{"id":471,"date":"2022-09-10T12:35:15","date_gmt":"2022-09-10T12:35:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/?p=471"},"modified":"2022-09-10T17:38:40","modified_gmt":"2022-09-10T17:38:40","slug":"anuradha-roy-interview-the-rumpus-aug-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/2022\/09\/10\/anuradha-roy-interview-the-rumpus-aug-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"Anuradha Roy interview, \u2018The Rumpus\u2019 (Aug 2022)"},"content":{"rendered":"
For some reason, I found myself looking up the name \u2018Arundhati Roy\u2019, winner of the Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 1997 for her novel The God of Small Things<\/em>\u2014and came across another name, that of Anuradha Roy. Damn webpage, I thought, can\u2019t even spell. It wasn\u2019t till\u2026. Ok, completely different individual, my bad. And I bothered to order in a copy of one of Anuradha Roy\u2019s books from the library, the 2015 fiction novel \u2018Sleeping on Jupiter\u2019, longlisted for the Man Booker prize. I\u2019m enjoying the read. The setting\u2019s foreign to me, but that\u2019s part of the joy\u2026.<\/div>\n
\n

 <\/p>\n

Roy\u2019s fifth novel, \u2018The Earthspinner\u2019, was published in 2021. She spoke with Janet Rodriguez for an interview published in August 2022 in The Rumpus<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Three questions & responses from the interview\u2014<\/p>\n

(on writing poetry)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rumpus: <\/strong>Your words are so elegant, I am sure you write poetry . . .<\/p>\n

Roy: <\/strong>I don\u2019t write poetry, actually! I have never been able to, but I have always read poetry.<\/p>\n

(on identity and loss<\/strong>)<\/p>\n

Rumpus:<\/strong> Regardless of how you categorize the book, The Earthspinner<\/em> is a deeply gorgeous work of fiction. I found it to be filled, like your other books, with themes of identity and loss. Why do you think these show up in your writing?<\/p>\n

Roy: <\/strong>A poem I used to know almost line for line was Elizabeth Bishop\u2019s witty and wise \u201cOne Art\u201d<\/a> where she goes from the loss of inconsequential objects to the great, irreparable loss, of someone she loves. The fear of loss, the inevitability of loss\u2014it\u2019s a universal theme. As for identity, this has become so politically charged for most of us in the world these last few years that it\u2019s difficult to escape addressing it.<\/p>\n

(on relationships across religious divides)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rumpus:<\/strong> Sara remembers the time of this violent upheaval as the same time she learns how to spin pottery. In her small village, a Hindu man named Elango, the local artisan potter, agrees to mentor her. Elango is in love with a Muslim woman, Zohra, which is another politically charged issue. There\u2019s a Romeo and Juliet quality in Elango and Zohra, isn\u2019t there? They almost don\u2019t understand the danger of their union, do they?<\/p>\n

Roy: <\/strong>Everyone who lives in India is aware of the extreme danger of loving across the religious divide, and yet people do it. That\u2019s one thing that hasn\u2019t changed since Shakespearean times. Elango knows the dangers in relation to Zohra but carries on anyway.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Which is simply to say, IMHO, Anuradha Roy is well worth a read. Below, from \u2018Sleeping on Jupiter\u2019:<\/p>\n

He had idled near the temple for only a little while when Hari, another temple guide, tapped his arm saying, \u201cBhai, Badal. I need to leave \u2013 something urgent \u2013 and I\u2019ve two people waiting for me. You take them to the temple, give them a quick round.\u201d<\/p>\n

Luck appeared to be on his side. It had to do with his early morning glimpse of shirtless Raghu, he was certain. Or perhaps it was those ten rupees and prayers at the old woman\u2019s shrine. He remained carefully unsmiling and continued chewing his samosa. Between bites he said, \u201cI\u2019ve no time, got another group soon. And in the afternoon I need to get home.\u201d He had no work till evening, but Hari did not need to know that. He looked towards the temple gates. he must not let Hari\u2019s clients escape. He had to slow it down to extract as much as he could from Hari, but not too much.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For some reason, I found myself looking up the name \u2018Arundhati Roy\u2019, winner of the Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 1997 for her novel The God of Small Things\u2014and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[90],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-roy-anuradha","entry entry-center"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=471"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":474,"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471\/revisions\/474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/walleahpress.com.au\/currajah\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}