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Anne-Marie Slaughter “Unfinished Business”

Sheryl Sandberg and I agree on many things. We both encourage women to speak up and take their place at the table; we both want to see many structural changes in the workplace. To some extent the difference between us is largely a matter of which side of the equation to emphasize — a difference that, on my side, at least, is a function of relative age. I would have written a very similar book to Lean In at forty-three, Sandberg’s age when she published her book. My kids were very young and I had never met a work-life challenge that I could not surmount by working harder or hiring people to help out. By fifty-three, when I wrote my article, I found myself in a different place, one that gave me insight into the circumstances and choices facing the many women who have found that for whatever reason, leaning in simply isn’t an option.

Anne-Marie Slaughter’s Unfinished Business was published in 2015. It is a book based upon her extremely popular article published in the Atlantic in 2012, “Why Women Still Can’t Have it All” (July/Aug 2012, http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/07/why-women-still-cant-have-it-all/309020/ ). It went viral. Three years later this book was published and another article in the Atlantic. This time by her husband, Prof. Andrew Moravcsik called, “Why I Put My Wife’s Career First” ( Oct 2015, http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/10/why-i-put-my-wifes-career-first/403240/ ). She also did a TED talk in 2013, ‘Can we all “have it all”?’ ( https://www.ted.com/talks/anne_marie_slaughter_can_we_all_have_it_all?language=en ).

Of late there have been many conversations about women, feminism, the work and home balance etc. Many puritanical feminists firmly believe that men should do their share of household chores and chipping in with parenting etc. Many women are made to feel wretched for not being professional enough at work if they mention their children and family responsibilities as being of concern too. Many women are denied opportunities to grow professionally for being mothers and having a family. Being a single woman or preferably a woman without children raises the chances of professional growth exponentially. But seriously, is it important to lean in so much that either work or family suffers? Why cannot it all be seen as a slow dance that evolves and grows?

Anne-Marie Slaughter’s Unfinished Business is the feminist bible for now. Another text may come along and replace it very soon given with what speed content is being uploaded on the internet. But for now this book works wonderfully well. Its arguments about striking the balance, importance of family and institutional support for working women, essential to have male role models like her husband who opted to look after the children without any hassles and of keeping egos at bay. Many marriages fall apart since it is so deeply ingrained in society that the man should be earning more than the wife and if roles are reversed, even when the husband is supportive, societal pressure can get to be so much that it puts undue stress on the relationship.

Personally I feel that many of the institutional structures are based on a very fixed linear notion of how time operates, inevitably a patriarchal construct. Whereas most women work on “stolen time” especially when there are children involved and they are the primary caregivers. Alas, it is this masculine interpretation of time as being linear that dominates our daily function. Motherhood is a slow, nurturing process and sometimes it is the mother’s presence that is required more than the father’s — an argument that may not go well with too many traditional feminists. Similarly with work responsibilities and one’s career. But it is true. Feminism is not simply about being empowered by acquiring more masculine characteristics to prove that irrespective of being born a woman, you can do everything on an equal if not a better footing than a man. Modern day feminism is about being an empowered woman who has the ability to voice her opinion, make her choices and stand by them. Women negotiate and make choices on a daily basis in whichever space they inhabit. This is why Unfinished Business is relevant for everyone.

Read it.

Anne-Marie Slaughter Unfinished Business Oneworld Publisher, London, 2015. Pb. pp. 330. Rs 499

24 February 2016

Literati – Kids and reading ( 1 February 2015)

31 01 , 2015 3 Comments

My monthly column, Literati, in the Hindu Literary Review was published online ( 31 January 2015) and will be in print ( 1 February 2015). Here is the url http://www.thehindu.com/books/literary-review/literati-a-look-at-the-world-of-books-publishing-and-writers/article6842119.ece. I am also c&p the text below. )

One day a mother asked me how she could get her sons to read. I wondered if the children were off picture and pop-up books too. The mother said, “They are too old for pop-up books! They are in kindergarten.”

In January, Scholastic Inc. published Kids & Family Reading Report (Fifth edition) based on a survey conducted in the US.., but some of the results are valid worldwide. Reading out aloud to children regularly kindles an interest in books, unleashes their imagination, makes them curious and introduces them to a variety of cultural indicators. Children aged six and above began to show signs of easing away from reading for pleasure. A possible reason is that adults want the children to be “independent readers” and so stop reading out aloud. Eighty-three per cent of children across age groups say they love(d) or like(d) being read to a lot — the main reason being it was a special time with parents. With an older age group of children (ages 12-17) who are frequent readers, it was noticed that they read a book of choice independently in school, relied upon e-reading experiences, had access to a large home library, were aware of their reading level and had parents involved in their reading habits.

Ninety-one percent of children aged 6-17 say, “my favourite books are the ones that I have picked out myself.” The majority of kids aged 6-17 (70 per cent) say they want books that “make me laugh.” Kids also want books that “let me use my imagination” (54 per cent), “tell a made-up story” (48 per cent), “have characters I wish I could be like because they’re smart, strong or brave” (43 per cent), “teach me something new” (43 per cent) and “have a mystery or a problem to solve” (41 per cent). While the percentage of children who have read an e-book has increased across all age groups since 2010 (25 vs. 61 per cent), the majority of children who have read an e-book say most of the books they read are in print (77 per cent). Nearly two-thirds of children (65 per cent) — up from 2012 (60 per cent) — agree that they’ll always want to read books in print even though there are e-books available. Heartening news for publishers!

At Digital Book World Conference 2015 (January 13-15, 2015), New York, Linda Zecher, CEO, Houghton Mifflin, said, “You can’t serve content to children, you have to curate.” Mixing a variety of books for younger readers is important — picture books, pop-up books or even explosive pop-up books and poetry. Sudeshna Shome Ghosh, Editorial Director, Red Turtle, says, “With simple words that may have repetitions or rhymes and pictures, these books are easy to reread and even remember by heart. Even as a child grows older, trickier concepts are easier introduced through picture books (where do babies come from, how people/things are same and different, concepts of diversity, human emotions etc.)”. Imprints that specialise in graded reading are Puffin India, Hole Books/Duckbill Books, Read it yourself with Ladybird, Banana Storybooks/Egmont Publishing, Usborne Young reading, Let’s read!/Macmillan, I Can Read!/Harper, Step into Reading/Random House, and Scholastic Reader.

In India, children are fortunate to be exposed to a multi-lingual environment. It is not always easy to locate a single publishing list that will whet all appetites. Instead it has to be “curated” from the moment infants are given cloth and board books and flash cards. Some books for all ages that “work” splendidly are the late Bindia Thapar’s Ka Se Kapade Kaise (Tulika Books); Anushka Ravishankar, Sirish Rao and Durga Bai’s One, Two, Three! (Tara Books), Devdutt Pattanaik’s Pashu: Animal Tales from the Hindu Mythology, Puffin Books; H.S. Raza’s Bindu with Ritu Khoda and Vanita Pai (Scholastic India); What a song! A Bundelkhandi Folk Tale (Eklavya Publication); Rabindranath Tagore’s Clouds and Waves (Katha); Ruskin Bond’s Tigers for Dinner: Tall Tales (Red Turtle) and Nury Vittachi’s The Day it Rained Letters (Hachette India).

As adults we like books that have “pictures”. Few like to admit to the truth. So we disguise it with our preference for heavily illustrated books, photo books, coffee table books and to some extent graphic novels. So why is it with our children we are in a hurry for them to read books that border on the “educational”?

31 January 2015

Guest post: Why “The Lives of Others” makes me afraid, Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar

25 09 , 2014 1 Comment

( While reading ManBooker shortlisted novel, Neel Mukherjee’s The Lives of Others, I began to discuss it with Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar. He is an avid reader. Initially he was happy with the novel, it was well written, but then there was this long silence from him. A few days ago, I got a message from him at 2am to say he was not very comfortable at the portrayal of Santhals in the book. He should know. It is his community. So I asked him to contribute a guest post for my blog. I am posting it as he sent it. )

When I first saw the Indian hardcover edition of Neel Mukherjee’s second novel, The Lives of Others, at a book store in Kolkata in June 2014, I was struck by the familiarity of the contents of the book. Having grown up and lived all my life in a southern corner of the state of Jharkhand, the complexities of a Bengali joint family and the Naxalite movement were familiar issues. However, what was even more familiar – and striking – was the map at the beginning of the novel; for inset in that map were all the places that remind me of home. They are not big or famous places. They are small, district towns and villages. They do not find a regular mention in the media like bigger cities like Kolkata or Delhi do. An incident that takes place in these places has to be very big, remarkable in every way to have people talk about these places. Even if these places find a mention in the front pages of The Telegraph or The Statesman, I am quite sure that many readers won’t remember their names just a mere 24 hours after having read about them. Yet, these are the places whose names I have been hearing ever since I developed the ability to listen to and understand words and names; maybe, since when I was 2 or 3 years old. I am 31 now, and the names of these places fill me with a desire to just run back to my ancestral village or my hometown at the first given opportunity.

I can vouch for the actuality of three places in that inset: Belpahari, Binpur, and Jhargram. I am not too sure of Gidighati and Majgeria. Perhaps, they, too, are real. Perhaps, they are a creation of the author’s imagination. But Belpahari, Binpur and Jhargram are real. They exist. There is another place mentioned a number of times in the novel, giving that place a certain importance, although it does not appear in the map: Gidhni.

The name of my village is Kishoripur. It is the village of my ancestors; the place where my father, grandfather, and all those who came before were born and raised. Kishoripur is a village in Chakulia block of East Singbhum district of Jharkhand, a mere 10 km from the border with West Bengal. Both Gidhni and Belpahari are some 10-15 km from Kishoripur, in two different directions—Gidhni, towards the east; Belpahari, towards the north. Jhargram is some 30-35 km from Kishoripur, towards the east. Binpur is some 20-25 km from Kishoripur, towards the north-east. I remember a saying I have grown up with. Choluk gaadi Belpahari—Let the vehicle go to Belpahari. This is a cry of excitement that village people, who, in earlier times, didn’t usually get to see a car or bus or other automobile, used to make when they boarded a gaadi. The poetry in this simple cry of excitement cannot be missed. Gaadi and Belpahari rhyme with one another. Somewhere in the book, Ghatshila has been mentioned. Ghatshila, the place famous for its copper factory, and for being a favourite weekend getaway among the Bengalis from Kolkata, is the place where my parents used to work and where I have grown up. Ghatshila is my hometown. Belpahari, Binpur, and Jhargram were the reasons that drew me – and, ultimately, made me read – The Lives of Others; while Gidhni and Ghatshila filled me with a feeling of pride that the places I am so familiar with – one of those being my hometown, no less – are being read about by people all over the world.

As I progressed with the novel and the ups and downs in the Ghoshes’ lives, I came across many other familiar places, like, Bali, Nalhati, and Memari. I am working with the government of Jharkhand and am posted in Pakur. Pakur is a district in the Santhal Pargana division of Jharkhand. When I came to join my job in Pakur, I had no idea about the route. So my father accompanied me and we came from Ghatshila to Pakur by road. We passed through four districts in West Bengal – Pashchim Medinipur (western Medinipur, mentioned in the book), Bankura, Bardhaman, and Birbhum – before we entered Jharkhand again and reached Pakur. Nalhati and Memari were two places we passed through. Now, I travel from Ghatshila to Pakur by train. I first travel from Ghatshila to Howrah, from where I catch the train to Pakur. Bali and Nalhati are two stations I pass through. The familiarity provided by these places further drew me into The Lives of Others. I wasn’t reading the book because I wanted to know what happened with the Ghoshes. I was reading The Lives of Others because it was so familiar, because it told me things I knew, because I hoped to find another familiar point in one of its pages, because it seemed to speak to me.

I wasn’t disappointed. The book threw up the names of other familiar places. Jamshedpur, Giridih, Latehar, Chhipodohar, McCluskieganj. I had goose flesh as I read the names of these places and realised that many like me, all over the world, were reading these names.

Not only places, The Lives of Others was familiar also with regards certain terms that I have grown up with. For example, munish. Our family owns land in our village. When I was very little, my grandfather used to talk about letting the munish farm our fields. At that time, I understood that munish meant workers. Men who work in the fields. As I grew up, I learnt that munish meant the sharecroppers who worked our fields for us. This, exactly, is the meaning The Lives of Others gives for the word munish.

Then there were the familiar Bengali sayings. “fourteen forefathers”. When I read this term in Chapter 18, I, despite the sad and fearful context of this chapter, couldn’t help smiling. That is because I have heard people saying the original term: Choddo gushti—and also the comic implications of this term when it is said in anger. Another saying was: “a case of the sieve saying to the colander, “Why do you have so many holes in your arse?””, in Chapter 10. I know the Bengali of this one too, although that has the sieve with a needle. The sieve is riddled with holes, but it accuses the needle of having a hole!

The Lives of Others was, indeed, speaking to me. I don’t think I need to write about how meticulous this book is. I came to know of the politics in West Bengal, as well as about the processes involved in the manufacture of paper—this shows how good the research, the work on the background, has been. Finally, when the narrative reached the villages of West Medinipur, and Santhal characters entered the story, I found myself turning the pages in sheer delight. I wanted to read what had been written about Santhals, how they had been presented.

And this undid everything.

Maybe I had had too high expectations of The Lives of Others. Just because a book seemed so familiar, and was well-researched and well-written, I had felt that it would be entirely satisfactory. I was wrong. The description of the Santhals in The Lives of Others is anything but satisfactory. At the most, it is stereotypical, one dimensional, and whatever the author has written about Santhals has been drawn so heavily from whatever opinion the world, in general, holds about Santhals – about the Adivasis, in fact – that it all seems like a cliché.

First, there is this violent scene in Chapter 10—a moneylender called Senapati Nayek being hacked to death with tangi (an axe). The men who wielded the tangis were Dhiren, a young man from Kolkata who has turned to Naxalism, and Shankar Soren, a Santhal man from the village Majgeria. Senapati Nayek was hacked twice, and it has not been mentioned who hacked him, whether Dhiren or Shankar. It could be that each of them hacked him once. It could also be that either Dhiren or Shankar hacked him twice. In Dhiren’s case, it could be understood that he was driven by his Naxalite ideal to kill the landlord. He had something to prove. In Shankar’s case, he only had his poverty, and the fact that Senapati Nayek was cheating him out of what he produced on his land. The novel tells us that Senapati Nayek cheated Shankar Soren, that Shankar Soren sought revenge. The novel does not tell us what kind of person Shankar Soren was. He could have been a good man, but he could have also been a bad, a cruel man. For, the novel tells us that he beat his wife. He beat his wife, the novel informs us, out of frustration, but that could also mean that Shankar was depressed, that there was something going on in his mind. The novel further tells us that Shankar was drawn by Dhiren into the plot to kill Senapati. Shankar agrees to it. But, sadly, whatever the novel tells us about Shankar, it does not give us a detailed insight into his back story, it does not give Shankar a redeeming story. Shankar, here, represents the Santhals, and what we come to know about Santhals through the character of Shankar is that Santhals are naïve, helpless, frustrated, angry, yield easily to incitement, and violent—in this order. I don’t understand if this description of Santhals – through the character of Shankar – does any good to Santhals. Chances are that readers who are not familiar with Santhals might take Santhals to be fools who tend to lose whatever they own and repent for it, and then turn to violence to get their possessions back. Perhaps, Santhals might be seen as a bunch of psychos.

Second, there is this scene in Chapter 15, in which a drunk man called Ajit tells his friend Somnath: “…I find these tribal people really innocent and pure. Qualities we city-dwellers have lost.” Fine, this could be true. But let us consider the scene in its entirety. Ajit is drunk. How much weight do the proclamations of a drunk man hold? Next, there is one more friend, Shekhar, he too is drunk, who adds: “[The tribals] have no money, no jobs, no solid houses, yet look how happy they are. They sing, dance, laugh all the time, drink alcohol, all as if they didn’t have a single care in the world.” Now, isn’t this stereotyping? It has been taken for granted that tribals “have no money, no jobs, no solid houses”, and they “sing, dance, laugh all the time, drink alcohol”. Even if it is assumed that it is the voice of that particular character – and not the voice of the author who wrote this book – what positive thing do these lines hold for tribals? A reader who does not know tribals will assume that all tribals do are “sing, dance, laugh all the time, drink alcohol”.

Third, and this really irritated me. Chapter 15, just before that drunken discussion about tribals. Somnath, who is a complete lecher, is attracted to a young Santhal woman and goes to ask her the name of the flower she has put in her hair. The woman behaves coquettishly, and asks Somnath: “Babu, you give me money if I tell you the name of the flower?” At this point, I can’t help noticing, The Lives of Others turns into Satyajit Ray’s film adaptation of Sunil Gangopadhyay’s novel, Aranyer Din Ratri. The young Santhal woman could very well be Duli, the Santhal woman in the film Aranyer Din Ratri, played by Simi Garewal; while Somnath of The Lives of Others could be the city-bred Hari, played by Samit Bhanja in the film Aranyer Din Ratri. In fact, there is a scene in Aranyer Din Ratri, set in a small rural joint selling hooch, in which a drunk Duli comes to a drunk Hari and asks him to give her money to buy more hooch. “E babu, de na. Paisa de na”—Duli’s lines from the film are still clear in my mind, not because I liked those lines, but because, being a Santhal, I found those lines terribly embarrassing, and the character of Duli – played by Simi Garewal – absolutely unreal and a caricature. The same feeling of embarrassment came over me when I read about the Santhal woman in The Lives of Others asking for money from a city-bred man. Simi Garewal in Aranyer Din Ratri might have looked very glamorous to some people, but I cannot forgive Satyajit Ray for making a complete hash of a Santhal character. Similarly, I cannot forgive Neel Mukherjee for Aranyer Din Ratri-fication – or Simi Garewal-isation – of a Santhal woman in his novel.

Further, in the same chapter, Somnath has successfully seduced that Santhal woman, promising to buy her liquor, and was leading her towards the forest to, apparently, make out with her. This is what has been written in the novel: “He had heard that these promiscuous tribal women had insatiable desires; they were at it all the time, with whoever approached them”. Promiscuous? I wonder if the author was trying to count the qualities of tribal women or just generalizing things. If a woman drinks alcohol, does that make her promiscuous? Was it necessary to portray “tribal women” as “promiscuous” and with “insatiable desires”? This, together with lines like, “You think we didn’t see you unable to take your eyes off the ripe tits of these Santhal women?”, “Ufff, those tits! You’re absolutely correct, Somu, they’re exactly like ripe fruit. The only thing you want to do when you see them is pluck and shove into your mouth”, and “[Santhal women] fill every single sense. But not only tits, have you noticed their waists? The way they wind that cloth around themselves, it hardly covers anything, leaves nothing really to imagination. High-blood-pressure stuff” (all lines from Chapter 15) seem to only further the Simi Garewal-isation of Santhal women. Santhal women have been presented as objects of fantasy, what spoilt, city-bred men desire. While there might be some truth in men lusting after Santhal women, is it that difficult to accept Santhal women as real persons and not merely as objects lustful men fantasize about?

Finally, in Chapter 3, there is a mention of “the burial grounds of the Santhals”. I wonder, what burial grounds? I am a Santhal. I know that we Santhals do not bury our dead. We cremate them. So where did these “burial grounds of the Santhals” come from?

The “burial grounds of the Santhals” part did put me off a bit. But it was still quite early in the novel, and I was ready to overlook this error because I had started falling in love with this novel. I found one more error: “Gidhni Junction”, in Chapter 2. Gidhni is an actual place, and the railway station at Gidhni is not a junction. If one travels to Gidhni from Howrah, one would reach Jhargram first and then Gidhni. So why would “the railtrack [become] a loop-line” and why would “the train [leave] the main railway line and [go] over the cutting”? If one travelling from Howrah needed to get down at Jhargram, he could easily get down at Jhargram without needing to travel all the way to Gidhni. I overlooked “Gidhni Junction”, initially, thinking it to be a creative freedom the author took. The type of creative freedom that Jhumpa Lahiri took in The Namesake when she made the young Ashoke Ganguly travel from Howrah to Tatanagar in an overnight train instead of in one of the many trains that ran during the daytime so that the overnight train could have an accident near Dhalbhumgarh and Ashoke Ganguly’s life be changed forever. I tried overlooking both “Gidhni Junction” and “the burial grounds of the Santhals”. But what else was written about Santhals crushed all my hopes in such a way that The Lives of Others, a book I had found so familiar, stopped working for me.

I am happy that a novel which has a few Santhal characters is being received so well all over the world; but that is exactly what makes me afraid—that readers all over the world are reading about Santhals in The Lives of Others. Some readers might even believe in what The Lives of Others tells them about Santhals, and this does not make me happy at all, because the actual lives of the Santhals is somewhat different from what The Lives of Others tells us.

25 September 2014

Neel Mukherjee The Lives of Others Random House India, London, 2014. Hb. pp. 514 Rs. 399

HANSDA SOWVENDRA SHEKHAR is the author of the novel, The Mysterious Ailment of Rupi Baskey, published by Aleph Book Company. He is a Santhal, a native of Ghatsila subdivision of Jharkhand; and he is currently living in Pakur in the Santhal Pargana division of Jharkhand, where he is working as a medical officer with the government of Jharkhand. ( http://www.alephbookcompany.com/hansda-sowvendra-shekhar )

To Kill A Mockingbird published as an ebook for the first time

08 07 , 2014 No Comments

Random House is delighted to announce that 54 years after it was first published Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbirdwill be released as an ebook today for the first time.

This Pulitzer Prize-winning novel has been translated into more than 40 languages, and sells well over 1 million copies each year worldwide. Now, for the first time, To Kill a Mockingbird will be available as a straight text ebook, an enhanced ebook with extra exclusive content, and a digital audio, narrated by Oscar-winning actress Sissy Spacek.

‘I am amazed and humbled that Mockingbird has survived this long,’ said Nelle Harper Lee. ‘I’m still old fashioned. I love dusty old books and libraries. This is Mockingbird for a new generation.’

The ebook is available with all ebook retailers including Flipkart, Amazon, Google Play and Kobo.

8 July 2014

Caroline Newbury

VP Marketing and Corporate Communications

Random House India

Penguin Random House

7th Floor, Infinity Tower – C

DLF Cyber City, Gurgaon 122002, Haryana

P +91 124 4785600

F + 91 124 4785606

[email protected]

www.randomhouse.co.in

PubSpeak: Total Recall

21 02 , 2014 1 Comment

( My column, “PubSpeak”, in BusinessWorld online focuses on the Wendy Doniger book controversy. Here is the url to it: http://businessworld.in/news/economy/total-recall/1266222/page-1.html . )

On 11 February, Penguin Books India reached a compromise drawn up in a Delhi Court that insisted it cease the publication and sale of American Indologist, Wendy Doniger’s book The Hindus: An Alternative History in India within six months. Dina Nath Batra of Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samitri had filed a civil suit against the publishers to withdraw from circulation all copies. Given that Batra had filed the case four years ago and it was still subjudice, the news of this compromise spread like wildfire. Later that day, Doniger issued a press statement “I was, of course, angry and disappointed to see this happen, and I am deeply troubled by what it foretells for free speech in India in the present, and steadily worsening, political climate. And as a publisher’s daughter, I particularly wince at the knowledge that the existing books (unless they are bought out quickly by people intrigued by all the brouhaha) will be pulped. But I do not blame Penguin Books, India. Other publishers have just quietly withdrawn other books without making the effort that Penguin made to save this book. Penguin, India, took this book on knowing that it would stir anger in the Hindutva ranks, and they defended it in the courts for four years, both as a civil and as a criminal suit. They were finally defeated by the true villain of this piece — the Indian law that makes it a criminal rather than civil offense to publish a book that offends any Hindu, a law that jeopardises the physical safety of any publisher, no matter how ludicrous the accusation brought against a book.”

Penguin Books India released a statement on 14 February stating “a publishing company has the same obligation as any other organisation to respect the laws of the land in which it operates, however intolerant and restrictive those laws may be. We also have a moral responsibility to protect our employees against threats and harassment where we can…. The settlement reached this week brings to a close a four year legal process in which Penguin has defended the publication of the Indian edition of The Hindus by Wendy Doniger. We have published, in succession, hardcover, paperback and e-book editions of the title. International editions of the book remain available physically and digitally to Indian readers who still wish to purchase it.”

What followed the announcement perhaps was only a natural outcome given the speed at which social media helps communicate information. There was public outrage at this development— newspapers, print, digital, and, of course, social media forums. A number of commentators, journalists, and even Penguin authors wrote passionately against Penguin Book India’s decision to destroy the book. Arundhati Roy in an open letter spoke of her distress and said “You owe us, your writers an explanation at the very least”. Nilanjana Roy, author and member of PEN Delhi wrote on censorship and how to remain free; Jakob de Roover in an outstanding essay “Untangling the Knot” discussed the complexities of governance, judiciary and free speech; journalist Salil Tripathi commented perceptively on the issue on many platforms ; Stephen Alter wrote, “Both as a writer and as a reader, I am deeply offended that anyone should dictate what I may read or write”; Penguin author and essayist, Amit Chaudhuri reiterated that “It’s important that the law protect all texts”; and Antara Dev Sen, Editor, The Little Magazine, wrote that the Indian Penal Code “Section 295A targets ‘deliberate and malicious acts (which include speech, writings or signs) intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs’. In an age of identity politics and hurt sentiments, this has been used frequently by politically motivated people to stifle free speech. But back in 1957, the Supreme Court had ruled that only when there is a ‘deliberate and malicious intention of outraging religious feelings’ is it an offence under this law. Higher courts in India have consistently ruled in favour of freedom of speech and have protected books and people hauled to court under this law.”

In fact, two Penguin authors, Siddharth Varadarajan and Jyotirmaya Sharma, asked for their contracts to be terminated. Another Penguin author, Arshia Sattar (who has translated Valmiki’s Ramayana and the Kathasaritsagara from Sanskrit to English) expressed her dismay at the “complete capitulation” of the firm and how her “pride and that faith has been shaken…of being with a publishing house that protected its people and the books they wrote”.

A counter legal initiative perhaps was expected. According to the website, Legally India, advocate Lawrence Liang, part of the Bangalore-based Alternative Law Forum, has issued a 30-paragraph legal notice to Penguin India, claiming that the publisher has violated freedom of speech laws and readers’ rights by agreeing to destroy all copies of Wendy Doniger’s book ‘The Hindus’. The notice sent on behalf of Liang’s clients, Shuddhabrata Sengupta and Aarthi Sethi, argues that because Penguin has agreed to withdraw the book from India and destroy all copies, after a legal dispute with a religious group, it has “effectively acknowledged that it is no longer interested in exercising” its ownership in the work and should surrender its copyright to the Indian public. Sengupta is a Delhi-based artist and writer, while Sethi is an anthropologist with a “deep interest in Hindu philosophy”, according to the legal notice. Both are “avid bibliophiles” and were apparently “delighted” when Penguin published Doniger’s book, “and as people who have closely followed the scholarly contributions of the said author they regard this book to be a significant contribution to the study of Hinduism. They consider Ms Doniger’s translations of Indian classical texts and her work on various facets of Hinduism from morality in the Mahabharata to the erotic history of Hinduism as an inspiration for their own intellectual pursuits.”

At the recent Globalocal event (German Book Office, New Delhi’s annual B2B conference on publishing), a regional language publisher wondered if it was possible for any other publisher to option this book and publish it, after all it has not been legally banned in this territory. Echoing this sentiment, Shamnad Basheer, IPR lawyer, writing in Spicy IP, reflected upon the pros and cons of compulsory licensing, and whether it was possible if a publisher decides to stop publication, one could apply for a compulsory license.

Globally Penguin has been in the news related to their peripheral businesses and their merger with Random House. In 2012, Pearson PLC (of which Penguin Books India is a part of) acquired the self-publishing firm, Author Solutions, for $116 million. But in 2013, this deal soured as a number of disgruntled authors filed lawsuits against Author Solutions for its poor service. In the landmark case pertaining to ebooks and agency pricing, in April 2012, the US Department of Justice sued Apple and five publishers, including Penguin, for conspiring to raise prices and restrain competition. This was done after Amazon filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission. In 2013, Penguin was obliged to pay $75 million. George Packer observes in the New Yorker, “an enormous sum in a business that has always struggled to maintain respectable profit margins”. On 1 July 2013, the global merger between Penguin Books and Random House was announced. It was a strategic alliance, forged as a response to the growing presence of Amazon in the publishing industry. The formation of Penguin Random House (PRH) has created a group that has 25 per cent of the market share. A merger comes at a cost of resources that have to be taken into account for the new firm to begin work on a strong footing.

In Oct 2013, Penguin Random House announced the completion of its purchase of Ananda Publishers Private Limited’s minority stake in Penguin Books India. It plans to invest Rs 55 crore or $8.6 million for this stake buy. As banker-turned-author Ravi Subramanian, with whom in June 2013 Penguin Books India signed a two-book deal worth an estimated Rs 1.25 crore (approx $210,700) wrote on his blog with respect to Doniger’s case, “publishing is a business”. For any firm, particularly in publishing, this is a lot of money being moved around its balance sheets. Naturally the ripple effect of these financial adjustments will be felt even in the local markets—it is like conducting business in a global village where in the context of a globally contacted world, the minimum consumption that people desire is also influenced by what is going on elsewhere.

Similarly, with the Doniger case, Penguin Books India has probably taken an informed business decision, based upon a global strategy when it signed this deal on 11 February, in order to preserve a healthy English-language publishing market in India.

Chiki Sarkar, Publisher, Penguin Books India, in a guest blog post in 2012 during the Banned Books week, had this to say: “Injunctions make things costly, time consuming, and take our energies away from the work we are really meant to do. And so we try and avoid them as much as possible. Apart from the fact that we don’t fight hard enough for them, I wonder whether it means we impose a kind of self-censorship on ourselves.”

Ironically this latest controversy broke exactly twenty-five years after the fatwa was issued against Salman Rushdie for his ‘Satanic Verses’ published by Penguin. At the time, his publishers stood by him and did not pulp the book. The fact is publishing is a business that is built upon the creative energies and emotions of people. India is also a functioning democracy. Freedom of speech is the right of every citizen. With the General Elections less than a hundred days away, the need for openness, frank conversations without any inhibitions, and certainly not a capitulation to any ideological position is imperative.

Scholar-journalist and historian Mukul Kesavan points out that that selling books is not like selling any other commodity. Publishers have moral responsibility and a publisher voluntarily agreeing to withdraw a book has previously been challenged with the case of James Laine’s book on Shivaji in 2007. Oxford University Press voluntarily agreed to withdraw the book. An FIR was issued against the publisher and printer of the book in Pune (one charge, under Section 153 A, was ‘inciting class hatred’) and the printer was actually arrested. When the case (‘Manzar Sayeed Khan vs State Of Maharashtra, 2007’) came up before the Supreme Court, however, the government of Maharashtra’s case against the author and the publisher of the book was found to be wanting. So, there is a precedent by the Supreme Court to rule in favour of free speech.

Nevertheless, the Wendy Doniger book controversy raises a bunch of issues pertaining to the publishing industry. Questions about legislation and the freedom of speech, what are the ethics involved in publishing, do readers and authors have a right that they can exercise, what does it mean for licensing, do possibilities exist in a mixed environment of digital and print publishing such as do readers have a choice?

Finally does this self-censorship by a publishing firm mean an inadvertent promotion for self-publishing, encouraging authors to be responsible for their books completely? Interestingly in a space of less than six weeks I have heard John Makinson, CEO, Penguin Random House and Jon Fine, Director, Author & Publishing Relations, Amazon talk about their publishing businesses and both have stressed upon the importance of discoverability of an author. This controversy could not have come at a better time for Doniger and even Penguin. They have achieved the Streisand effect whereby in an attempt to censor a piece of information, it has had the unintended consequence of publicising the information more widely. It has achieved what no PR could have—a boost in sales.

21 Feb 2014

“Keeping The Word”, PubSpeak, Dec 2013

04 12 , 2013 4 Comments

( PubSpeak in December 2013 is about trust deficit. It has been published originally in BusinessWorld online. Here is the url: http://www.businessworld.in/news/books/columns/keeping-the-word/1175440/page-1.html I am also c&p the text below. 4 Dec 2013)

Publishing industry too has its share of tales where people have not honoured their word or fulfilled contracts. Jaya Bhattacharji Rose writes of ways to prevent these

Some time ago, I received a message on Facebook from a distraught illustrator. The illustrator had been commissioned by a prominent publishing house to create paintings for a book cover design of a forthcoming young adult novel. The cover had been through three draft designs and had been approved by everyone including the author. At the final stage, some design changes were asked for. The illustrator was not happy. Nevertheless, in complete faith, the illustrator decided to submit high resolution files of the altered paintings since the project was nearing completion. But the relationship came apart (and legal recourse had to be taken to) because the art director of the publishing house refused to honour the contract, withholding part of the payment due on the grounds that the design had been created inhouse. But there is barely any difference other than the shade of colour and the size of the images if you compare the designs submitted by the illustrator with those that were done inhouse. Since then, the first illustrator has refused to work with the publisher.

Twenty years after the publication of ‘A Suitable Boy’, fans of Vikram Seth were waiting in anticipation for the sequel – A Suitable Girl. Unfortunately Seth did not deliver the manuscript in time to Hamish Hamilton. Soon after the merger of Penguin Books and Random House was official in July 2013, this book was one of the earliest casualties. The author was asked by the publishers to return the $1.7 million advance for a two-book deal, including the paperback rights of ‘A Suitable Boy’, bought off Orion publishing. According to media reports the new group — Penguin Random House — is expected to cut costs as it tries to compete better with new forms of publishing and competition from online rivals such as Amazon. Fortunately for the author, his original publisher Orion, stepped in and is committed to publishing A Suitable Girl in Autumn 2016.

Disturbing Trend
The world of publishing is full of such stories — some tamer than others. People yearning to be published, some having been published, some selling better than others, some getting noticed critically more than the others, many satisfied with what they have achieved, yet there is a constant subterranean rumble of unpleasant anecdotes. Many of the stories, often open knowledge to ‘those in the know’, deal with plagiarism, contracts not being honoured, copyright violations, disappointment about advances, dissatisfaction about contracts drawn or negotiations about rights hitting nasty patches, sales and marketing executives not fulfilling orders, bookstores not adequately stocked, at times even missing titles that have been shortlisted for literary prizes.A popular topic of conversation is the efficiency of vendor management systems and authors stealing ideas from each other. The stories are about professional relationships being affected, relationships that are forged, nurtured and sustained by humans. These, in turn, affect the commissioning potential of editors and the formation and evolution of lists and imprints, the emergence of new ideas and creative collaborations and more importantly the growth of the business of publishing.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, to “publish” is defined as “prepare and issue (a book, journal or piece of music) for public sale. Print in a book or journal so as to make generally known.” A “publisher” is a company or person that prepares and issues books, journals, or music for sale. In traditional forms of publishing, that is, the printed form, specialist knowledge of the processes involved including sales, marketing and distribution was essential. Many of the books published were and are inevitably born out of a conversation (or a “gentleman’s agreement”) that a commissioning editor has with the author (or the content creator, as the ‘author’ could even be another publisher or an organisation, and not necessarily an individual). It is after a series of negotiations based on trust that the business details of the arrangement are thrashed out and subsequently enshrined in a written and signed contract. These are then preserved and referred to for the time that the firm has the license to publish the book(s).

For many authors/illustrators this is a smooth process and continues to be so. From the moment authors are signed on, they begin to be a little more aware of their rights, wanting clarity on the royalty statements, visibility and easy availability of the book in all formats and kinds of stores. Publishers too want professionalism from the content creator and other collaborators on the project. Similarly bookstore owners/online retailers/customers want quick fulfillment of their orders. Readers want satisfaction from the books that they read.

So, What Next?
Every October, publishers from around the world flock to the publishers’ mecca, the Frankfurt Book Fair, for a week of intense conversations and meetings. This time the news emerging from the Frankfurt was about the most innovative and viable method of connecting books with readers, these were mostly reserved for the digital domain. Some examples of digital-only imprints are HarperCollins India’sHarper21; Italy’s RCS Libri’s Rizzoli Lab, dedicated to experiments in digital; Indireads presenting modern South Asian literature in digital friendly formats.; HarperCollins established HarperTeen Impulse; Random House launched Loveswept, Hydra, Alibi, and Flirt; Harlequin has Carina Press and Bloomsbury has Bloomsbury Spark.

Another tactic is to create blogs on publishers’ websites where most host curators prefer to focus only on their books and authors. The Melville House publishing house’s blog has to be one of the richest in its generosity of sharing accounts, stories and opinions related to books and not necessarily confined to its own lists.

Today, with social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest, content creators (authors, illustrators) can have conversations directly with other publishing professionals. A democratisation of the system that is challenging established business models of publishing. A notable result has been the rapidity with which self-publishing has become an attractive proposition — primarily because the author is in control of producing his book in all formats, can track the distribution and sales and is responsible for the promotion of the book. With the number of authors opting for this form of publishing it is no surprise that even traditional publishers are offering self-publishing services as an option.

Through this wonderful burst of creative energy and proliferation of platforms for publishing, two facts stand out. First, these innovations are obvious responses to the changing environment of publishing. Second, given how complex the book market is becoming, with new channels of news dissemination and distribution, publishers are being innovative in accessing readers and customers. But these new business models of outreach will only be successful if publishing professionals do not keep their word and the growing “trust deficit” in the publishing eco-system is not addressed immediately.

Stuart Diamond writing in his bestseller ‘Getting More’ says “Trust is a feeling of security that the other person will protect you. …The major component of trust is honesty—being straight with people. Trust does not mean that both sides agree with each other, or are always pleasant to each other. …Trust is something that develops slowly, over time. It is an emotional commitment to one another based on mutual respect, ethics, and good feeling. …lack of trust has a cost.”

These challenges exist in all industries but it is slightly different for publishing which relies upon human relationships and creativity for growing the business organically. For it to be a sustainable business model, there has to be bedrock of trust among all stakeholders, irrespective of the format they choose to publish in.

The writer is an international publishing consultant and columnist

@JBhattacharji

“Jeeves and the Wedding Bells” Sebastian Faulks

01 12 , 2013 No Comments

Sebastian Faulks has written a homage to P. G. Wodehouse, a novel, Jeeves and the Wedding Bells. It is meant to be a new addition to the Wodehouse collection of Bertie Wooster and Jeeves novels. It was announced with a great deal of fanfare earlier in the year and released in November 2013. Unfortunately it does not meet one’s expectations at all. It is stiff and difficult to read. It misses the humour of Wodehouse.

Resurrecting beloved characters that have endured and continued to charm generations of readers is a trend that is going viral among publishers. In the hope of keeping markets alive, publishers are introducing new and young readers to characters that they may not be familiar with. Popular contemporary novelists are entrusted with the task of scripting new stories. For instance, Anthony Horowitz wrote a new Sherlock Holmes mystery, The House of Silk ( 2012); William Boyd wrote a new James Bond novel, Solo (2013); and next year Sophie Hannah will be writing a new Hercule Poirot mystery. ( If the buzz at Frankfurt Book Fair 2013 is to be believed this is a novel to watch out for.) Keeping with this trend, Sebastian Faulks was asked by Random House to create a new novel with Bertie Wooster and Jeeves. These editorial decisions of matchmaking between popular contemporary novelists with old favourites are actually very sharp. If these new novels are written well ( as House of Silk is) everyone stands to gain—the readers have a new novel, the author and the publishers have a new market to tap. More importantly, most of these characters are either out of the copyright domain or are about to become available. By introducing new versions of the characters, estates of the authors can consider arguing legally “having that single book under copyright means that the entire character is covered by copyright”. ( Read. Conan Doyle Estate Is Horrified That The Public Domain Might Create ‘Multiple Personalities’ Of Sherlock Holmes http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130915/00291924523/conan-doyle-estate-doesnt-understand-public-domain-freaks-out-harms-it-might-cause-to-sherlock-holmes.shtml ) Thus keeping a tight control on the royalties earned by the new lease of life these characters are given. Significantly at a time when multiple formats are splintering and expanding the market, creating alternative revenue streams, it is important for publishers to explore ways of making inroads, testing markets and this can be done at least cost with old characters that are favourites, out-of-copyright or require minimal license fees to be paid, and new business models are explored.

In Faulks on Fiction, Sebastian Faulks has an essay on Jeeves, ‘The Mood will Pass, Sir”. His opening line is “one of the odd things about Jeeves is how seldom he appears in the stories that immortalised him. While P. G. Wodehouse never used anything as vulgar as formula, there is an elegant pattern to Jeeves exits and his entrances.” ( p.239) Well if Faulks was interested in exploring the Jeeves angle in The Wedding Bells, he failed. He misses the point of Wodehouse’s fiction. Probably because Faulks is unable to get rid of his awe for Wodehouse. He remains nervous, hesitant following ( writing?) in the footsteps of Wodehouse and seems to be only keen to explore a perspective he feels is missing from the established Wodehouse canon.

Sebastian Faulks Jeeves and the Wedding Bells, Hutchinson, London, 2013. Pb. pp. 258 Price not mentioned.

PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE ACQUIRES FULL OWNERSHIP OF PENGUIN BOOKS INDIA

03 10 , 2013 No Comments

(October 3, 2013, New Delhi, India)—Penguin Random House today announced the completion of its purchase of Ananda Publishers Private Limited’s minority stake in Penguin Books India.

Penguin India was formed in 1985, with UK-based publishing house, Penguin Publishing Company, holding a 40 per cent stake, which it later increased to 55 per cent. Penguin Random House has now acquired the remaining 45 per cent, and takes 100 per cent ownership of the Penguin India.

John Makinson, Chairman of Penguin Random House India, said, “The partnership between Ananda Publishers Private Limited and Penguin in India stretches back more than 25 years and has created a local publishing company that leads the market in both size and reputation. My friendship with Arup and Aveek Sarkar has been one of the highlights of my Penguin career but there is always a right moment to move on professionally, and the watershed merger of Penguin and Random House provides it. The two wholly-owned companies are now combined under the leadership of their CEO, Gaurav Shrinagesh, who will be able to build on the legacy of these two fine India publishing houses.”

Gaurav Shrinagesh, CEO Penguin Random House India, observed, “The merger of Penguin and Random House has brought together India’s two most successful publishing houses, and we are delighted that with the completion of this deal, they now are fully united as Penguin Random House India. Under the partnership with Ananda Publishers Private Limited, Penguin became one of the most recognizable and respected publishers in India. We are now looking forward to building on this foundation with our talented authors and colleagues from across the whole of Penguin Random House India.”

With offices in Noida and Panchsheel Park, Delhi Penguin Random House India publishes many of the most recognisable and successful authors across the sub-continent in adult and children’s fiction and nonfiction published in hardcover, paperback, audio, and digital editions.

About Penguin Random House
Penguin Random House (http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/) is the world’s first truly global trade book publisher. It was formed on July 1, 2013, upon the completion of an agreement between Bertelsmann and Pearson to merge their respective trade publishing companies, Random House and Penguin, with the parent companies owning 53% and 47%, respectively. Penguin Random House comprises the adult and children’s fiction and nonfiction print and digital trade book publishing businesses of Penguin and Random House in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and India, Penguin’s trade publishing activity in Asia and South Africa; Dorling Kindersley worldwide; and Random House’s companies in Spain, Mexico, Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia, and Chile. Penguin Random House employs more than 10,000 people globally across almost 250 editorially and creatively independent imprints and publishing houses that collectively publish more than 15,000 new titles annually. Its publishing lists include more than 70 Nobel Prize laureates and hundreds of the world’s most widely read authors.

3 October 2013

On “discoverability” in publishing. (PubSpeak, BusinessWorld, Aug 2013)

01 08 , 2013 1 Comment

( My monthly column, “PubSpeak”, in BusinessWorld online. July 2013 is on “discoverability”. Here is the link to the orignial url http://www.businessworld.in/en/storypage/-/bw/publishers-search-tools-to-find-readers/r1013160.37528/page/0 )

Publishers’ Search Tools To Find Readers

Jaya Bhattacharji Rose on why it is the discovery of a book that ultimately matters for the business of publishing

How does a reader ‘discover’ an author/book? Today digital technology is rapidly becoming a unifying factor in the coming together of print and electronic forms of publishing. It is also responsible for the “discoverability” of a book. Traditional forms of discovery – curation in a brick-and-mortar bookstore, word-of-mouth recommendations, libraries, second hand bookstores, gifts, book reviews in newspapers and magazines and book clubs continue to be significant. Literary prizes too are important.

Caroline Newbury, VP Marketing and Publicity, Random House Publishers India explains the link well with reference to their author, Shehan Karunatilaka winning the DSC prize worth $50,000 in 2012 for his book Chinaman. “Any prize which supports both new and established writers is to be praised but the DSC Prize is a special case for its specific promotion of writing about South Asia,” says Newbury. “Since its DSC Prize win we have reprinted Shehan Karunatilaka’s Chinaman and its prize-winning credentials definitely help bring it to a wider readership in India and beyond.”

Yet it is the popular modes of discovering a book including online reading communities like Goodreads and Riffles; advertisement banners in e-mails and on websites; automatic recommendations on online retail sites like Amazon, Flipkart; conversations and status updates in social media spaces such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest; following literary curators; bloggers; and even movie adaptations of a book.

Two books that I read recently – 50 Writers, 50 books: The Best of Indian Fiction and Reading New India: Post-millennial Indian Fiction in English, apart from being thought-provoking commentaries on literature, are a good way of discovering authors. The first is an anthology of essays discussing books from Indian fiction, across languages and the second a critique with a synopsis of the stories of predominantly commercial fiction. The texts complement each other well, but for a reader they are valuable for discovering fiction hitherto they have unheard of, especially since the fiction discussed is recommended by academics, authors, critics and literary tastemakers.

It is important to delineate the thin line between discoverability and promotion of a book. Discoverability would depend largely upon the gravitas of the book, the whispers that are heard about a book in various contexts. But promotions would be the marketing blitzkrieg created by the publishing houses. These could include the predictable book launches, panel discussions, and author tours, interviews in the prominent newspapers and participating in literary festivals. Now add to that list partnerships with coffee chains. Authors too are beginning to hire PR firms and consultants to strategise and create a media buzz for their books.

Last week two publishing professionals – Jonathan Galassi, head of Farrar, Straus & Giroux (http://www.vulture.com/2013/07/farrar-straus-giroux-jonathan-galassi-on-hothouse.html) and Anakana Schofield, debut novelist ( http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/jul/25/anakana-schofield-how-to-write ) – raised the fundamental question about the meteoric rise in the number of writers, but where are the readers? It seems that for the first time in publishing, there are more writers than readers. It should be considered as a happy trend. More to publish, more to sell. But are there any takers? Or more importantly, how do you discover a book you want to read so that you will buy?

On 1 July 2013 Penguin and Random House announced that their merger had been approved. From 2014, the merged entity Penguin Random House is expected to be publishing 15,000 titles a year. Assuming these are all new titles of the front list, it will be a formidable stable of authors. But at the rate of publishing 41 books a day will only make it tougher to locate a title.

And if this is the scenario in English-language trade publishing how does the rest of publishing fare? Some of the other categories to be considered would be trade lists in other languages, translations, children’s literature, non-fiction, and of course academic publishing. All kinds of authors are struggling to be heard/ read.

And this conundrum of discovering an author or a relevant text extends beyond trade publishing to academic publishing too. Last week The Bookseller, a publishing industry daily, announced that “Google is to bring a textbook sale and rental service to the Google Play store this August in time for the Back to School season. The company announced it had partnered with academic publishers Pearson, Wiley, Macmillan, McGraw Hill and Cengage Google Play will offer textbook rentals and sales for up to an 80 per cent discount, the company has said, which is the same claim Amazon makes for its Kindle textbook rentals.”

This is similar to the CourseSmart model provides eTextbooks and digital course materials. It was founded in 2007 by publishers in higher education including Pearson, Cengage Learning, McGraw-Hill Education, Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishing Group (Macmillan) and John Wiley & Sons. According to research firm Outsell Inc Online products accounted for 27 per cent of the $12.4 billion spent on textbooks for secondary schools and colleges in the US last year. Publishers like Pearson Plc and McGraw-Hill Education are also creating online versions of their texts, often loaded with interactive features, and selling students access codes that expire at semester’s end.

These alternative methods of discovering an author may be worth exploring. It is probably “easier” to experiment with dedicated platforms for textbooks where the selling price of a title is exorbitant. So, offering short-term licences (“access codes”) to academics and students to review, rent and (in moderation) print relevant pages creates a wider community of users.

Plus, it is increasingly becoming an important alternative source of revenue generation for publishing firms, although reservations exist about the adoption of a digital format by students, indications are that students prefer books. Whereas for trade publishers investing in platforms will be economically unviable unless you are Penguin and create Book Country. But for most others it will be an expensive proposition unless they opt for digital catalogues. Hence an online, interactive, cross-publisher catalogue service that supplements or replaces traditional hard-copy publisher catalogues like Edelweiss, whose tag line is “Finding your next favourite book is a lot easier”. As marketing executives say books are a low-cost product so media copies are distributed but it is the discovery of a book that ultimately matters for the business of publishing.

Jaya Bhattacharji Rose is an international publishing consultant and columnist
@JBhattacharji

Women and diets / healthy living

27 07 , 2013 No Comments

Over the past few months I have read a bunch of newly published books on weight loss, healthy living, eating wisely and dieting. All the books seem to be targetted at women, all though men too would benefit hugely from reading these. Ishi Khosla gives practical advice on how to measure quantities of food (with the actual size of a cup printed), to eat regularly and healthy. More than going on a crash diet to lose weight, it is more about managing one’s time, health, food etc.

Charmaine D’Souza discusses the importance of understanding your ingredients and how a fair knowledge of kitchen herbs and spices ensures a healthy living. She explains the spices, their properties and then lists some common ailments that are easily prevented or treated at home. For novices the line drawings of the spices will also help in recognising the spices and herbs being discussed. Recently I had a long discussion on Skindalous Cuisine ( A Facebook group that discusses food and shares recipes) about recipes that use Kalonji or onion seeds. It is rarely used in cooking despite it being extraordinarily beneficial for the health. According to Charmaine D’Souza these seeds have been used medicinally for over 3,000 years. It is used to treat ailments including asthma, bronchitis, rheumatism and related inflammatory diseases. Also skin infections and cold symptoms too. But from the discussion group I discovered that it is rare to find recipes using this spice since it is usually offered as prasad to the gods. Hence it is used sparingly in Indian cuisine.

Sheela Nambiar writes for the Indian Woman. Her advise is to stop agonising about chasing the pipe-dream of achieving a Size Zero figure, instead concentrate on getting fit than just losing weight. She has packed her book with loads of tips on how to manage oneself. How to exercise while scrambling to finish the day’s chores. There are few illustrations but easy to understand.

Reenita Malhotra Hora also advocates a healthy living but by relying upon Ayurveda.

All the books mentioned are useful to have and read. Also to practice. I would even go to the extent of saying how empowering these texts are in teaching a person, especially a woman, on how to manage her time, her diet, her health. It is well-known that women always compromise on their health and needs. For most of the time they are so focused on their family, children, careers etc that they do not think twice about neglecting their own needs. Little realising that self-preservation is very important. My only concern about these books is that they may be bought, they will inspire but to sustain these diets and routines is expensive. It will be an added expense to a family’s budget, it will be a strain on the women (who are inevitably in charge of the kitchens) to create a separate dish for themselves etc especially after all the needs, requirements and demands of the family are met. It is much easier for many women then to be accommodating and eat whatever is put on the table, rather than assert themselves. So the purpose that these books set out to achieve will be negated. Unless these authors instead of taking on only high-society clientele actually design and distribute meals suitable for a person on a diet. These could be according to the requirements (and budget) of the client. Thus ensuring that for a nominal fee, the dietician gets a new client and the client has a stress-free way of managing their diet. The food arrives at their door step, with the right size of portions. I am not sure how feasible it is to conduct such programmes in India given distances, weather conditions etc but I hear that these are being done in America and are actually working.

On a related note. Devapriya Roy has published a novel about the weight loss club in the Nancy Housing Cooperative. It sounds promising. (I have just begun to read it.)

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