Why I might just not write a novel, annus horribilis nearly and other miscellany

This will probably be my closing blog for the year.  There are lots of things on my mind at this time.  Hence this confused title.  

Right on top in my mind is this business of the novel that I have been referring to in a couple of posts.  So some of you have been intrigued or surprised that I had one in mind, some of you have encouraged me to press on with it.  

Knowing that you are a small set of people to whom I send links to my blog, all of fourteen at last count, and knowing that you are all dear to me there is a sampling bias in these reactions. 

So here is the story on my novel.  I have written up most of the plot.   But the core of the setting into which I wish to my weave my story has just started taking shape.  I know it will be a long way before I get that bit in place. 

I would like to engage in this writing effort purely as a matter of indulgence.  I would like to do it for my sake.   I wish to spend a lot of time researching the historical setting at the core of the novel.

That said, here are the reasons I might eventually not write the novel after all.  And if I did I might not publish it.  At a very basic level I believe a writer needs to be a sensitive person, being able to get into the minds of the character.  A writer needs to have a good command of language, with the ability to create the right effect on the reader’s mind with nothing more than words to create that effect.  Above all, a writer needs to be able to tell an engaging story.

Having spent an enormous amount of time thinking about myself as a writer I am not sure I have acquired any of these abilities in adequate measure.  If at all my blogs suggest that I possess some kind of writing skills I would dismiss them as inadequate for a novel where the writer has to engage the reader for an extended period of time.  My raconteuring skills are even poorer.

So, here I am.  I would love to tell a story that has been close to my heart, for more reason than one.  The setting I want to locate the story in has been close to my heart as a topic in history.   Hence my belief that writing this novel will be an act of pure indulgence.  Again, my story is about a protagonist who is modeled on someone special that I know.  That leaves me with this dilemma:  Should I lay bare the details of this protagonist and her life?  Or should I just preserve my thoughts and recollections of the protagonist as a private treasure?

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With three days to go, I cannot wait for this year to get over.   I know that sounds awfully superstitious.  But then this year started off with so many transitions that my wife and I said to each other in the middle of January that we could not wait for the year to get over.

 

Looking back, by the grace of God, it has not turned out to be quite the annus horribilis that we were afraid that it would be.   It is true that we will not see any more of some relatives, friends and acquaintances that we would miss.  But then we are grateful to God that the year did not get any worse.

On a different note I realize that during the year I got to know someone very interesting, very likeable as a person, someone who impressed me deeply with some extraordinary qualities I noticed during my interactions, although she is a generation younger to me.  It was a strange and first of its kind experience for me, although I have heard of friends and relatives telling me about having turned completely unconnected acquaintances into adopted nieces and nephews and assorted family.

It is a pity that I will probably not have much longer to get to know this person, more or better, since she will very soon move on to pursue a new phase in her destiny in a different part of the world that I may have nothing to do with.  So much so there will be practically no touch points in our incipient connection in a few days from today.   

So here is the bright side:  Apart from the joy that one gets out of admiring someone talented, someone likable, I also discovered that after all I am capable of caring selflessly for someone from whom I had not received anything, from whom I looked forward to nothing at all, except the joy of having cared for.

I am grateful to God I made this acquaintance.  I am sorry our (this individual's and mine) paths will probably never cross again, after a few days from now.

That would bring up the obvious question:  What about my wife, my sons and other members of my family?  Did / do I not care for them?  After much thinking I am now of the belief that none of that so far has been truly selfless.  I have asked myself probably the ultimate counterfactual:  Would I love them all just the same if I had not received the amount of affection that I had received or been receiving from each of them?  That is a tough question to answer.  And the most honest answer I can give is I don’t know.

Having been through all of that I can now say this:  Those folks who are capable of loving and sharing without asking for anything in return are truly a blessed lot.  That has been a great realization this year for me.

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This year has been a slow year on the work front.  But that is nothing new for me.  With the year behind me, I realise that I will have nothing significant to show that would take me closer to immortality, which perhaps is what many would consider the final frontier of achievement.  

I will leave out the notion of immortality from this discussion.  Shankaracharya is immortal as is Gautama Buddha.  Alexander the Great is immortal.  But isn’t Timur the lame immortal too?  Is Adam Smith immortal?  Is Louis Pasteur immortal?  What about Karl Marx?  They have all touched our lives our influenced our thoughts in such perceptible ways.

Getting back to my life this year at work, it has been just another dull and uneventful year as many others in the past, with nothing that took place portending that anything significantly different in a positive way is likely to happen in the next year. 

But then I look at the bright side:  It could have been worse too.  Thank God it wasn’t so.


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It turns out that since I started blogging three years back I would have written the largest number of posts this year.  I resumed writing after suspending it for a few months when I thought that I had said that all I had to.

And then I went through this rather wrenching experience this year that made me want to resume writing.  It is commonly believed that behind many a creative work there is a Muse.  My spurt in blogging productivity is largely due to a Muse.

Some of you have sensed it already.  Although I wrote on a variety of topics during the year I eventually came back to the one same theme, which had to with my unrequited feelings for the Muse and my troubled relationship.  Although of some antiquity, the ghosts of that relationship came back to haunt me this year.  It bothered me a great deal.  To the extent, that my niece, one of the people in my list of people I mail links to, wrote back that she had had enough of  that theme.  

I think it is now time for me to sign off for the year - from the theme as well as blogging.  

In closing, I want to thank each of you for having been such kind and occasionally even indulgent readers, often getting back with kind feedback, suggestions and thoughts.  Thank you for patiently reading my rambling posts.  All I can give you in return is my prayerful best wishes for a great 2015 for you and everyone in your family.

Nanni.  Namaskaaram.