,
38:50you will forgive me.
38:51I am the only one that.
38:54Acts of wonderful humanity,
38:57that come from a place of having so little.
39:00Yes.
39:01And yet having so much of emotion,
39:03or sympathy,
39:04or imagination,
39:05to be able to say something,
39:07that is so revealing.
39:09It is so sad also.
39:10It is very sad.
39:12And all our political leaders have contempt for them,
39:17because they offer us so little.
39:19They offer these people,
39:20who have all this to offer us in return,
39:23so little.
39:24And what are their hopes,
39:27they trade them,
39:29their votes,
39:30which lead to their own prosperity,
39:33but the greater impoverishment of the masses.
39:36Yes.
39:37They are going to be the same.
39:39But why do we accept it?
39:42It is so easy.
39:43I am asking them to leave them.
39:46What is wrong?
39:47Let us leave them.
39:48What is wrong?
39:49We are going to be the same.
39:50Yes.
39:51We are going to be the same.
39:52But on the other hand,
39:53we are going to be the same.
39:54But Bihar has been the site of repeated revolutions,
39:57repeated agitations.
39:58People do rise up.
40:00And, you know,
40:02as the old book shows,
40:05Bihar shows the way.
40:06It is a title of a good book,
40:08which is also documenting how agitations have arisen in Bihar.
40:14We always say that it is the land of the Buddha.
40:18Because Buddha found enlightenment,
40:21he actually went through,
40:23he endured suffering to arrive at enlightenment.
40:25At that level.
40:26So, maybe we have internalized that.
40:29Or maybe we are so used to waiting even for a revolution.
40:31That's why.
40:32We are such experts at waiting.
40:35Thank you so much, Amitav Ji,
40:37for talking to us as a friend.
40:39And please read this book,
40:41how traveling actually,
40:43and we travel so less these days, you know,
40:45to figure yourself out.
40:47Discover our truths.
40:48And to kind of confront what is out there.
40:50I think that is,
40:51there is something to confront reality on a train.
40:54And also read his other books.
40:57I would strongly recommend Matter of Rats.
40:59And the one that I read,
41:01Non-Fiction,
41:02which is The Husband of a Fanatic.
41:04And also My Beloved Life.
41:07And I feel that, you know,
41:09there is something about being somebody
41:11who is tackling this identity of being somewhere else,
41:15then somewhere else,
41:17and in between.
41:18And that's why this journey is important.
41:19You know,
41:20we attach very little to journeys actually.
41:21And that's something which is here.
41:24So yeah, thank you.
41:29Bye.
41:305
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