Q. What do you think are your strengths and weaknesses as a writer?
Very hard to say that. What I do think I know for sure is that what I have done is to dismiss the notion that Indian writing needs to have the mandatory exotic elements. And to establish that what endures is the story and the story telling rather than just beautiful writing.

Q. How did your career in advertising help you in your writing?
An eye for detail. Prose that isn’t verbose or cumbersome. And I tend to be ruthless when I edit my work. Best of all, it got me used to the idea of rejection which allowed me to stay with my belief that I will write as I see fit and if no one wants to publish me the way I write, then so be it....I don’t mind editing, in fact, each one of my editors think I ma one of their most reasonable authors but I don’t allow anyone to negotiate the premise of my work.

Q. Why did you explore the male psyche in The Better Man, which makes a universal statement on the theme of hope through change?
Two reasons. Exploring the male psyche was that much more challenging. And a 58 year old bachelor would make me reach into a realm that was completely out of my everyday life....Later it made sense because most readers tend to think that a first novel is autobiographical. I hate public scrutiny of my personal life and this book tended to be as distant as it could be from my life....

Q. In your next novel, Ladies Coupe, the same theme is reiterated but the protagonist is a woman.
How different was the experience when you delved into the mind of a woman?
I think in some sense writers lose their sexuality when they walk into the world of words; I believe that writers ought to be able to slip under the skins of bother men and women. Only then will the writing and the characters have credibility and strength. There are men and women characters and sometimes a crossover but never male or female literature.

Q. What were you trying to say by this gender change in Ladies Coupe?
I see LC as a contemporary novel about the contemporary Indian woman and what it means to be her.
It isn't easy to be a contemporary Indian woman. One the one hand she is aware of her rights and the need for an identity. On the other hand tradition dictates that she submerge it in her role as mother and wife...such a conundrum is exciting for a writer and also very challenging to depict. And as I was also tired of the hackneyed depictions of the Indian woman, I have attempted to show the Indian woman for who she truly is. Someone who has a core of steel despite being wrapped in many layers of tradition.

Q. Your works are replete with subtle shades of humour. How important is the element of humour in your work?
Very. I am and will perhaps never be a comic writer but a work that lacks humour or irony is not complete to me as a reader or writer.

Q. What inspired you to write poetry?
I write poetry as an instant reaction to some deep emotion that stirs me. Sometimes I am trying to fathom the emotion, at other times treasure it as a memory in words. And at other times even unburden myself of the weight of that emotion. So unlike my fiction, it is never a planned process.

Q. Of poetry, fiction, short stories and prose pieces, which one was the toughest to write and why?
Poetry happens.
Fiction requires work. Now the form of fiction I choose to write stems from how I react to a situation. Anecdotal gleanings as short stories and trying to understand why and what becomes the novel. I enjoy the novel the best because it is with me for a long time and gives me ample room and scope to understand and dwell over nuances and details...

Q. What are your views on the postcolonial writings in contemporary literature?
There is a lot of mediocrity and an occasional gem. Honestly though, I hate literature to be tagged.

Q. What interests you other than writing?
Music, cooking, my garden, swimming, ‘standing and staring'....

Q. What are you planning to write next?
I have just finished work on two children's books. A collection of 50 Indian myths and 30 world myths. It will be published by Puffin India [the children's imprint of Penguin Books] later this year.
I have started work on my next novel. It is about a male dancer. It will be set in Kerala and will span a century. The book will explore the theme of artistic success.

Interviewed by Satarupa Ray

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