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Manoj Das

Conversation with Bijay Kumar Das

(Recipient of Padma Shri in 2001, and Saraswati Samman, a very prestigious award for literature in the same year, Professor Manoj Das is one of the literary doyens of our country. He has won both Central Sahitya Akademi and Orissa Sahitya Akademi Awards for his collections of short stories. He has also been bestowed upon the highest honour from Orissa, namely Utkal Ratna. He was the editor of the prestigious monthly ‘The Heritage’. As a scholar, thinker and distinguished fiction writer, Manoj Das is well known all over the country and abroad. He has been chosen as Fellow of the Sahitya Akademi in 2006.)

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Of the different forms of creative writing (novel, short story and non-fiction prose) that you have done, are you more comfortable in any one genre than in others? Do you have a preference for any one specific genre?

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he form follows the demand of the content and the demand of the content determines whether it should be a short story or a novel or a non-fiction prose. Once the content has taken hold of me (or vice versa), the form follows spontaneously. Since I have consciously chosen to put across a particular theme in a particular genre of creative writing, I have no special preference for any one of them. Had I any preference, I would have written only in the preferred medium, be it the medium of short story or of novel. As you know, for some themes I have chosen neither the short story form nor the novel form, but the form of the novelette or novella. Coming to non-fiction writing, I have written essays and newspaper columns out of a different kind of commitment, maybe a social commitment.

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How did you start writing?

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To be honest, I started rather unconsciously. I wish I could locate a starting point. It came to me just as one of the means or activities of expression such as speaking, laughing, weeping, singing and playing. Similes and metaphors would get formed in my imagination when I looked at the moon or a swaying tree or the waves of the ocean even when I was in my mother's arms, years, before I learn the alphabet. No, I am not claiming to have been gifted with any extraordinary trait: the same process could be in operation in the case of so many others. But I must claim closeness to the great Valmiki in one respect! If he was inspired to come out with the first-ever verse when agitated over the conduct of a hunter, to the best of my memory I composed my first verse, a piece of satire, out of my agitation over the conduct of our maid who would try to stop me from stealing lumps of sugar from our kitchen store. What a common factor of agitation!

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Were you conscious of any kind of literary tradition when started writing? In retrospect, do you see yourself in the Oriya tradition or Indian English tradition of storytelling?

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I had no theoretical knowledge of any tradition. But since I listener to informal recitation of verses from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata by my mother and once the formal recitation of the entire Bhagavata Purana by a Brahmin, spread over some days for fulfillment of some vow by my parents, naturally I imbibed their influence. So far as story writing is concerned, I heard tales from the Panchatantra and ire Kathasaritasagara, like any other village child and once capable of reading, read the stories of Fakir Mohan, the pioneer of modern Oriya fiction. The Indian English tradition-if at all that could be called a tradition decades ago- was as unknown to me as icebergs jutting out of distant seas. Born and brought up in a remote village, I even did not know that there were what we call English-medium schools! Beyond the English alphabet I learn the language only when I was admitted to a school, Biswanath Academy at Jamalpur, some twenty miles away from my village, in Class V.

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Which particular writers do you admire?

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Valmiki and Vyasa-the founding fathers of Indian literature- and then Gunadhya, Somadeva and Vishnu Sharma. These are the "particular" writers I admire and - more than that - I adore.

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Did you follow any literary model in course of your writing career?

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I did not plan to be a writer; I did not even know that the art and craft of writing could be taught or that there were models to be followed. When some of the younger writers very kindly inform me that I am their model, I wonder who my model was. Influence - yes. I was greatly influenced by those whom I heard and read in my childhood. Folktales, heard from many quarters, also exercised their influence on my writing. No, I did not follow any literary model.

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Your stories treat a wide range of subjects such as animals, birds, ghosts, children, human beings, mysteries, miracles etc.-all woven together. Do you have a pattern?

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I have never planned any pattern. Patterns could have evolved and if so, it is for scholars to identify them.

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Do you give more importance to plot or theme?

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To both—probably in equal degree. For a theme cannot be driven home without an appropriate plot. In a creative mind, I believe they rise simultaneously. Themes a mere idea without plot; the plot is soulless without theme.

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The readers and critics today search for themes overlooking the organization of a story. Do you allow your characters or at least the central character to change in course of the story?

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I understand the law of development of a character, especially of the protagonist. As situations, dialogues and supporting characters are built, aspects of the central character get revealed more and more credibly. But how can the character change — if the author was propelled by the spirit of that character before it had got a concrete personality? No, none of my characters had changed in the course of his or her development.

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Critics often distinguish between 'change' stories (i.e. the stories in which characters change) and 'theme' stories (i.e. the stories in which the author's desire is to enrich the readers' moral perceptiveness) to show their impact on the reader. Which type of stories do you prefer?

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I am unable to determine the generic or theoretical nature of a story either before or after I write it. Concerning the first part of your question, I have already stated that my characters develop, but they do not change from what they were before their portrayal. The character, like a sculptor's vision where he or she is already present. His or her subtle presence is pressing upon the author to give him or her a palpable life or personality.
So far as the second part of your question is concerned, I do not have a preconceived moral ideal to present, though a message, subtle or robust, is inevitably there in any story. It is different with a story I choose to retell or a story written for children where you impart them primary lessons of sound and sensible life. That, needless to say, is not my forte, though I have written a number of such stories to comply with certain demands. My original stories do not plan or anticipate any specific impact. Once written and published, the stories assume their own personalities and cause different response or various degrees of response in different readers.

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Does the writer's capacity to create memorable characters and events depend on his/her belief in the theme?

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Capacity of a writer includes several psychological elements such as his or her understanding of the vicissitudes of life, laws of different planes - from physical, gross and pragmatic to occult and spiritual -laws and forces that mould situations, events and circumstances for the human beings and, last but not the least, the art of creative writing. Such qualities are independent of the writer's belief on a theme. The successful execution of the theme depends on the writer's capacity. However, if you mean by 'belief in the theme' the writer's conviction about its worth, surely, his or her capacity will find better scope for its exercise while handling such a theme.

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You have used folktales, legends, myths and superstitions in your stones. What's the purpose?

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The stories where such elements have been used should themselves justify their use. However, if you demand an answer beyond that, all I can say is, the vastness of life embraces them, is enriched by them and literature will be poorer without their abundant presence in it.

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Irony and parody are important modes of some of your stories. Is it because you want to make the reader aware of the reality that engulfs him?

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Right, when irony and parody serve a specific purpose.

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As a bilingual writer do you find your first language (i.e. Oriya) as a source of strength or hindrance in writing in English?

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As a source of strength, of course!

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You seem to have a great sense of movement in your writing. Could you tell me about your childhood days as depicted in your memories, ‘Chasing the Rainbow’?

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The sense of movement my stories impart is inherent in their themes. My childhood experiences - their rapidity - for example the calm and serene situation of my charming village suddenly being shattered by a devastating cyclone or our affluence being overnight reduced to naught, thanks to our household being plundered by savage bandits twice in quick succession, could have contributed, albeit indirectly, to my approach to life and its fast-moving situations.

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For a writer there is a need to remember the past, so that the readers would not forget that past.

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The writer projects or recreates the past - I mean the past of a culture or a nation or of the world - inevitably in his work, even when that is not his subject. He simply cannot escape doing so. Then there are themes and plots based in the past, as in a historical fiction. If you mean the past of the writer himself, he can bring it up in his literature only when it is important as literature or if he had the gift to promote it to the level of literature. But no write takes up the past so that the readers do not forget it. That is a mission expected to be discharged by historians. By the way, there is nothing wrong in a creative writer becoming a historian, say like H.G. Wells. History then becomes highly readable, though vulnerable to creative onslaughts! Or take for example our own Indian Novelist Bhabani Bhattacharya. His Glimpses of Indian History makes an excellent reading.

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In the present context it is said that one has to be a good reader in order to become a good writer. Your comment, please.

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Much depends on what is meant by a good reader. A fast reader who reads a lot? A keen reader who reads a work with concentration?
I am a slow reader. I have not read much. Coming to concentration, I can muster that for works of great depth and profundity, the works of Sri Aurobindo, for example. You miss much if you miss the import of a single line in the Life Divine. You miss much if your loving attention sways from a single phrase in the epic Savitri. I cannot concentrate on a work of fiction, however interesting it may be, for hours at a stretch. I do not read much. I cannot even proceed with some of the sensationally popular novels of our time beyond the preliminary pages. A few of my friends and readers who know this weakness of mine console me saying that my weakness is in fact a sort of strength, for that helps me retain my originality. I do not know.
"Present context" is a dubious concept. If one intends to eaten up with fashionable trends, if a writer is more eager to circulate in the contemporary market and is ready to compromise with his own spontaneity, the dictum may carry value. In his "present context" how much did Kalidasa read apart from the plays of Bhasa, how much did Valmiki or Vyasa read beyond the Vedas, how much a Homer read, even how much a Shakespeare read, are fathomless questions. I do not say that they have to be my excuse for not reading a lot. But the simple fact is that I cannot read a lot. If reading a lot is the sign of a good writer and if you had considered me a ‘good writer' till date, you may now consider revising your impression!

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Your non-fictional prose, ‘My Little India’, reveals your insight into events as well as human nature, Do you lay emphasis on psychological aspect of human nature?

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I do, naturally, but psychology for me is not what the university prescribes. I believe in the existence of “more things in heaven and earth. Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy". There is a state of consciousness where you realize that it is not past that determines the future, but the future that determines the past. More than psychology, it is the exploration of consciousness, rather an adventure in consciousness, that is the real secret purpose of life.

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Could your memoir, ‘Chasing the Rainbow’  and ‘ My Little India’ be taken as extension of your short story?

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Is that necessary? They belong to a separate genre.

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BKD: Could you tell something about what you are involved in writing

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I have just completed - almost -a complex compilation that had been entrusted to me by Professor D.P. Chattopadhyaya, the renowned scholar who was once a Cabinet minister at the Centre and a Governor too and now Chairman of the Centre for Studies in Civilization, and Professor Kireet Joshi, the distinguished educationist and thinker who was till recently the Chairman of Indian Council of Philosophical Research. I had to edit a volume on the varieties of Yogic experiences through the ages. More than forty noted scholars have contributed to it. It is a part of a massive project under the General Editorship of Professor Chattopadhyaya, bringing out volumes on different aspects of Indian heritage. There are a few other unfinished commissions to be given final touches. Only then I may take up creative writing.

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Awards certainly influence the readers. What about the writers? You have won numerous awards including the Saraswati Samman and the Sahitya Akademi Awards (both national and state) for your creative writing. This year you have been chosen as Fellow of the Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi. Do these awards and honours affect you as a writer?

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I am yet to come across a writer who does not answer this question with an ascetic accent- asserting that he or she does not care for awards! You can only add my name to the list. But who would believe it? You see, there are writers and writers. The values and personal dispositions of everybody cannot be the same. As you have rightly said, awards influence the readers. Sale of a book receiving an award picks up, even when it is not a worthy book. Awards are not given by Oracles, but by human judges. They are expected not only to be impartial, objective and free from bias, but also rich in their understanding and appreciation of genuine creative talent. In reality it is not always like that — though I do not deny that more often than not the right work is chosen for an award. I look forward to a future when award or no award, a work that merits attention should get it. But that is only a dream. Coming to the point, no. I am not elated by awards, but I recognize their social importance. Sometimes I feel that publicity caused by awards highlight works at the cost of more genuine ones that have gone without awards. However, these are realities with which one has to put up.

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You are a very successful bilingual writer-- writing in Oriya and in English for several decades, with equal ease. Therefore you can truly be called as an ambilingual writer. But the question is how do you like to be described as a writer?

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An Indian writer writing in Oriya and English.

(Courtesy:  “The Indian Journal of English Studies”, Vol.XLIV, 2007)

Prof Manoj Das for April Conference 2016

About Manoj Das

For thousands of men, women and children of the past two or three generations, Manoj Das has been the very synonym of light and delight, whose writings in Odia and English inspire in his countless readers faith in the purpose of life and also open up concealed horizons of confidence and compassion in humanity a dire need today.