Sometimes every writer aspiring to be an author needs a reality check.
Writers need to hear someone who doesn’t mince words about what it is really like. Writers need to travel with someone who from another world made an entry into the literary world. Writers need to learn from someone who manages to retain his passion for literature no matter what.
For the 8th session of Anita’s Attic, Harimohan Paravu, fast bowler, management mentor, and fine writer took the writers on a rollicking journey of what it means to be out there.
The pace of a crease, the heart break of bowling a full toss in the literary world and then going on to deliver a yorker to clean bowl his way into a movie deal.
“50 Not Out Book” by Harimohan Paravu Launch, with VVS Laxman
There is nothing more satisfying for a teacher than to realize that her students have absorbed all that she has had to impart.
It was the first Anita’s Attic offsite outside Bangalore for 26 Tata-ites at the Tata Management Training Centre. I didn’t know what to expect in terms of the participants, their level of enthusiasm and how together we were going to make a difference.
Much as organisations want to enhance their employees talents, the bottom line is how would they use these learnings at the workplace. Happily enough, through presentations, Q & A sessions, individual and group assignments, we discovered that they had ample room to use the Anita’s Attic experience in several ways.
As for myself, I discover that I had immense fun sharing my understanding of writing with the group.
Ultimately it is all about this one principle I believe in : if it isn’t fun, I won’t do it!
Long before everyone was talking about saving the girl child or the glass ceiling for women in the corporate space, Gita Aravamudan had started writing about everything women have to contend with.
And on the eve of International Women’s Day, who better to address the seventh session of Anita’s Attic than the gracious and always inspiring Gita Aravamudan on the twin streams of writing she handles with equal ease and adeptness – fiction and non fiction.
If you don’t find the book you are looking for, write it!
As we hit the half-way mark of the Season 1 at Anita’s Attic, I could see a curious fatigue set in. Writing a piece of fiction is a lot like running a marathon and unless one paces oneself, it is easy to feel defeated a little into the run.
The first flush of enthusiasm gives way to a flatness of thought and a falling of energy: why bother writing this book?
Which is when a writer like Pradeep Sebastian, bibliophile, columnist and a repository of knowledge about the printed word and its many dimensions is the right person to infuse the romance of books into writers who cant see the book for the blank page before them.
A blog is a dark dingy place no one really reaches until they are told how to get there; For an author in these times, visibility is key – How to leave a digital footprint was the theme of the guest speakers segment at Session 4 of Anita’s Attic’s Creative Writing Mentorship program.
My digital partners *conditionsapply talked to the writers explaining what needs to be done to make their presence felt in the digital space. The tools and techniques to be used, and importantly, what not to do.
Thank you Biju Ebenezer and Joshi Jose. As always you guys were terrific !
It is a matter of pride and joy when one of the writers of Anita’s Attic has his or her writing published. Krupa Ge is a fine young writer from Chennai who comes to Anita’s Attic every week from Chennai. Her stories step aside from the conventional world of mainstream fiction and instead seek to locate itself in the lives of the peripheral and marginalized segments of the Tamizh society. There is texture and flavour as well as a great sensitivity. Here is one of her recently published stories in the Open Road Review.
Krupa Ge has a gold medal in MA Sociology from the University of Madras. She has worked as a journalist for over seven years now. Her short fiction has appeared in Spark Magazine, Muse India, The Bombay Review, The New Asian Writing Short Story Anthology 2014 and Indian Literature, among other electronic and print journals. Her non-fiction work has appeared in The Hindu, The New Indian Express, The Alternative, etc.
No writer is ever free of self doubt and especially when one has just begun writing, countless questions fill the mind.
More than anything else, writers need to hear that it is doable. And so the third session of Anita’s Attic had the brilliant Srinath Perur author of If it’s Monday, It Must Be Madurai speak to the writers on his journey from writer to published author.
As for my writers at the Creative Writing Program, with each week I see their enthusiasm for the program and their commitment to their project grow. Could a teacher or mentor ask for more?
Jayapriya Vasudevan from the Jacaranda Literary Agency, based out of Singapore, interacted with the Class at Anita’s Attic, on 31 st January 2015 – the second week in the Creative Writing Course & Mentorship program at Anita’s Attic.
Jayapriya has more than twenty years experience of working in publishing, during which time she has worked in virtually every area of the business. Born in Calcutta, to a family of writers, she studied literature at college and went on to work for numerous publishers, learning the business firsthand. From editing and event management, to sales and distribution, she has ‘done it all.’
Then, having spotted a gap in the market, together with a partner, she set up India’s first bookstore café in Bangalore. It was here that she organized literary salons, inviting up to fifteen authors at a time to speak. Bookseller magazine hailed her as “one of India’s most dynamic booksellers.”
In 1997, she decided to use her years of experience in publishing to set up Jacaranda, India’s first ever literary agency. She went on build up an impressive list, working with distinguished authors such as Anita Nair and Shashi Warrior.
Following a stint living in Beijing, where she continued to develop her list, Jayapriya moved to Singapore in 2006. Once there she founded Books@Jacaranda LLP. Over the years the agency has grown and now represents more than 45 authors across South East Asia and beyond. Jayapriya has spoken at literary conferences all over Asia, from Istanbul and India to Manila and Singapore. Now a Singapore citizen, she is passionate about the visual and performing arts, about books, travel and people.
In less than five months since we first discussed the possibility of setting up a writing academy and mentorship program, Anita’s Attic opened its doors on 24 January 2015 to its first batch of writers. A whole new beginning. A journey that we will undertake over the next twelve Saturdays. Diverse voices but equally exciting talent. Can’t wait to see what emerges at the end of twelve weeks.
It’s exciting, magical and will certainly drain me out…but hey, one must try everything at least once except incest and Morris Dancing.
It was a batch of 13 participants at the first off-site creative thinking and writing workshop held under the auspices of Anita’s Attic at SAP Labs Bangalore. A baker’s dozen, I thought with a secret laugh. And how appropriate it was for I love baking and writing holds the same inexplicable combination of art and science that makes some better bakers than others.
Over two sessions held over two weeks, I saw the initial hint of skepticism fade. No one can teach another person to write but what is possible is to identify the strength of a writer and mentor it. It gave me an incredible high to see how well the writing exercises seemed to draw out latent abilities and how with each assignment, the confidence and the voice of the writer grew stronger. The queries at the end of each session became more focussed and more pertinent.
Just as the participants I had been unsure on what to expect from this workshop. But I think I learnt from the experience just as much as each one of them did. To draw out the shy and reticent participant to bridle rambunctious creative energy to step in only when I needed to or for most parts let the creative vision follow its own path.
For Anita’s Attic is not about creating an army of clones but is about shaping your creativity and your voice to be your own.
