Anita Nair’s gorgeus new children’s book, Muezza and Babyjaan: Stories from the Quran, illustrated by Harshad Marathe, sees Muezza, the Prophet Muhammad’s cat, narrating stories to Babyjaan, an adorable baby camel with lashes to sigh over. Full of shape-shifting djinns, desert animals and the 99 names of god, there’s something so compelling about the story, and it made us wonder why exactly she decided to write it, and how she settled on these particular characters.
Anita Nair will be at the Times Litfest Bengaluru 2017, presented by ACT Fibernet this weekend. On the 11th of February, she’ll be part of a panel discussion on the concept of the noir hero, and on the 12th of February, she’ll be reading from her new book.
The team of The Ladies Finger spoke to Anita Nair about what made her write this book, her writing process and her immense productivity as a writer. Edited excerpts from the conversation:
Your children are grown up now. Why children’s books now?
I’ve written five children’s books before. I think I write them for the manic child jumping around within me.
What different kind of skills does it take to write a children’s book?
It’s the tone that you really have to think about when writing for children. When you’re writing for a child, you can’t talk down to them, but while sounding all buddy-buddy, I always try to weave in some nuance, some kind of life lesson for them, maybe through humour or an anecdote.
The other thing is, when writing for adults, you’re talking to your peers, plus, you have some leeway. Adults judge books based on various factors, like what other people have said about the book, for example. They also give a book a chance. Even if the first page is boring, they think maybe it’ll pick up by page five. With kids, you don’t have that luxury — if it isn’t interesting right from the first page they aren’t going to read the book, so you have to be much edgier, and in a way, go back to being a child yourself. I try to find a way to use a child’s point of view while using adult techniques.
Do you have to go into a separate zone, so to speak, when writing children’s books?
Not really. As a full-time writer, it would be tough for me to write the same things again and again, so working on many books simultaneously allows me to switch head spaces and get out of that zone a little.
What made you decide to write this particular book?
I had very very specific reasons for deciding to write this book. I’ve been feeling so uneasy about the rising intolerance all around. There just seems to be such a profound lack of understanding, even among my own close circle of friends and family, who’re otherwise lovely people. I notice even bleeding heart liberals disparaging Islam so casually. There’s such a lack of inclusiveness that I notice generally.
When I was writing Idris, I had to delve into the Quran, and I found myself wondering so many times, why didn’t I know this already without having to set out to do specific research? I mean, I’m not Muslim myself, I’m a Hindu, and while I had a very secular upbringing, I had no real meaningful access to the Quran, and it’s like that for a lot of us. There are so many myths and veils around the Quran that it’s important to know what actually in it. I’m not some kind of Quran expert myself, but I can tackle stories in it. And I wanted to do that through a children’s book; children are so much easier to get through to.
Can you tell me a bit about the characters, Muezza and Babyjaan, and how you decided upon them?
So when I decided to write this book, I was thinking of how to locate it, in a literary sense. So while reading, I randomly came across the fact that the Prophet had a cat that he was very fond of. I have lots of cats myself, and I know that they’re very intelligent creatures — very different, no dithering, they know exactly what they want. So I thought having a cat who lived in close proximity to the Prophet would be a great voice to speak through, also so that it wouldn’t be me talking, it would all be through the voice of the cat. That also made it easier to write these stories.
Then it came to the next character, whom the cat would be speaking to. It really came to me so randomly, like a lightning bolt. I was reading about djinns, and learned that there was a category of djinn called jaan that takes the form of a white camel. So I decided to name her Babyjaan, since she’s a baby camel, and the name also has a really nice Arabic flavour to it.
What is your writing process like — do you have a routine? On a good day, how many words do you average?
I do have a routine. I’m definitely a morning person, I’m an early riser and I work best in the mornings. I’m done writing by 11.30 am and I spend the rest of the day reading and doing other things. I average about 1,000 words a day.
Do you have tips for other people to increase their writing productivity?
Well, I would say two things in particular, discipline and planning. You can’t do “maybe”, you have to plan your writing and be realistic. Don’t aim for too much, or you’ll end up with backlogs. Also, if you like what you do, you sometimes don’t want to stop. Sometimes, when I’m reading or researching or writing something interesting, I just keep going. But you also should know when to stop, else you get fatigued. Writing is a bit like marathon running, you have to pace yourself.
Would you consider yourself a productive person?
Well, I don’t really consider myself a productive person. But then when I look at my body of work, it seems that I am.
Anita Nair will be at the Times Litfest Bengaluru 2017, presented by ACT Fibernet this weekend. On the 11th of February, she’ll be part of a panel discussion on the concept of the noir hero, and on the 12th of February, she’ll be reading from her new book.
The team of The Ladies Finger spoke to Anita Nair about what made her write this book, her writing process and her immense productivity as a writer. Edited excerpts from the conversation:
Your children are grown up now. Why children’s books now?
I’ve written five children’s books before. I think I write them for the manic child jumping around within me.
What different kind of skills does it take to write a children’s book?
It’s the tone that you really have to think about when writing for children. When you’re writing for a child, you can’t talk down to them, but while sounding all buddy-buddy, I always try to weave in some nuance, some kind of life lesson for them, maybe through humour or an anecdote.
The other thing is, when writing for adults, you’re talking to your peers, plus, you have some leeway. Adults judge books based on various factors, like what other people have said about the book, for example. They also give a book a chance. Even if the first page is boring, they think maybe it’ll pick up by page five. With kids, you don’t have that luxury — if it isn’t interesting right from the first page they aren’t going to read the book, so you have to be much edgier, and in a way, go back to being a child yourself. I try to find a way to use a child’s point of view while using adult techniques.
Do you have to go into a separate zone, so to speak, when writing children’s books?
Not really. As a full-time writer, it would be tough for me to write the same things again and again, so working on many books simultaneously allows me to switch head spaces and get out of that zone a little.
What made you decide to write this particular book?
I had very very specific reasons for deciding to write this book. I’ve been feeling so uneasy about the rising intolerance all around. There just seems to be such a profound lack of understanding, even among my own close circle of friends and family, who’re otherwise lovely people. I notice even bleeding heart liberals disparaging Islam so casually. There’s such a lack of inclusiveness that I notice generally.
When I was writing Idris, I had to delve into the Quran, and I found myself wondering so many times, why didn’t I know this already without having to set out to do specific research? I mean, I’m not Muslim myself, I’m a Hindu, and while I had a very secular upbringing, I had no real meaningful access to the Quran, and it’s like that for a lot of us. There are so many myths and veils around the Quran that it’s important to know what actually in it. I’m not some kind of Quran expert myself, but I can tackle stories in it. And I wanted to do that through a children’s book; children are so much easier to get through to.
Can you tell me a bit about the characters, Muezza and Babyjaan, and how you decided upon them?
So when I decided to write this book, I was thinking of how to locate it, in a literary sense. So while reading, I randomly came across the fact that the Prophet had a cat that he was very fond of. I have lots of cats myself, and I know that they’re very intelligent creatures — very different, no dithering, they know exactly what they want. So I thought having a cat who lived in close proximity to the Prophet would be a great voice to speak through, also so that it wouldn’t be me talking, it would all be through the voice of the cat. That also made it easier to write these stories.
Then it came to the next character, whom the cat would be speaking to. It really came to me so randomly, like a lightning bolt. I was reading about djinns, and learned that there was a category of djinn called jaan that takes the form of a white camel. So I decided to name her Babyjaan, since she’s a baby camel, and the name also has a really nice Arabic flavour to it.
What is your writing process like — do you have a routine? On a good day, how many words do you average?
I do have a routine. I’m definitely a morning person, I’m an early riser and I work best in the mornings. I’m done writing by 11.30 am and I spend the rest of the day reading and doing other things. I average about 1,000 words a day.
Do you have tips for other people to increase their writing productivity?
Well, I would say two things in particular, discipline and planning. You can’t do “maybe”, you have to plan your writing and be realistic. Don’t aim for too much, or you’ll end up with backlogs. Also, if you like what you do, you sometimes don’t want to stop. Sometimes, when I’m reading or researching or writing something interesting, I just keep going. But you also should know when to stop, else you get fatigued. Writing is a bit like marathon running, you have to pace yourself.
Would you consider yourself a productive person?
Well, I don’t really consider myself a productive person. But then when I look at my body of work, it seems that I am.
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