Writers’ Festival Plans: What New is in the Offing?

Feature: Rama Adhikari

Three big festivals of the Nepalis are at our doorsteps. Dashain is already here at home; Tihar and Chhath are following closely. It’s a vacation time for many, and for others, it is an easy time at office, having intermittent days off between working days. People are busier at home than at officers— worshipping, making merry, receiving guests, preparing delicacies, singing, dancing and above all, living like themselves.

Writers, since time immemorial, have been labeled ‘eccentric’—stealing time off every occasion, and sneaking into their own imaginative worlds. Festival or no festival, vacation or no vacation, they are always on look for an opportunity to invent solitude and create something. They are like artists, who pick thrown-off straw strands or sugarcane husk, and weave beautiful caps or head-wears out of them.

What are our writers doing at present? What are their festival plans? We talked to a few Nepali writers at home and abroad, and tried to learn about their festival plans. We have taken care to include writers of different ages.

Usha Sherchan, a senior poet and fiction writer, counts the lock-down season as creatively productive, though it has hampered other walks of life. This is the only time in her life she has been able to free herself from a housewife’s role, and become an almost fulltime writer.  Says, “I always called myself 99% housewife and 1% writer in the past. After all, I am from a Thakali Family, where we are obliged to act in group interest. We also have equally many festivals and auspicious occasions. As eldest child in the family, I have equally many responsibilities to bear. Besides that, being a writer also means additional responsibilities. On top of that, the capital today has many literary events every day, and since there are calls I cannot simply ignore, I am obliged to attend a few out of curtsey. Domestic responsibilities are aplenty too, and crushed among so many duties at the same time, I never found ample time to write until I was sixty-five. This time, the lock-down forced a full-stop on many things. I neither had the rush to visit somewhere, nor serve guests visiting us. Besides attending a few virtual events, writing good wishes to some junior writers for their books and giving written or oral interviews to some online media, I have had nothing much to do. Only upon turning 65, I could feel that I am 99% writer and 1% housewife. This is the first time in life that I got this feeling.”

Ms Sherchan recently compiled her scattered muktaks (quatrains), added a few new ones and handed it over to Book Hill publication for her next book Trashadika Himnadi. She considers it a privilege on her part and on the part of Nepali muktaks to find a premier publishing house like Book Hill. This is going to be the first collection of muktaks Book Hill is launching. She is also collecting her scattered songs, and writing a few new ones. “I want to launch a collection of songs as soon as I can,” she says. She is also working on a new collection of stories, which, in her own words, is her bid to “free characters that had been caged in her mind for years.” She also wants to compile her poems and launch Collected Poems of Usha Sherchan, but has no plan to write a novel, for her novel Aadhi was launched only a few months ago.

Why is Ms Usha in such rush to collect, compile, write and publish? She has own logics: “I am, after all, a setting sun. Before I depart, I want to get these works done. Everything does not come about just because we want. We need to see what plans destiny has, or what has been predestined.”

Poet and novelist Pragati Rai is planning to read two story collections and write reflections on them during the festivals. The first book is Chhakalai, a collection of stories by twenty young writers. She has started reading it, and is enjoying it entirely. Says, “Reading it is like observing tiny tots taking their first steps. It reads like shrewd writings of some seasoned writers here, and like the crude writing of beginners there. I am even more thrilled to consider how I would feel when I sit down to write my reflection on it.”

The second book she is planning to read is Yambuner, a story-collection by Bina Theeng. She has this book underneath the pillow, and is thrilled to consider how beautiful a read it would be for her, as it is a work by a Tamang woman, endowed with wonderful creative art. For the time being, she is reading certain engaging facts about the Buddha.  

Tika Aatreya, a Nepali poet and ghazal writer from Itahari has no personal plans for this festival season. She also is obliged to stay restricted to her home this time, owing to the Corona pandemic. She has no internal tourism plans this time, unlike other years in the past. Nevertheless, she is planning to finish reading some books she had been planning to read since long.

Her plans, as a writer, including finalizing an anthology of poetry she is working on. Says, “I am preparing to hand over the manuscript to the publisher soon after Tihar. I will also compile my prose poems that lie scattered.”

Dr. Goma Adhikari, a Guwahati-based Indian-Nepali writer, considers the Dashain festival a special one. But like others, she feels the blow given by COVID-19 this time. She is beleaguered in Guwahati, all by herself, away from her family members who are way far in Manipur, some 500 kilometers away from her current location. But she says, “I have decided to make the season positive and safe. I shall perform worship at home and drive my half-done works to their accomplishments.” Her literary plans include guiding her little son to face the English Olympiad well, and completing the Hindi edition of her seminal work History of Nepali Literature in India. It’s Nepali version is already in the market.

Mani Bhattarai, a Nepali poet and lyricist based now in America has decided to observe the festivals this time without visiting relatives. He is planning to make a video call to his parents on Tika Day to seek the latter’s blessings. He blames the Corona pandemic for this state of affairs. He says, “Like me, everyone must be unhappy on having to stay restrained during the festival season of Dashain, but we ought to stay alert to save ourselves and others from the virus.”

But Mani feels, Dashain makes no much impact on his writing. He thinks he shall maintain his usual pace even during the festivals. He doesn’t love to write something in rush, just because Dashain is at our doorsteps. Says, “I write whenever I feel like writing. A writer should feel the joy of writing, when he or she is at the writing table. One should be able to derive the type of pleasure writing ought to give during the process of writing. Reactions from readers is the second-layer satisfaction that follows later.”

Bhattari has bought some new books, and is willing to read them  all, as far as he can. In a foreign land, Dashain is not a vacation time. But then, he has planned to observe the festival in a mode little kids would understand and feel its frenzy. 

Novelist, actor and director Tanka Chaulagain remembers his habit of writing and compiling in the festival seasons. This time, he thinks, the task will be even more orderly. “In ordinary times, a lot of rush would always impede the task. I have left many things unread; many works incomplete. I also have a lot of themes in mind I want to write on.”

He loves reading e-books and watches two films a day. This has been his routine ever since the lock-down started. Yet, he has kept his creative pen moving. “I have written fourteen plays for children and one for adults. I have made a framework of five novels as sequel to my novel Zero Cottage. I shall rewrite them now. This year is, for me, the most productive year as a writer.”

Reason Mayalu, a young poet from Ilam, finds himself more restless than on other festival seasons, basically because of the restrictions imposed by the pandemic.  His restlessness has other roots too. Says, “The pain of finding ourselves safe, but seeing others in grief of losing their near ones is terrible. I am also moving along the same ladder. Obviously, Dashain is not as festive as it used to be in the past.”

Yet, he has some productive plans for the reasons. He and his friends have been able to use the social media and found a literary organization in a short time. “I felt the urge to do something for the downtrodden much earlier in the course of living. I have seen students who come walking along a long path to attend their school, all soaked in sweat.”

Through the organization “Unmukta Sahitya Samaj” he and his friends are planning to establish a library here, so that these eyes of our future, the kids from families living below poverty lines, can be benefitted. “I have decided to used the social media to raise fund for this work,” he says. He adds: “I have myself lived through a time when an aspiring generation, willing to study on, had to live a penniless life. For me, it is important to hone this mission to success, fundamentally to keep the zeal of such kids living.” Besides this, Mayalu is busy doing his routing reading and writing works.

Nepali book market has always shown a surge of deliveries soon after Dashain-Tihar festival. This time as well, every writer we reach out, has mentioned something under preparation. Once again we can expect a similar book, through there are rooms to imagine a comparative shrink because selling and buying is not as comfortable this time, as it used to be in the past. This season, usually is a season of book exhibition in Nepal, which is by far the most awaited occasion for selling and buying books. But this season, we saw no such exhibition. Literature festivals, also usually planned for this season, saw a dead-still condition this year. Virtual festivals do not encourage sale and purchase of books. Online buying has not become a culture among the Nepalis yet. Considering all these indications, book market is likely to stay mild this year. Yet, the preparations writers are making is quite encouraging, and one day or another, they will appear with a bang in the Nepali market.

Best festival wishes!