'I write for a few, and my books sell poorly'

Dehradunbased author Irwin Allan Sealyrsquos book The Small Wild Goose Pagoda has been hailed as yet another masterpiece in which the protagonists are three ordinary nay extraordinary workmen and a 433 squareyard piece of land Four months into the release of his book Sealy is still basking in the glory of appreciation and rave reviews that have come his way The book is the seventh milestone in Allan Sealyrsquos 25yearlong journey as a writerAuthor Irwin Allan Sealy Pic courtesySamimitraIn 1988 Sealy then 37 astounded the literary world with his first novel The TrotterNama A Chronicle It was remarkable for an unknown writer then to have been published by Knopf and receive critical acclaim from the literati A year later Penguin published TrotterNamarsquos British and Indian editions The book went on to win the Commonwealth Writersrsquo Prize in 1989 for being the Best First Bookrdquo by a writer in Europe and South AsiaSealyrsquos writing is essentially intuitive and not measured or laboured he admits that he does not have a routine wherein he writes 10001500 words every day He says his heart guides his fingers No wonder then that Sealy does not write a book every year like many authors attempt to do After his book Red An Alphabet 2006 it took Sealy eight years to write The Small Wild Goose PagodaSealy tells sunday midday about why he became a writer and whom he really writes forQ What inspired you to take up writing If you were not a writer what would you have been today A The inspiration to write comes from the writers you revere You dream of producing something that might approach if not match those standards Then you take your time but nothing inferior gets through the gate If I hadnrsquot turned to writing I might have been a quality controller for a pharma company and driven them to bankruptcyQ St Stephenrsquos alumni by and large opt for civil or foreign services even though there have been a few authors among them too Did you then not think of joining the civil servicesA Irsquom not sarkari material I work too hard and only for myselfQ You had once said at a book release function that you did not read newspapers or even watch news channels Have you since become comfortable with print and electronic mediaA I have no interest in this thing called lsquonewsrsquo Therersquos nothing new under the sun mdash just look at the front page of a newspaper from the lsquo60s when I came of age and yoursquoll see how little has changed Therersquos never been a TV in my house but I do browse the net and trawl the worldrsquos media from the New York Times to the Hindu As a young man I was what you might call lsquopoliticalrsquo but nowadays I generally click on a human interest story The Internet is a great gift to someone living in a mofussil town and unlike TV yoursquore in controlQ What really motivated you to write Pagoda Had you conceptualised it in its entirety from the very beginning or did it gradually evolve as you began constructing itA Itrsquos a book about labour the labour of building and the labour of writing It most certainly evolved but I did have a rhythm in mind from the start like that of the seasons Our old mali who is one of the chief characters in the story and a kind of example for me embodies this change and constancy I hope to attain something like that equanimity some dayQ The book has won universal praise Has that translated into sales Which of your books became a bestseller by the Indian yardstick Does your writing pay enough to make a comfortable livingA I have never written a bestseller though The Everest Hotel was actually pirated back in 1998 Both facts leave me unreasonably pleased My books sell poorly but then I write for a thousand people at most not 10 or a hundred thousand Irsquom middle class well off by any local measure Live too comfortably and your writing suffersQ Most people find in you an interesting and lively conversationalist What is your social life like A I have a small circle of valley folk whose friendship I greatly value as you get closer to the centre of that circle the talk gets freer and wilder Itrsquos very good for example to have a poet like Arvind Krishna Mehrotra just up the road and thanks to email Irsquom right next door to the most farflung friendsQ I understand you donrsquot have a regular writing routine What is your writing process likeA My output is pitiful especially lately when Irsquove turned into wardboycummali Prolonged physical work leaves you drained and unfit for writing but Irsquom still making notes The raw stage of writing is in any case far more pleasurable than the finished Writing hours vary widely depending on the circumstances certain books were nightowl music others dawn birds During the day therersquos housework and general upkeep I sleep four hours a nightQ Has your writing career given you what is called job satisfaction Have you reached the goals you carved for yourselfA The satisfactions of writing are immense and to my mind immeasurable Irsquom convinced that they mdash not your royalties mdash are your earnings The thresholds are reachable crossable the ceilings you canrsquot hope to touch Chekhov is one ceiling Calvino is another Babel a third and so on all those idols I spoke of earlierQ How do you feel about the praise for hellip Pagoda Whatrsquos nextA The praise is gratifying when it zeroes in on details you yourself were pleased with itrsquos recognition of that kind that matters things you were hoping wouldnrsquot go abegging Next is a long poem a book of essays and a novel of a new kind altogetherRaj Kanwar is a Dehradunbased author and freelance journalist