YADAM RAM Kumar, who is one such novelist, playwright and poet, for whom writing an innovative piece for ordinary folk, market outlook notwithstanding, is a source of great contentment. And why not? It is probably his modest beginning that influences Yadam at every step. Much of his creative work addresses the downtrodden, to whom many in today’s world don’t pay heed.
Q: The plagiarism is a derisive problem in the present writing scenario. What is the reason?
Y: The professionalism of creativity is the one and only reason driving budding authors in a wrong direction. As you saw in the case of Kavita Swaminathan, the Harvard scholar, who blurred the image of writing world with prone to plagiarism. On the contrary, the writers of by gone days weren’t crazy about the returns, they aimed at imparting their thoughts among the people. Now the writers aim at royalty in millions. The successful writer is one who gets huge amount of royalty.
Q: So you aren’t money-oriented. You don’t crave for Man Booker and Nobel. May I know what you aim at?
Y: Yeah I’m not crazy about those you said. I’m writing because I’m inspired from my inner self, society and natural environment. I aim at dissemination of my thoughts and experiences among the people through writing. I don’t write for growth of my bank balance and the display of awards in the show-case of my home.
Q: In most of your writing you represent the life of women, especially the Indian women. For example: ‘A Lonely Lady’ is all about different facets of Indian women, same your poetry ‘She’ is. You’re a male writer, so, how you could represent the lives of women in your writings.
Y: Ha! Ha! I’m a male doesn’t mean that I can only represent my gender community. ‘A true author is a person of all genders as well as all genres. Since my child hood I have had special interest in the lives of Indian women. I’ve even done close study on them. When a female author does write on own gender community is considered natural. If a male writer like me writes on woman the work becomes extra-ordinary. For example; a woman does feel other woman’s pain and pleasure, emotion and sentiments, it is natural but when a male feels the same and writes the expression makes different.
Q: You started your writing career with the general fiction ‘A Lonely Lady’, there after you wrote children fiction ‘The Seven Sleeping Pills’ and ‘Yadam’s Tales’. Now your coming novel ‘The King Of Desert’ is a mystical fiction and ‘The Delhi Streets’ is a collection of short stories based on Delhi. What does inspire you to write different genres?
Y: I’m not particular about a genre-fiction, children and non-fiction. I always explore new ideas and concepts, and make it a book. I never follow the traditional pattern of writing because I write what comes from my inner self. Before starting a book I don’t think ‘if it will be a success in the market or the publishers will accept’.
Q: You’re known as a pavement writer. How do you feel with this nickname?
Y: Ha! Ha! I enjoy the name because I roam in public places, especially at roadside and slums and, collect the concepts from the pavement from the odds and sods.
Q: It is good for India, somewhere in the corner of the country writer like you is budding who attempts to restore the charm of literacy and creativity the great Indian writers like RN Tagore and RK Narayan maintained.
Y: The charm of literature is still same in India after literary figures like Arundati Roy, Kiran Desai, Arvind Adiga and Salman Rusdie bagged prestigious Man Booker prize. I assure you that I’ll continue in producing unique works.
