Arundhati Roy: I'm alive because I'm privileged

Arundhati RoyChaotic slangy messy superficial The audacious and most condemning review yet of the mostawaited Indian novel of this decade unsettled many book lovers when it came out early this week Reviewer Eileen Battersby minced no words in her scathing attack of the book shredding an effort of 10 years piece by piece word for word Closer home actor and BJP MP Paresh Rawal ruffled feathers when last week he tweeted asking for the same author to be tied to the now infamous Indian army jeep instead of the stone pelter from Kashmir who was paraded as a human shield The immediate trigger was a fake news story attributed to the author where she allegedly condemned the Indian ArmySitting at her home in New Delhi we can imagine writer Arundhati Roy curly wisps of her peppersalt hair carelessly falling on her face half smiling half amused as she absorbs the venom spewed at her Some criticism she needs to steel herself to others like Rawals probably unwarranted and uninformed But Roy is no stranger to this hate campaign Two decades of activism has taught her to take things in her stride Having been charged with sedition back in 2010 for her alleged antiIndia speeches and later being derided as enemy of the nation for sympathising with the Maoist cause has taught her one lesson her writing will always singe if not destroyHer new novel The Ministry of Utmost Happiness Penguin second only in 20 years comes long after the celebrations of winning the Booker Prize for The God of Small Things But unlike the first book when Roy came with zero baggage the second one has the writer pigeonholed as a firebrand activist taking her cause forwardWhile the book doesnt disappoint to that effect in an email interview Roy makes it clear that her fiction should not be compared with the reality of her polemic essays and nonfiction The Ministry of Utmost Happiness is born of many years of travelling thinking reading and writing The political writing my essays are also born of that And yet they are completely different creatures says Roy The essays are urgent political interventions that were made when things were closing inhellip they trace the battle lines they take sides The novel attempts to create a universehellip a way of seeing I would never write a novel that is a disguised manifesto peopled with mechanical characters who are slaves to that enterpriseYet almost everything in the novel spells out the problem that has plagued India in the turn of this century and before From Ayodhya to the Anna Hazare movement the steady decline of the Congress burning militancy in Kashmir the Maoist insurgency and the rising saffron tide helmed by a leader whose story she dangerously unveils in the Gujarat Riots of 2002 Roy spares no moment in modern Indian history while weaving her narrative Listening carefully to the music Catching the beat Mastering the movement Knowing the geography of the stage on which you perform she says while hinting why so many conflicting ideas movements and causes take centrestage in the book But for Roy there is no larger purpose than telling a grand tender beautiful story The Ministry is not just about people its about animals landscapes cities valleys mountains music and poetry too she clarifiesSometimes it all feels like an overdone hodgepodge While the characters especially that of the hijras Anjum and Tilottama are beautifully fleshed out the many layers of stories and back histories can leave you high and dry but not before reeling you inRoys groundwork is however strong and her prose lends the novel enough urgency for one to stand and take noticeThe writer doesnt reveal this urgency in her writing also one of the reasons why The Ministry took so long to pen I did not feel under any pressure whatsoever to write another novel she says of the time after TGOST when she made a sudden leap as a literary giant to reckon with I have never thought of it as a duty I always said that I would write another novel if I had another novel to write And even when the characters in The Ministry began to visit me which was about 10 years ago I was in no hurry I knew it would take its time adds RoyAll said and done one cant deny that the writer is among the few shining superstars of the literary world The attention is not what counts Only the quality of the writing counts she says Her bittersweet and enduring prose reflect thatAnd theres never a moment when Roy is not writing Her obsession with aerobics doesnt stand a chance either Even when I work out Im writing Im always writing says Roy who describes herself as a disciplined writer If and when she takes a break from writing and activism it is to bite her dogsStirring controversy for things she said and never said no longer disturb her Lately many people have been lynched by mobs because of fake news and rumours lynched while policemen and people looked on Its become normal life in India Im privileged to be alive Or maybe Im alive because Im privileged