Something of Myself
Monday, January 09, 2006
Ah, Shantaram...the magic goes on!
Gregory David Roberts. Author of Shantaram. Convict. Fugitive. Smuggler. And now, an acclaimed writer. Was reading one of his interviews. Mind-zapping…
Q. Going by the Arthur Road section of ‘Shantaram,’ I find it hard to credit that you’re still walking around as a functioning human being. How does a person recover from the trauma of being tortured?
GDR: Art is a critical component, but I think that love is a very important aspect. I’ve always had my mother’s love, and even though I had a very conflicted relationship with my father, my relationship with my mother was always sound. I’ve known a lot of men in a lot of prisons around the world and most of them are sad men, not bad men. The vast majority don’t have that sense of certainty that no matter how damned they become or how profoundly they damn themselves, there is someone there who will always love them no matter what. In my case I always had that. In those moments when the blood is running out of your body and you think you’re going to die, it’s that love that stays with you and keeps your heart going and says don’t give up. I’ve seen soldiers dying and heard the other people around them saying, “I love you, I love you” and they don’t love the guy, they just know instinctively this is what’s gonna keep them going.
Q: It’s funny that writers often get portrayed as decadent, flaky individuals rather than some guy digging a ditch with a pen.
GDR: It took me five years to write this book, it took me a year and a half to edit it. The first two drafts were destroyed. In that time, if you’re not dedicated to what you’re doing, you are gonna let it go. The amount of focus you need is the diametrical opposite of being flaky. And of course it took me a long time to realise that. I couldn’t write without a bottle of scotch and an ashtray and a packet of cigarettes, and by the time I finished a few pages work the bottle was half empty, the ashtray was half full, and that’s how I wrote. I don’t smoke now, I don’t drink and I don’t take drugs, and the work that’s coming from me is the best work I’ve ever done. And I’d never take any substance of any kind that might jeopardise the flow of work. There’s a coherence and an ability to focus, a clear-headedness that is directly connected to sobriety. But I did have that quasi-romantic view once. I spent my life as a writer preventing myself from being able to write. I was being published when I was at university, and I had every chance, everyone said you have a stellar career ahead of you as a writer and then I lost it all, threw it all away.
Q: I've read that your first drafts were destroyed in prison—how did you overcome what must have been tremendously depressing obstacles?
GDR: I think there are two kinds of writers in the world: those who write because they think it's a good idea, and those who have no choice but to write. I'm the second kind. I wrote in solitary confinement without a pen or paper by memorizing the 3,000 words of a new short story, one repeated sentence at a time, day after day and week after week. It's always my first instinct to write, and I've always written my world, no matter what my circumstances.
When I was chained to a wall in an Indian prison and being tortured, there was a moment when it seemed to me that I was going to die. I was chained face down. My body was stripped bare. The razor-sharp bamboo canes were whistling scars onto my shaved head, my back, my legs, and the bare soles of my feet. In the constant struggle to lift my face from the bleeding, red puddle of sweat and tears, I was choked by the fear that I would drown in my own blood. But in that terror, in that clamp-jawed defiance, I heard the clear, indomitable writer's voice in the deepest part of my mind: "Damn, this is good material! If you live through this, you've got to write it down!"
Gregory David Roberts. Author of Shantaram. Convict. Fugitive. Smuggler. And now, an acclaimed writer. Was reading one of his interviews. Mind-zapping…
Q. Going by the Arthur Road section of ‘Shantaram,’ I find it hard to credit that you’re still walking around as a functioning human being. How does a person recover from the trauma of being tortured?
GDR: Art is a critical component, but I think that love is a very important aspect. I’ve always had my mother’s love, and even though I had a very conflicted relationship with my father, my relationship with my mother was always sound. I’ve known a lot of men in a lot of prisons around the world and most of them are sad men, not bad men. The vast majority don’t have that sense of certainty that no matter how damned they become or how profoundly they damn themselves, there is someone there who will always love them no matter what. In my case I always had that. In those moments when the blood is running out of your body and you think you’re going to die, it’s that love that stays with you and keeps your heart going and says don’t give up. I’ve seen soldiers dying and heard the other people around them saying, “I love you, I love you” and they don’t love the guy, they just know instinctively this is what’s gonna keep them going.
Q: It’s funny that writers often get portrayed as decadent, flaky individuals rather than some guy digging a ditch with a pen.
GDR: It took me five years to write this book, it took me a year and a half to edit it. The first two drafts were destroyed. In that time, if you’re not dedicated to what you’re doing, you are gonna let it go. The amount of focus you need is the diametrical opposite of being flaky. And of course it took me a long time to realise that. I couldn’t write without a bottle of scotch and an ashtray and a packet of cigarettes, and by the time I finished a few pages work the bottle was half empty, the ashtray was half full, and that’s how I wrote. I don’t smoke now, I don’t drink and I don’t take drugs, and the work that’s coming from me is the best work I’ve ever done. And I’d never take any substance of any kind that might jeopardise the flow of work. There’s a coherence and an ability to focus, a clear-headedness that is directly connected to sobriety. But I did have that quasi-romantic view once. I spent my life as a writer preventing myself from being able to write. I was being published when I was at university, and I had every chance, everyone said you have a stellar career ahead of you as a writer and then I lost it all, threw it all away.
Q: I've read that your first drafts were destroyed in prison—how did you overcome what must have been tremendously depressing obstacles?
GDR: I think there are two kinds of writers in the world: those who write because they think it's a good idea, and those who have no choice but to write. I'm the second kind. I wrote in solitary confinement without a pen or paper by memorizing the 3,000 words of a new short story, one repeated sentence at a time, day after day and week after week. It's always my first instinct to write, and I've always written my world, no matter what my circumstances.
When I was chained to a wall in an Indian prison and being tortured, there was a moment when it seemed to me that I was going to die. I was chained face down. My body was stripped bare. The razor-sharp bamboo canes were whistling scars onto my shaved head, my back, my legs, and the bare soles of my feet. In the constant struggle to lift my face from the bleeding, red puddle of sweat and tears, I was choked by the fear that I would drown in my own blood. But in that terror, in that clamp-jawed defiance, I heard the clear, indomitable writer's voice in the deepest part of my mind: "Damn, this is good material! If you live through this, you've got to write it down!"
3 Comments:
Wow interesting read...
**and those who have no choice but to write.
Im that too :)
Keshi.
Thanks Keshi. It's very passionate isn't it? Glad you liked it. I'd like to believe I am one of them too w.r.t. "those who have no choice but to write"...
Oh btw, if you want to read more, do drop by at www.shantaram.com.
Until then, all best.
Thanks Pele I will check it out some time :)
Keshi.
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