'Devdas was a flawed character'

quotA lot of literature has been translated into Bollywood movies and films are being made into books The relationship between the two is incestuous The worlds have collided Bollywood and literature have started looking at each other as complementary arts Bollywood is a driver The world is looking at us through a tint window you call Bollywoodquot Sheikh said in a candid chat Bollywood writer Mushtaq Sheikh has documented 39Devdas The Indian Hamlet39 The Bollywood writer who has documented 39Devdas The Indian Hamlet39 39The Making of Ashoka39 and 39The Making of Om Shanti Om39 is best known for 39Still Reading Khan39 a biography of superstar Shah Rukh Khan and the screenplays of 39RAOne39 39Om Shanti Om39 and 39Billu Barber39 Sheikh39s biography of Shah Rukh Khan has been released recently in a paperback edition The writer who spent 15 years in Mumbai as a film journalist before taking to scripting screenplays and documenting Bollywood for posterity said quotTill a few years ago films were being relegated in the world of books and no one was documenting cinema the mirror of the time for generations to comequot quotReaders wanted to know how modern and contemporary classics like 39Pyaasa39 and 39Kasme Vaade39 had been made but there was no written record I was one of the trendsetters who started writing about the making of films Each one of my books is differentquot the writer said Sheikh said his account of the movie Ashoka was quotmore researchbased about the life of the Hindu king who became a Buddhistquot quotI explored the myths connected with Ashoka in context of the making of the movie Then I pitched both of them to get an interesting mix of facts and historyquot Sheikh said 39Devdas The Indian Hamlet39 in contrast was more about the character quotI researched 16 versions of Devdas based on a short story by Bengali writer Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay made all over the country in languages like Malayalam Telugu and Bengali The interpretations of how Devdas and Paro thought about their lives and about each other are different Each version adds a different colour to Devdas and is connected to the region it was made Devdas was a flawed character and anything which is flawed is attractive to usquot he said quotThe book about 39Om Shanti Om39 was about the making of the moviequot he said quotI put in an element of kitsch so that it was fun and read faster It was not academic because I was on the sets every dayquot 39Still Reading Khan39 the biography of Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan published in 2006 however still remains the most special book in Sheikh39s life quotI was writing about a man who does wear intelligence on his sleeve Shah Rukh has worn success as a tuxedo and I had to do justice to the character where I had to pay tribute to a man who takes life with a pinch of saltquot Sheikh said quotAccess was the key card to the biography I was a journalist when I met him for the first time and I knew there was a story to be told I had to write a book Our friendship became a bond And we started sharing work space and personal spacequot the writer said The Bollywood writer has embarked on a new course He is working on a collection of children39s fantasy tales like the Aesop39s fables inspired by the stories he told Zidane and Zia his nephew and niece u00a0