Writers on Reading. Part Eleven, Manu Pillai.

Manu Pillai has opened our eyes to aspects of our own history that were either forgotten by time or deliberately side-lined for their inconvenience to the colonial or nationalist project.  Pillai’s first book, The Ivory Throne: Chronicles of the House of Travancore, which describes in fascinating detail the complex tryst between a matrilineal Travancore state and a British colonial administration steeped in Victorian morality, won him the prestigious Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar.  The book was also picked up by a major film production house. Pillai has since gone on to publish two other books on pre-colonial and colonial history, the latest of which, The Courtesan, the Mahatma and the Italian Brahmin, was released in July. 

Manu Pillai’s investigation of Indian history ultimately holds up a mirror to ourselves. His work reminds us of our fascinating, complex past, a far cry from the one-tone history that is de rigeur in school history textbooks.  From The Ivory Palace’s Sethu Lakshmi Bayi to Muddupalani of The Courtesan, the Mahatma and the Italian Brahmin, Pillai’s books place female characters as pivotal to our history. His telling of history steers clear from the ossified norms of academic history writing. Even though his work derives from rigorous fact-based archival research, Pillai’s style of writing, reminiscent of William Dalrymple or Reza Aslan, combines creative writing that centers the human experience and makes for delicious reading, while at the same time revealing a historian with a solid grasp of the socio-political and economic changes sweeping through the historical periods he covers.

In this Q&A, Pillai describes his journey as a writer, what draws him to the characters he writes about, his writing process, and his true feelings about Twitter. 

You mentioned in one of your recent interviews that you initially wrote fiction.  How did you begin your journey towards chronicling India’s diverse history? Was there a single moment or episode that made you write on the subject?

The fiction, oddly enough, was thanks to my father who, in his eagerness to be a good parent, was determined to encourage any hint of talent in his children. I must have been in class 6 or 7 when I wrote a funny poem in honour of my bench-mate, comparing her to flying cows and so on. It wasn’t a nasty affair at all—just a comical tribute to her. She tore it up regardless, which taught me to draw inspiration from more appreciative people in the future. Then came a “novel” about wizards and witches, its core plot heavily plagiarized I suspect from a book I borrowed from the British Council library. My sister and father were its sole readers. But it was really in history that I found my interest anchored by the time I was in my late teens. It began with stories of my own interesting, somewhat eccentric and refreshingly imperfect ancestors told by my grandmother with much irreverence. And that method—of explaining the past devoid of textbook tedium and full of human honesty—really got me interested in looking at the past through the men and women who made it, rather than through battles and dates alone. As I grew older, it became clear that this was what I wanted to do: bridge the academic with a well-written narrative, so that history might appeal to others, as it did to me.

As a writer, pitching to publications and getting rejected is quite common. Did you face this in your initial years as a writer? How did you cope with this?

I was actually spared this, though I have heard horror stories about writers having to wait years to be published—a Pakistani writer once told me he had two books out the same year, simply because one of them was delayed long enough to emerge at the same time as his new one. For me, the process was less traumatic. I spent six years working on my first book. Three years into the project, in fact, I thought the book was ready for publication, and there was a publisher willing to take it. But then—and thank god this happened—I went on for another three years, which significantly improved the book. (So when kids ask me for publishing advice now, despite my policy to never give advice to anybody, I can’t stop myself from saying this one thing: never be in a hurry to publish because a poorly finished book will haunt you for life.) And as I approached the final phase of my writing (drafts four and five), I finally wrote to VK Karthika who was then at HarperCollins. I guessed she was probably bombarded with manuscripts daily, so what I did was to send her only the first six pages of my book, with a carefully crafted email. And I sent the email at 2 o’clock in the morning, so it would be at the top of her inbox when she woke up. And it worked—I got up around 11 am and her reply was at the top of my inbox, asking me to send her the complete manuscript. The success of the first book (I think we are at 14 or 15 reprints in under four years, in addition to the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar it won), meant that publishing the next two was not a challenge. 

You’re known as a chronicler of historical narratives, but our readers are also curious to know, what fiction do you enjoy reading? And what books are you reading right now?

My favourite has always been PG Wodehouse. A lot of the fiction I read as a teenager was also tied to film and television adaptations. My parents wisely did not allow us a cable connection, and the only TV we were allowed to watch was every weekend when we got video cassettes (if people still remember those) and DVDs from the British Council library. So, for instance, if my sister and I watched Sense and Sensibility on screen, the next week would be dedicated to reading the actual novel by Jane Austen. Or if I read David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, I’d look out for a screen adaptation (and there was indeed a two-part TV movie featuring a not-yet-famous Daniel Radcliffe, with Maggie Smith as Betsey Trotwood). Wodehouse too: there is a wonderful series featuring Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry. Fiction now for me is to obtain a break from work. Since my research involves massive amounts of reading of non-fiction, academic work, journal articles, archival records and so on, when I read for leisure it is fiction. I just finished a lovely novel called A People’s History of Heaven by Mathangi Subramanian, set in a Bangalore slum and packed with interesting characters. Before that I was on KR Meera’s The Angel’s Beauty Spots, translated by the brilliant J Devika. My favourite last year was Amrita Mahale’s Milk Teeth. 

You manage to effortlessly bridge the divide between academic and creative writing since we’re notoriously short on attention span these days, this seems especially difficult to manage, could you tell us how get around this particular problem? Or do you even see this as an issue?

That’s the thing ☺ It looks effortless but takes a great deal of effort really. The trick is to not let the reader feel the weight you endure when putting it together. My way of doing this is to construct the early drafts of my books in a relatively seriously, straightforward way. It is at the final stages that I start reading my own pages from the perspective of the reader, asking myself consciously what I can do to induce her to keep reading, to keep turning the pages. The narrative flair and lightness come in at this relatively late stage, after I have already created the basic structure, and got all the footnotes in place. Then it is tone, choice of words, irreverence and that sort of thing that creates the magic, making the book appeal to more people than just academics. So it is, I suppose, a two-part process. Again, the key is not to be in a hurry. 

If you had to send our readers on a tour of the most fascinating places you came across during your research, what are the places that would feature?

This is particularly tough to answer, given that India is full of such magical places. It is important to actually see as many sites as possible if you are going to write about them. With my second book on the Deccan Sultanates, it was while I was at the Qutb Shahi tombs in Golconda, just outside the fort, that I took the decision to do the book. Earlier this year I was in Srirangapatna, admiring the magnificent murals and propaganda art Tipu Sultan has left behind on the walls of his palace there. Some weeks ago, I covered a little under 300kms in a single day, zipping from Chennai first to Mahabalipuram, and then to Kanchipuram to look at temples. What I do now is to always try and tie up visits to historical sites when I am travelling for a literature festival or a lecture somewhere. Not only does this inspire ideas, but it really gives you a sense of the scale of things. Even after three books, it is when you actually look at the wonders out there that you realise how insignificant your work is in comparison with all the stories that exist.  

Can you tell us a little about your writing process?  Do you work in total silence at home for hours, or are you able to write from anywhere? How do you avoid distractions, especially the internet?

I can work from anywhere really, but yes I need silence. The toughest part for me is to get the basic structure of my book and its first draft in order, and till that is done, I tend to be very irritable and nervous and snappy around people. So I sequester myself and don’t go out into society (bad manners are inexcusable, so best to lock yourself up). I am not attached to my desk or anything, however—that sort of attachment to a physical space or to physical objects has never been important to me. In fact both in London and when I was living in Goa, I have had different people look at my room and comment that it felt like nobody lived there. Because besides my laptop, there’d be nothing around, no sign of a human being occupying that space. As for distractions—in our age, it is difficult to avoid them. So the best thing to do is to ration your time for diversions. My favourite social media platform is Instagram. All of last year when I was in the middle of a big research cycle, I was stuck for about 10 hours a day at the library, barely speaking to anyone or having a social life. Instagram and funny stories I’d share on it, usually in the form of captions attached to an old miniature painting, were my sole diversion and escape from the stress. So I use the distraction for my purposes and to lighten my day, rather than let it take over my life. 

How did you encounter the historical characters in your books?  Whether Sethu Lakshmi Bayi of Ivory Throne or Roberto de Nobili and Muddupalani of The Courtesan, The Mahatma and the Italian Brahmin – most of these characters and their amazing stories are unknown to people.

Sethu Lakshmi Bayi in The Ivory Throne was “found” because of healthy curiosity. I had been reading up on Kerala history and on princely Travancore for some time, and through the Kerala Council for Historical Research obtained some old books as well. And in these, I discovered that while she received a passing mention, there wasn’t much on her, which was quite in contrast to other rulers of that region, who were treated more generously and allotted a lot more real estate in print. I began to ask around why she was footnoted, and that is when in bits and pieces the story began to emerge—telling her story, it became clear, would cause awkward questions to be asked, and like a good 18-year-old, when I was told not to dig up something, I had to do the exact opposite and start digging with all my energy. By 19 it was clear that there was a great deal to find here, and though I didn’t consciously set out thinking it would be a book, I knew I had a remarkable story. With the other two characters, you mention: the thing is that these men and women have been studied and their tales do exist, except that they have been limited to academia so far. My contribution has only been to lift them from there and try and mainstream them. And since I pretty much live in the archives and in assorted libraries, finding such characters is not unusual—you just have to look, and you’ll find many amazing stories and men and women.

If you could meet any of the historical characters you’ve written about in person, who would it be and why?

I can’t really name figures as much as give you a sense of the kind of people I may want to meet. I’d definitely want to meet and study an emperor, perhaps a Chola emperor. I’d like to listen to a female bhakti saint, because behind words of devotion are often hidden powerful, even subversive messages. And I’d like to witness the lives Dalit heroes—men and women who don’t exist in records but in folklore and song—because we don’t read as much as we ought to about them today. 

You’re quite active on Twitter.  Which Twitter handles do you particularly enjoy following?

Hah! Actually I believe I am not too active on Twitter by the standards of most people. I don’t get into competitive games of outrage, avoid controversies, and simply block rude people (recently a man called me a genocide apologist—I didn’t even ask him what and when simply choosing to thank him for his thoughts before blocking him). I really use Twitter for the news, to stay abreast of what is happening in the world, and for tweeting out my weekly column and other essays as and when they appear in various publications. Beyond that, it is Instagram that receives more attention. There are no trolls (yet) on Instagram, so it is a far more cheerful place. Twitter is hopeless and a danger to society as well as democracy—we’ll see this more clearly in future. 

When not researching and writing on history, what do you enjoy doing?

I ruminate about the wonder that is sleep, of which I don’t get enough. I travel a great deal for events, which can vary from closed-door sessions in lovely venues to sweaty lecture halls in small-town colleges. I enjoy these, even though they can take a toll on one’s health because it is part of my larger interest in popularizing history and really taking these stories out to as many audiences as possible. It really makes a difference to go out in front of people and talk to them directly. But for most part, since I am now almost a full-time writer, all I do is work. Even holidays have to be strictly timed and planned, and inevitably there will be a column to write, or some work tied up with that too. 

We couldn’t help but notice you were planning to watch Downton Abbey; did you like it? Are there any period films that pique your interest? 

Hah! So you have noticed my Instagram! The movie was okay. It felt like another episode of the series, and if a person who hasn’t watched the series encounters the movie, they wouldn’t be able to make much sense of it. As for period films: as I was saying earlier, I grew up watching a lot of old British films and TV series. I remember a 1970s series called The Good Life which I loved, and another called To the Manor Born, both of which were comedies but also set around themes of class and social pretension. I remember a third series called The Duchess of Duke Street, which was about a royal mistress, but I must have been fairly young when I watched it because, for some reason, in my memory, it registered as a comedy. 

And finally, what advice do you have for writers facing too many rejections? 

Publishing in India is an industry where, in general, especially with English language books, sales figures are relatively modest (a book that sells over 10,000 copies in a country of 1.3 billion people is a bestseller, for instance), profit margins are small, and this means that publishers tend to play it safe. For some people things “click”, while others have to plod through several rejections before it works out. But like life itself, ups and downs will come for everyone: best not to get too dismayed, and to keep hammering away. Success, though, isn’t merely about having a good book. Sadly it also involves good timing and a fair amount of luck. 

Interviewed by Dnyanesh Kamat