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Get off to the write start
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This November a literary race against time is on. It challenges participants to put down 50,000 words of the novel they always wanted to write, in just 30 days
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Photo: K. Ananthan
UNITED WE WRITE Knowing that thousands of other people are doing the same thing makes you think you can do it too
Like many individuals connected with the arts in some way, I often claim to be an amateur novelist. Amateur because, like thousands others, one does not really know where to begin that journey, and so hides behind every commitment in life. Meanwhile
, as the folks at NaNoWriMo say, the novel remains a one-day exercise: “One day I will write my definitive novel.”
For dozens of other Indians stuck in the same rut, a welcome impetus has come in the last few years in the form of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month, although the National is redundant now).
This is a literary race against time that challenges participants to put down 50,000 words of a coherent tale in just 30 days from November 1 to 30. Like all interesting explorations that happen for the joy of exploration, NaNoWriMo has no prizes for best novel, quickest-written novel and so on. Instead, everyone who hits the 50,000 word mark and registers the fact on the website by November 30 is certified a winner.
The aim of this annual event, says Nishant Shah, a four-time participant and a volunteer Municipal Liaison for India, is to get people to realise that if they have a story to tell, the only way to do so is to start putting it down on paper right now. “Most people know they can write, but they don’t know how to start. Here, no matter how inconvenient it is, you have to write. And if you succeed, it gives you the raw material that you can then work on to convert into something readable.” NaNoWriMo aims to break down the romanticised image of the inspired, solitary genius and replace it with the idea of a disciplined craftsperson. “A lot of people overthink things before they get started on their novel. Often, they don’t get started because they are scared that what they write will not be good enough, that they haven’t received enough training and so on. But knowing that thousands of other people (over 100,000 from 70 countries at last count) are doing the same crazy thing drives home the point that maybe you can do it too,” explains Tanushree Parial, another liaison based in Hyderabad.
It is that sense of community that NaNoWriMo participants say draws them to the event. Aside from the knowledge that one is sharing one’s creative sufferings with 100,000 others, the sense of community also takes the shape of forums on the website, where people can discuss their work and harvest ideas from others. “It’s like a whole community of people looking at something that you want to look at. So, it often feels like a lot of other people have also taken the time off to help you write your novel,” says Amarpreet Kaur, a first-time participant. And with two Municipal Liaisons for India helping to connect local participants, the community has become more specific, says Tanushree. “In the Asia region, you really don’t have any identity of your own. The fact that we’ve got over a 100 participants from India shows there are so many people here interested. And it makes the forums far more specific, which helps writers put more realism into their novels.” The two liaisons will goad their community into reaching the word count with creative gifts for achieving milestones, two and three-day write-a-thons, or partnering up writers.
Sceptics object to many points of NaNoWriMo — the focus on quantity over quality, and lack of judgement and appraisal in the competition. What’s the point of the whole event if works are not appraised or even published anywhere for public consumption and comment, they ask. Participants say the goal of the competition is not to turn out the perfect novel, but to put down a significant amount of writing that can then be edited and reshaped to become readable. “Here, you aren’t writing for the market, or a publisher. You are writing for yourself, and it makes you feel really proud to simply finish something like this,” clarifies Aparna Bhaduri, who hit the mark last year and is back again this year to try something more experimental. Scepticism about the format is to be expected, points out Nishant, considering it is the easiest offence and defence to anything. “Just because something is new and popular, it doesn’t automatically become cheap. In the end, the day 100,000 participants feel they don’t need a NaNoWriMo, it will stop.” For the moment, however, the event fulfils an organic need, giving independent writers a platform to explore their talents at a time when even university courses are geared towards theory rather than practice.
And besides, there is some truth to what the NaNoWriMo website says in its FAQs section: “Art for art’s sake does wonderful things to you. It makes you laugh. It makes you cry. It makes you want to take naps and go places wearing funny pants. Doing something just for the hell of it is a wonderful antidote to all the chores and ‘must-dos’ of daily life. Writing a novel in a month is both exhilarating and stupid, and we would all do well to invite a little more spontaneous stupidity into our lives.”
For details on NaNoWriMo, log onto www.nanowrimo.org.
RAKESH MEHER
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