Making of ‘ A City Full of Stories’ — 4 : Author’s Notes
Myriad thoughts bubble in my mind. It all started in December 4, 2011, when I wrote my the first part of ‘The Heir of the Hair Dresser’. But the story behind each of the stories in my recently launched book ‘ A City Full of Stories’ is the same, yet different. Let me tell the common story first.
THE COMMON THREAD:
No space to think about others. I am worried about my family, my business, my wealth, my health, my lack of discipline and vices. My mind is filled with desires to enjoy life today and not worry about tomorrow.
I live in a busy city. I came across people and places, that hardly notice. Because, I am busy running things in my head.
Yet, people catch my eye. A dog. A ragpicker. A thirsty vagabond. An office goer. Kids. Barbers. Colleagues in office. A quirky thought. A camera click. A mental note — in a small locker somewhere, stashed in the pile of thoughts clogging my memory.
Then, someday, I find the locker, open it to find that quirky thought. The picture. The mental note. Then I think, imagine and WRITE.
That is how the stories in my book ‘ A City Full of Stories’ were born. The common thing in the book is Mumbai, the financial and commercial capital of India. I lived there for 5 years, and fell in love with the city.
The characters don’t talk much but they go through an experience along with me, and by extension the reader. A story that comes out that experience makes the book.
It is not my story. But I am part of each story. I corroborate some of the stories with the actual pictures. I have added Author’s notes at the end of each story.
Now, I will tell you some specific experiences when some of the stories were written.
YET DIFFERENT:
Only one of my characters, read a part of this book, when it was being written. I wrote the piece for her, and showed it to her. Believe me or not, she sobbed for almost 10 minutes, and said that nobody ever had humanized her as much as I did in that piece. The story is ‘Cupid over Coffee’. For me, that was a big vote of confidence and revelation — there is empathy in my stories.
I had written few stories in the form of internal dialogue and action of the characters — no conversations. I call it ‘thought fiction’. A few are from my own experiences, and others, from what some of the characters told me. Those were the most challenging stories to write. Why? The notion of a ‘vagabond and forest fire’, an imaginary concept that is born and dies in the character’s mind, or the notion of time being unearthly is nothing but a series of thoughts, but connected together. There is that door that connects reality and the virtual world of the character’s mind.
Some characters, mostly from the bottom of the pyramid, that each of us would normally encounter in our lives, had a story. Some are extended by imagination, but the inspiration is purely from the characters — a migrant from Agra, a dog in BKC, 3 boys running a saloon in Kandivali, a ragpicker searching for water in Thane, a coconut seller in Vile Parle, an IT professional switching jobs, and so on.
These characters cross paths with us almost daily. But somewhere, their lives too carry stories that are interesting and worth narrating. As we explore their lives, we understand their struggles and sorrows, and their ways of life.
The book is a small tribute to those characters, whose stories happen everyday, but remain untold. The book is also about issues of women safety, clash of cultures and habits, water management. The book is also about the little places that I encountered. The book reflects a slice of life in the megacity of Mumbai.
I dedicate this book to the city and the characters that made the stories possible.
Book details:
A CITY FULL OF STORIES
Available in Amazon and Kindle
Free on Kindle Unlimited
mybook.to/ACFOS — Book link.
~Ashok Subramanian
