Why Do I Write
I had been writing almost non-stop for the last eight years
in my post retirement period. While I was in service, in keeping with the
requirements of my academic profession my writings were limited to books,
essays and lectures on literature. The
productive post retirement phase has given
me plenty of time to read and write
books on subjects other than literature such as Higher Education, Inter-Religious Harmony and even my life
story. The last mentioned is an attempt to live through my long years -75 to be
precise and it is not to be mistaken as the memoirs of a celebrity meant to be
inspirational and motivational. It is simply a recount of a life lived long in
time and short in succulence. Not a day passes without my fingers thumping on
the laptop since I have developed a new interest in blogging. My blogs span
politics, current affairs and personal observations on life around us.
But after eight years, a kind of weariness has come over me.
The title of this piece expresses the constant echo within me as to why I
write. In fact no one reads these days and among those who read, majority
prefers pulp fiction or sensational exposure of celebrities in glossy magazines
but not any serious stuff. When I sent complimentary copies of my book on Higher Education to
my friends and close relatives, apart from the usual response –‘Great’, ‘Well
done’ or ‘Indeed a much needed book for our times’ etc, everyone
including academics and Vice- Chancellors (for whom, I thought the book will be
of great value) did not thumb beyond the Foreword page and that too because the
Foreword was written by a well known academician and Professor of history. The
few books that the publisher gave me as complimentary remain in my bookshelf,
slowly turning yellowish-brown with the fine dust that Delhi imports from the
Rajasthan desert. The winter publication of this book has turned into a summer
of discontent for me. I dread the fate of my next couple of books on Religious Harmony and Literary Essays as their audience will be limited to a small number of research scholars in Phiosophy and Literature.. My life story –Creative Truth-as I have titled it is meant for posterity and so
currently it is so to say in a vault, kept concealed from inquisitive eyes.
I have no tangible evidence of anyone reading the stuff I
dispense freely on my blog except what the statistics show as the number of
page views of these blogs. A slender
part of these statistics is flattering but more often than not, the articles that
I felt (in all modesty and humility) as my intellectual tour de force have scarcely
received any hits. Maybe my writings often interspersed with literary
quotations are not light reading stuff. Some of the blogs are long and may not
interest the insta-blog readers. Maybe the
contents of the blogs particularly about WE, the people of India and about the steep
decline of our political discourse make the readers uncomfortable and they
would like the proverbial cat close their eyes to remain in the dark. How I
wish I had received at least negative rejoinders than been humiliated and
ignored for my pretentious claims to cerebral status! Disappointed over nil
blog responses, I e-mailed a few select articles to some of my friends who have
a passion for reading anything that comes their way in the hope of receiving
their comments. But much to my distress, I did not receive even an
acknowledgement of my mail giving rise to the fundamental question as to whom I
write for. The second question ‘for whom do I write’ hurts while the first ‘Why
do I write’ is baffling.
Let me try to find honest answers to the two questions- as to
why and for whom do I write? Am I unique in subjecting myself to self inquisition?
Or is this kind of self interrogation common to all writers like me who fail to
make the writers’ grade? I cannot vouch for others, but I will be honest to
admit being often racked with such questions that obliquely reflect the
futility of my endeavour as a wordsmith. The incessant questioning as to why I
write makes me skeptical about the worthwhileness of articulating my thoughts
on paper. Do I write for others or do I write for my own pride and pleasure of
creating something out of myself like a mother delivering her child? The labour
pain of my writer’s cramp has been a waste in the absence of an appreciative
audience; otherwise it should have given me the joy of creating a beautiful and
interesting architecture of words.
I confess I have no audience. Someone
to whom I confided my hurt pride was kind enough to suggest that I send them to
the newspapers/newsmagazines for wider circulation. I tried quite a few times
and the silence of the media was more devastating to my pride than the silence
of the blog readers. In a polite manner by maintaining discreet silence, the
media editors made me recognize the folly of approaching them with writings which
in their view were substandard that cannot be seen in black and white in their
newspapers/magazines. Gone are the days
when I used to get back my typed article with a polite letter of regret. But in
this instamatic age, when e- mail has displaced the snail mail, I have to wait
for a few days to understand that my article has been deleted from the editor’s
mail-box. The silence of media today is so powerful as never to say
anything that doesn't improve on silence. Since my
self esteem would not allow me to accept my writings were sub standard, I often comfort myself by
attributing the rejection of my articles
to my aam admi status that does not have the celebrity tag to ascend up the hallowed
portals of the media.
So the second question- for whom I
write remains a question without an answer as no one really needs me to write
for him/her. I am not a blue blooded writer and therefore I remain an orphan
writer in search of adoption. And so to the question, why do I write? Though I
am no Samuel Beckett, the Nobel laureate, his words ring true even for writers
like me with no exceptional ability. Beckett , when asked about the nature of
contemporary art said: ‘…there is
nothing to express, nothing with which to express, nothing from which to
express, no power to express, no desire to express, together with the obligation to express.’ Writing is a
compulsive act almost genetic for those who want to express even if there is nothing
to express, who have a feel for the language even when there is nothing with
which to express. On the days I do not
write, I feel emptiness within and a sense of one more wasted day especially
when my days can be counted. The obligation to express is an obligation to
myself, to weave a garland of words that would satisfy my artistic ego, to
express as Wordsworth says ‘ the splendour in the grass and glory in the
flower’ ,to lighten the burden of thoughts that weigh heavily on our hearts ,
to let out the weight of emotions that
lie too deep for tears and though last, but not the least, to experience the pleasure of finding something ordinary in
the extraordinary and something extraordinary in the ordinary. When one retires
from active life, when one’s physique and athleticism are in the decline, the
vitality of the mind becomes paradoxically intense as it has been fortified by age-long life experiences. I no longer have the youthful subjectivity that gives rise
to intensity and passion; instead age has brought with it dispassionate objectivity that helps me to see
into the life of things. At this
advanced period of my life I have no need for crystal gazing as the future is
slowly regressing towards extinction. But the lens of the ageing mind has
retained a sharp focus to see life with crystal clarity. The essence of ageing is the
experience of life in all its greatness and smallness. It may sound incomprehensible and confounding
that the springtime of the soul occurs in our wintry years when we begin to
understand what freedom means-particularly the freedom of the mind. This is a
blissful time when one is not subjected to personal and professional
constraints that stifle the freedom of the mind. There is need to rein in the
expression of ideas and thoughts distilled from life experiences as there is no vested interest to be served. They
are a partial record of a life in search of self understanding. The path to
self knowledge- to know one self is through interpretation of life in all its
myriad facets and through articulation of that discovery. I write for myself.
If in the bargain my writings promote shared awareness and intellectual
nourishment to the odd reader , I may
get a reprieve from charges of egotism and self indulgence.
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