[Archana Thapa, PhD, is an independent scholar, author, editor and founder of Akshar Creations, a publishing house. Thapa writes both in English and Nepali. Her latest book is a story collection titled Kathaputala, that received an overwhelming response soon after its publication. She has worked as the senior member of a team to draft Five Years Strategy Plan (2014-19) for National Women Commission Nepal. Her areas of interests are literature, gender, culture, Nepali theatre and art. Thapa is deeply invested in non-mainstream literary works, discussions and women’s writing. She is one of the founding members of Aahwaan Group, a self-funded informal democratic discussion group based in Kathmandu that promotes meaningful discussions on literature, gender, media, popular culture and contemporary socio-cultural beliefs and practices that affect women’s life. Some of the seminar works she has complied and published include Telling a Tale, Sahaastitwako Khoj and Smritikathama Sattwa—works that compile personal stories of women, girls and other marginal categories who are virtually othered or silenced in the conventional Nepali society. Presented herewith is the edited excerpt of a talk Mahesh Paudyal of The Gorkha Times had with Dr. Thapa.]
Greetings. Your literary works show multiple dimensions. You are a writer, a critic, a literary activist and a publisher. Which of these roles satisfy you the most, and why?
I consider myself a reader who enjoys reading books and reflecting upon them. While reading, I open myself to new challenges and keep myself open to the possibility that reading of a particular book might change me, my beliefs and my deeply-held presumptions in one way or the other. Every book might not produce such transformative effect, but I feel that as a reader I should keep myself open to the possibility. My love for reading— fiction, non-fiction, literary theories, cultural studies, gender studies etc.—has helped me to think critically. It has also broadened my understanding of real issues that matter in life, such as issues of caste, class, gender, nationality and so on. In this sense, reading books can be a subversive act that can lead towards social activism and inspire one to work for social transformation. I feel that both reading and writing have the potential to become subversive and transformative acts. Reading was my first love. I love reading even more than writing and publishing
Looking at your recent-most book Kathaputala, a few books you edited before that and the subjects you pick up for your regular talk shows convinces us that ‘gender’ is one of the core issues you are interested in. In a society like ours where patriarchy still grips so hard, have you noticed any remarkable change in the later years in the conventional understanding of gender? What is the nature of that change, and what, do you think has brought that out?
As a woman living in men’s world, women’s issue and gender issues are important issues for me. I do not use the term ‘patriarchy’ in a light manner because it is the social system that makes people believe that women are lesser human beings. We do not realize to what extent gender affects one’s life. In one of the literary programs, when an established journalist proudly announced that he does not read women’s writing I was shocked. Later I realized that his proclamation was the result of the patriarchal mindset according to which women writers are not worth reading. This is just one example to show how our thinking shapes our actions.
However, the conventional understanding concerning gender is changing. Now people do not need any public forum to be heard or to be seen. Widespread use of social media has made it possible for conscious readers to challenge gender stereotypes, gender misrepresentation, rigidity of gender and much more. Today’s younger generation is more informed and aware of gender and identity politics, supports voices from the margin, and sides with social justice issues. They youngsters are more articulate and I see them as change makers of the society.
You have also compiled works that showcase experiences of women and girls. What untold story, do you think, do these women and girls have in them? What difference is the unraveling of those stories likely to make in our society?
In a society like ours where women are praised and glorified for their silence and suffering, it was not easy to make women write their personal experiences for public readership. During the compilation of Telling a Tale which was published in 2010, a few of the contributors were reluctant to write their personal story in the beginning. The major concern was ‘what is the use of writing a personal story’? Many of them, however, welcomed the idea; they wrote their stories and the book took a form. The second collection of women’s personal tales titled Swaastitwako Khoj came out in 2012. Both the collections have stories that relate to women’s existence, gender identity and multitude of other themes seemingly personal but related to their social and political rights. They are not simply stories of discrimination at the individual level; they are windows to the systemic discrimination that work in thousands of ways in the society, at the intersection of gender, caste, class, age, and religion. Those stories unravel women’s dilemmas concerning their existence in a society that considers them less than men. I believe such stories inspire readers to protest against all forms of injustices and oppressions.
Now a note on alternative sexualities! Any sexuality, other than the conventional or say compulsory heterosexual behavior still becomes an eye-sore in our society. Not much has been written in Nepal about gay, lesbians or any sort of queers. But, we cannot deny the existence of their natural categories. What, do you think, should be done by writers and critics to bright this issue to public notice?
In many other countries, along with the development of women’s studies, gay and lesbian studies and queer studies have developed within the academia and alternative sexualities are actively debated in public forums. In Nepal things are slightly different. The issue of identity, politics, sexual identity and the relationship between power and gender have gained some foothold in urban public forums, but many of us still understand gender only in binary terms: masculine and feminine. In my view, every individual should have the right “to be” and the “freedom to be” whatever gender identity one chooses. Gender is a series of repeated and stylized acts that create the illusion of a bodily ground. Just as many of us mistakenly consider “woman” as a unified category and cisgender as only gender, compulsory heterosexual relations are also misunderstood as natural and normal. Because of the same misunderstanding, acts of gender blending, and the realities of LGBTIQA+ are stigmatized, violently policed, condemned and punished. We train our kids from the very childhood to follow gender rules, and if they try to step out of the predetermined boundaries of gender they are punished. In my latest edited book Smritikathama Sattwa there are three such narrations, in additions to the narrations of cisgender men and women that tell how they resisted the prescribed gender norms and adopted the gender of their own choosing. Their narrations clearly refute the logic that gender and sexuality are natural, biologically determined and inevitable. We need more stories like these that challenge the universality of masculine and feminine gender identities and the presumptive universality of heterosexual relation.
You are also a publisher, and you run Akshar Creations, a publishing house. As a publisher, what is your observation on, or experience about publication and public reception of books that handle unconventional issues that have non-conformist, rebellious or radical nature? Or, do you think Nepali readership still prefers conventional issues?
It is difficult to talk about Nepali readership in singular terms. The term should be understood in much broader and diverse way. There are different kinds of readers and every reader’s reading tastes, reading expectation and experiences vary. Whatever a reader reads, be that a book of fiction, non-fiction or a poem, I hope it provides a possibility of critical engagement—a moment of reflection and action. The increasing number of women readers is also a positive sign because their views matter and their voice matters. About a decade ago, women were not considered serious readers.
Akshar Creations publishes only a few books each year and believes in publishing books not only for commerce and profit, but also for political reasons. I make conscious efforts to bring out books that raise the voices and issues of the marginalized. If commerce is not on the priority list of a publication house, it obviously faces many challenges, especially on the financial front. This is true in the case of Akshar creations as well.
I would also like to add this much here that if unsettling the idea of the unified truth is called ‘rebellious’, promoting women’s writings is considered irrelevant; resisting all kinds of hierarchies of power is looked down upon as desperately ‘utopian’; rejecting normativity of gender is called ‘outrageous’; contesting the canon of so-called great works of literature that excludes women is called ‘rebellious’, then yes, I am all of that. And the small section of the same rebellious Nepali readership who believes the same has given me enough strength to keep going despite obstacles and have reaffirmed my belief that there are other alternatives to ‘‘manterrupting’’ and “mansplaining” in the field of literature.
Could you briefly inform our readers with your latest literary or research engagements, books, priorities and subjects?
At present, I am busy reading a few manuscripts for future publication. I am also trying to finish the draft of a fiction that I started last year but have not been able to finish. Also I am spending quality time with my family.