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Writers Workshop Kolkata
June 7, 2008
I spent three weeks in the astonishing city of Calutta and met several writers, booksellers and librarians.
And notably, I met Prof P Lal (through a poet he had published); I attened his riveting 303rd and 304th lecture in his series on the Mahabharata which he has also “transcreated” to use his word. (He refers to current newspapers for examples of the Mahabharata’s continuing contemporary relevance.) And I visited him and his wife at his home, from which he has run Writers Workshop for 30 years. The books he produces are beautiful, each covered with hand-spun saree cloth, printed on hand-made paper and their titles inscribed with his own calligraphy. He keeps every book in print, even though they might sell very few copies; big sales is not the point. You can read all about it at the website. I went down to the kiosk and also over to the warehouse to pick out a small selection of the hundreds of books available, many of them enticing; I’m going to order some more online. I think of P. Lal as a kind of ideal publisher… both v old fashioned and way ahead of his time…
From P.Lal’s “Credo”
“Alternative publishing is desperately needed wherever commercial publication rules. WW is not a professional publishing house. It does not print well-known names; it makes names known and well known, and then leaves them in the loving clutches of the so-called “free” market (which can be and is very cut-throat and very expensive). It is not sad, it is obnoxious, to plead, as publishers do, “I will not publish poetry because it does not sell.” Most English book publishing today in boom-time India and outside is book-dumping. There is a nexus between high-profile PR-conscious book publishers, semi-literate booksellers, moribund public and state libraries, poorly informed and nepotistic underlings in charge of book review pages and supplements of most national newspapers and magazines, and biased bulk purchases of near worthless books by bureaucratic institutions set up–believe it or not!–to inform, educate and elevate the reading public.
Because WW goes in for serious creative writing, and because there is no satisfactory distribution network for such writing, its terms of publication are unique. I must be the only publisher in the world who knows when and where every book is sold;…”
Beyond Borders conference Melbourne Nov 05
June 7, 2008
“Beyond Borders – creative strategies for global harmony”
inaugural conference of the Asia Pacific Writers Network
I went travelling in India for 3 months after attending this, and felt I never had the time to really contemplate all that happened here. But – given my renewed commitment to this blog noting my literary-related activities, and given how wonderful this conference was, I must also belatedly and briefly note its occasion. This meeting was the brainchild of the indomitable berni m janssen, a poet, performer and literary activist who managed to get a mob of writers from Asia, the Pacific and Australia to give papers and readings and discuss many issues of moment to us all – freedom and censorship, translation and access, peace and boundaries, and what we might do in the future. The new website will include many of the papers presented here [will add url when I find it].
APWN is related to PEN :
http://www.pen.org.au
As a non-Indigenous Australian who can write and speak with relative freedom (even while our freedom is under threat) I was reminded of how much writers in far more repressive countries continue to suffer for practicing their calling. I met old friends, I met people whose work I knew or who knew mine, and I met lots of new people. Everyone here was a committed writer also engaged in politics. I am particularly interested in new hybrid identities, cross-cultural expressions and readings. In fact I called for a “mongrel” movement which appealed to some but not all.
Yoga and Writing Workshop November 05
June 7, 2008
Held at Victorian Writers Centre
Am WAY late posting this but wanted to note how stimulating it was to give this workshop in Melbourne. All the participants already practiced in both writing and yoga. I prepare this workshop fresh every time, but always start with some yoga asana practice in a sequence designed to bring stillness and awareness, then a writing exercise, then on to various discussions, processes and other exercises. Everyone has lives full of other demands and sometimes, no matter how much commitment and love there is for our practices, both writing and yoga, we need to deepen and renew that, and that’s one of things this workshop is for.
Giving this workshop always deepens my appreciation of yoga and writing as ways to self knowledge and as disciplines that can be related. And there is also the issue of using yoga to balance and correct the misalignment caused by prolonged acts of writing.
New book: sun square moon has arrived
June 6, 2008
Now that I’ve got a blog I’ve had to decide what to write here. No book reviews, literary journalism, political comment, personal diary, links to cool sites, reports on the culture. Plenty of that already out there. This will only be about my writing and publishing. Naturally I’ll reply to any questions that come up here.
Today, finally, boxes of my new book arrived. I self-published an edition of sun square moon: writings on yoga and writing – this has been ready to publish for over two years. The Indian edition, contracted to Rupa (publisher of my last novel Neem Dreams) has been endlessly delayed. I’ll be selling these through my new distributor Kathryn Johnson, who will offer online ordering as well as supplying bookshops (listed on the site). Am glad for the completion; I expect to do more writing in this area – looking at yoga from a writer’s point of view and at writing from a yoga student’s.
Meanwhile, and relevantly, I’ve been looking at the final edits on a chapter on Self Publishing I wrote for a book on academic publishing. Not that my publishing is academic. I’ll put the piece up on my site after the book is out. Another article I’ve been writing is on the casualisation of academic work in Australian universities.
On Friday I’m off to Melbourne, to give a workshop on yoga and writing at the Victorian Writers Centre. In the following days I’ll be attending the “Beyond Borders – strategies for global harmony meeting” (“an event of the Asia Pacific Writers Network, dedicated to writing, conversations and freedom of speech in the region”).
A week later I fly to Calcutta – my ninth trip to India but the first time to Calcutta. Kolkata, I should say.
Not crazy any more
June 6, 2008
Elise is over helping me update my website. She said it was crazy to be a writer and not have a blog. To my astonishment i found myself ready to blog.
I’ve called it after my new book, sun square moon.