A chat with children’s litterateur Deepa Agarwal is like a whiff of fresh air—an imprint that she leaves behind with each of her books.A chat with Deepa Agarwal is as invigorating and refreshing as a walk in the hills—Almora, to be precise; her book as invigorating as a deep of fresh air on the hill top. The renowned children’s writer was born and lived till in this picturesque hill town of Uttarakhand till she was seven. But though she is sentimental about everything pahaari and her connection with the hills is woven deeply into her identity, Deepa’s roots are “quite tangled”. “My paternal grandfather belonged to the Shauka or Bhotia tribe living on the Tibetan border, my grandmother was an Anglo-Indian, my maternal grandfather was from Almora and grandmother a Maharashtrian from Pune.” Despite these varied influences, the discerning can easily detect the dominating local accent in her speech!
The author’s tryst with writing began quite early. Deepa was shifted from Adams’ School in Almora to St Mary’s Convent, a boarding school in Nainital, at the age of seven and “used to make up stories in my head to put myself to sleep.” The influence of books was quite strong on the imaginative young girl for which she thanks her parents. They provided her with lots of books and encouraged her to read which Deepa feels was crucial to her development as a writer. Deepa changed school again when she was 13 and joined La Martiniere Girls’ College in Lucknow. A post-graduation in English Literature from Allahabad University “where I wrote a few short stories but made no serious effort to get them published,” followed. After her doctor father passed away, she opted for a teaching career on the advice of relatives though at that point in time she harboured a desire to become a journalist.
The writer’s bug would resurface at a later period though. In the meantime Agarwal taught at SPM College in Delhi for about three years. She took a hiatus when she got married and her eldest daughter was born. But after her youngest of three daughters started school, the author became restless and began to check out various career options. It was freelance writing that she felt was her calling as she had always loved writing. The perquisite of this profession was that it did not tie her down to regular office hours.
March 1984 marked the beginning of her serious writing career with the publication of a humorous middle about her dog in The Hindustan Times. She debuted a children’s author in August 1985 with a story written on “a random impulse”. It appeared in Target, a popular children’s magazine of the time and “from that time I began to see myself seriously as a fiction writer.”
For the generation growing up in the 80s and after, Agarwal wove an engaging web of words through her variety of books that took them into the world of mystery, fantasy, history and much more. With 54 books to her credit including three translated from Hindi, the author herself was inspired by all the writers she read when growing up. She feels particularly indebted to Shivani, the iconic Hindi litterateur from her hometown she says, “because after reading her work I became more conscious of the natural beauty of my surroundings and the particular cultural flavour of the region, which I had taken for granted till that time.”
This children’s litterateur has many favourite authors herself. “As a child I read a lot of books by Enid Blyton, Richmal Crompton and Angela Brazil, but among children’s and young adult authors I encountered later in my life, I would like to mention Roald Dahl, Philip Pullman and Cornelia Funke.” Deepa is also a great fan of Dickens, Jane Austen and Tolstoy among the classic writers and John Irving, Thomas Keneally, Barbara Kingsolver, Stephen King and Amitav Ghosh among contemporary ones. But her all time favourite is “Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. It has always been the perfect novel for me.” She also puts Vanity Bagh by Anees Salim very high on her favourites list. Writing children’s story requires a lot of imagination and creative skill, a vision to see through the eyes of the young readers. So how does Agarwal managed to turn up one bestseller after another in her decades long career as a children’s author? Agarwal says, as for the thought process that goes into writing a story, many of her ideas come from childhood incidents and other memories, or from random remarks made by children, even newspaper reports. “My own daughters have unconsciously given me a lot of ideas when they were children with their accounts of chance happenings in school and issues they encountered.”
About plot development, Deepa has an unusual term to explain her approach —“because I began writing before all the workshops and discussions on approaches to fiction became widespread, I have mostly been what they call a ‘pantser’ or an author who literally writes by the seat of her/his pants. I did not plan my fiction too much in the beginning of my career.” She adds, however, that she has learnt that “when you’re working on mystery you need to plot carefully to be able to justify your clues.” Elaborating further, Deepa says that plotting for her is mostly instinctive and depends on the kind of story she is writing or the creative spark. “If you can identify your main character’s motivation clearly, the rest of the events will follow.” She has no qualms in admitting that sometime back, she was so taken up by a real life incident that she didn’t think too much about the protagonist’s motivation, and writing the book turned out to be a time consuming and frustrating affair. “Worse, it is still unpublished!”
Sharing more tips, she adds, “Sometimes the first sentence comes to me, or the main character sketches out. In books like Caravan to Tibet, it was the protagonist Debu’s motivation that dictated the progress of the narrative.” First written as a long short story, Deepa unconsciously used the folktale pattern with the three testing-event structure. When she got the idea of expanding it into a novel, she says that she decided to add a fourth test Debu must pass, though it actually occurs after he attains his visible objective—finding his lost father.
Deepa, who is in the process of completing a non-fiction book about the secret exploration of Tibet during British rule by Nain Singh Rawat, a relative of her grandfather, plans to return to a fantasy novel she began a couple of years ago but which got sidetracked because she received some commissioned work. She is also compiling an anthology of poetry for children, both classic and contemporary, and hopes to write a historical novel for adults some day. It is difficult to imagine that a prolific writer like her can encounter the writer’s block but Deepa is quite nonchalant about it when she hits it. “I just continue to write even if it doesn’t make sense—it keeps my mind from freezing further and at times I manage to extract something worthwhile from it later. Or drop writing for the moment and read several books in a row.” She says that both methods have worked for her. Deepa feels that writing works as a great therapy, particularly for women who find it difficult to speak out in real life. Speaking for herself, she says that “my fiction and more perhaps my poetry has allowed me to deal with many contentious and painful issues in my life. The mere fact that you can share your emotions or express your views helps you to find balance and acceptance.”
Be it an author or a CEO of a huge MNC like Indira Nooyi who recently admitted to the conundrum of working women playing in multiple roles, family support counts. For Deepa it is extremely important, especially for a woman and a children’s writer. “The fact that this is a profession that doesn’t bring you great financial returns or enhance your social status means that if your family doesn’t back you, you might well get demotivated. My husband has always taken pride in my achievements, so have my daughters.” As our talk veers to the trend of popular books being adapted into films in India, I ask Deepa what she feels about this. “Overall, in the hands of good directors this trend can lead to better movies because most of the time Indian filmmakers give short shrift to the storyline, not realising that it is a crucial aspect of quality film making. Film rights being sold certainly add to your earnings, which can be a real boost for an author.” However, she has reservations with the way the author is often sidelined in the promotion of the film and the fact that adaptation may take too many liberties and move away from the book’s premise.
A voracious reader, when not into books—writing one or reading another—Agarwal “enjoys watching a good movie or a play or listening to music—classical or old film songs. I can also relax with a gripping crime serial on TV or a comedy show—but cheesy humour is a complete no-no for me.” Looking back, does this children’s author feel satisfied with her writing career? “The fact that a large number of readers have read and appreciated my books is a blessing and a reward,” says she. But the author has a genuine grouse. She is yet to achieve one of her initial goals, that of earning a decent income from her writing. This, despite the fact that some of her books have gone into numerous reprints. “I would particularly like to mention a series of picture books, still in print after 20 years, for which I was given a minuscule one-time payment.”
Deepa laments that conditions in our country have never been encouraging for children’s writers. “Our books are rarely promoted or marketed effectively. Even the distribution is disorganised.” She feels that with such a large number of schools in the country it should not be difficult to sell children’s books. But there is very little awareness among parents, teachers and librarians about the tangent benefits of leisure reading habit and the existence of good quality books by Indian authors. It is a sad reflection on our indegenous literary scenario that promotes a Harry Potter to the point of frenzied madness but ignores its own backyard of blooming children’s good reads.
Her tips to budding children authors: “Read, read and read! Keep a diary. It’s not only good discipline but also an excellent way to hone your writing skills. Keep trying to challenge yourself to write a notch better. Be particular about your research when you’re writing. Join a writing group and learn to take criticism. When you finish your story, revise, revise and revise. Don’t let rejection drag you down, revise once more, and try again. Important: if accepted, work out a strategy to promote your work.”The author who has been felicitated a number of times does not attach much importance to literary awards “since they reflect the subjective opinion of the people awarding them.” However, she does concede that they provide recognition to an author and definitely look good on one’s bio! “I also understand that some may not be strictly above board because of the lobbying that goes on behind the scenes.” As I take her leave, Deepa’s words resonate: “Ultimately, any writing that has emotional depth is connected with your sense of self and if you wish to acknowledge your roots, no matter how far removed, you will be rewarded in unexpected ways. To write with conviction, you need to be sure where you come from and take pride in it.”