They are calling You’ve Got the Wrong Girl a lad-lit. What exactly is lad-lit?
Lad-lit, as opposed to chick-lit, is defined as “fiction about young men about their personal and emotional lives.” This, in common understanding, is expected to be written by a man who would be able to enter the head of a young man much better than a woman. But I wanted to think and write differently, to turn the tables of this genre by deciding to pen a novel with a male as the protagonist, and give him the first person voice in the narrative. I wished to break new ground as a woman writer foraying into the realm of lad lit in India, made famous internationally by writers like Nick Hornby and Matt Dunn.
You have reversed the mythological tale of Dushyant and Shakuntala and relocated it within contemporary times. Can you explain?
I took it as a challenge to get into a man’s head, trying to understand the way he thinks about certain things on love, life, relationships and so on, and let me tell you it has been very difficult and also challenging to try and get under the skin of my hero Dushyant Rathod. True that I reversed the mythological love story of Dushyanta and Shakuntala by setting Dushyanta in search of this lady he fell in love with at first sight, and had no peace till he finally found the girl he had spent a night of love and passion with, against the blurred backdrop of the Taj Mahal.
How did this strange idea occur to you in the first place?
Just before writing You’ve Got The Wrong Girl I was reading Shakuntalam, of Kalidasa. I remember asking myself, ‘Why it is always the girl who falls in love hopelessly, then is forced apart from her lover by circumstance and fate, faces familial pressure, then decides to marry another guy (usually the villain/his son) and then in the last scene, dramatically there is a re-entry of the swashbuckling hero who rescues her and they live happily ever after?’ I connected the film to the play and looked at King Dushyant differently, wondering if he was the typical, confused, apparently metrosexual man searching for true love in an age of instant hook-ups and easy sex. I wondered if Kalidasa’s eternal romance could be seen as Dushyant’s story instead of being identified with Shakuntala’s search for the man she thinks is her husband.
What is your take on Dushyant, the King who forgot all about the woman he fell in love with at first sight, who also became pregnant with his child?
I began to look at Dushyant as the man who screwed up, falling in love with Shakuntala afterseeing her in the forest, love at first sight as he was struck by her beauty and grace, indulging in a passionate, timeless romance saga, making torrid love, composing love sonnets, having a Gandharva Vivaha, after which he must leave to take care of affairs in his kingdom. She is given a ring by the mighty scion, to be presented to him when she appears in his court so that she can then claim her rightful place as queen. But, cursed by the anger-prone sage Durvasa, Dushyant forgets her existence. The only way to make him accept her is for Shakuntala to show him the signet he gave her. She has to cross a river to reach him where the ring is lost. This is a clever twist in the tale, like in any Hindi film. When she arrives at his court, Dushyant refuses to acknowledge her. Fortunately, the ring is discovered by a fisherman in the belly of a fish, and Dushyant also realises his mistake and there is a proper ending.
How did you map out the flow of the narrative in You’ve Got the Wrong Girl?
It is a multi city, roller-coaster, sometimes soulful, sometimes bittersweet, sometimes fun, sometimes family drama. It involves a whole bunch of motley, everyday characters drawn from the people we see around us. And since I was inspired by Shakuntala as told from the male perspective, the reader will be able to easily guess that it is a modern-day Dushyant who is in search of his forgotten love never mind if it was a one-time wonder. How he wins her back is the backbone of the story. But the setting I have built up is a very modern landscape and Dushyant is a best-selling, new-age romance writer.
Tell us about lad-lit you have personally liked very much since it is relatively unknown in contemporary Indian fiction in English.
Nick Hornby tops my favorites – High Fidelity, A Long Way Down. Then there is Mike Gayle with his incredibly witty, My Legendary Girlfriend and Matt Dunn whose contemporary romantic comedy novels, including Best Man and The Ex-Boyfriend’s Handbook were shortlisted for the Romantic Novel Of The Year award. Steve Carter whose number one Kindle smash hit Love, Sex, and Tesco’s Finest Cava reached number one spot in UK Humour and number one in Contemporary Romance in March 2011.
What is it that attracts you to their writing?
Everything – their style, their understanding of the male psyche that can be as vulnerable as the female psyche, their ruggedness, their innate, not in-your-face wit and the coming-of-age of the male ego. Their works have motivated me to change the rules of writing here in my own way. We have had an overload of chick-lit and because Indian publishing is mostly formulaic, there is the same story churned out, and frankly, I cannot suffer another! So why not change the rules now? Why can’t a woman get into a man’s head?
You’ve Got the Wrong Girl is being repeatedly labelled as lad-lit versus chick-lit. But I have often seen that the term chick-lit within the broader scope of fictional writing is used rather pejoratively. But you do not seem to be sensitive to the term. Can you explain?
There has been an explosion of chick lit in India in the last few years and lad lit sadly has not quite taken off. Most chick lits are now standard and follow a set formula – largely emphasising on the woman’s coming-of-age saga and her search for Mr. Right. A man’s emotional journey on the other hand hasn’t quite been explored and that was my aim with You’ve Got The Wrong Girl! – to delve inside a man’s head and heart and tackle the resultant travails – to be true to the voice of a man in love, searching for answers on who is his perfect soul match.
This role reversal in terms of gender has us hooked. Did you expect this massive positive response to your new work? How does it differ from your earlier novels? Please explain.
My earlier two novels, Faraway Music and Sita’s Curse were strong, bold, feminist centric books, with the latter being India’s first feminist erotica. This is different as it is penned entirely from a man’s perspective. I think lad lit is an appealing genre because it is fresh and still an unexplored literary terrain. To view romance from a male angle is something a woman writer has rarely done and in that aspect the book breaks new ground. I hope the modern day Dushyant will appeal to a cross section of readers from both sexes, who can relate to his journey.
Some hints about your forthcoming books Rahula and Status Single?
Rahula is a political tragedy and will look at the life of the son of a large political dynasty in Delhi. Rahula was also Buddha’s son – a character barely explored in Indian literature. Status Single is my first work of non-fiction that looks at what being single means in this country – a no-holds-barred book on singlehood in modern, urban India.