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| Vol. 4, Issue 5 May 2012 |
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Reporting & Essays |
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Essay |
Paperback Messiah
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| Readers’ reports on Chetan Bhagat, the self-anointed poster boy of middle-class success |
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AM AT THE BENGALURU LAUNCH of Chetan Bhagat’s 2 States: The Story of My Marriage. Publicity has been minimal—a single message on Twitter is responsible for most of the youngsters trooping in. Some are young enough to be accompanied by parents; others come straight from work, laptop cases slung over shoulders; most seem to be college |
students. The chairs laid out by the bookstore are filled half an hour in advance and people file steadily into the space between racks. A screen loops TV clips of Bhagat: interspersed with upbeat stock music, a breathless voice informs us that after book sales in the millions over the past five years, Bhagat recently quit his ‘well-paid job’ as a banker. Cut to Bhagat chiming in earnestly, “I am the poster boy of Indian middle-class success.” After about 20 minutes of this the screen goes blank, bringing hope to the restless audience. Presently, an emcee appears, delivers his spiel about the bookstore chain that is organising the event, and reassures the gathering, “Ladies and gentlemen, we have the celebrity figure present right here.” A few minutes later, Bhagat, a boyish figure in jeans and a t-shirt, enters to an outburst of claps, cheers and camera flashes.
According to the programme, Bhagat is supposed to read from the book. “How many of you have already read the book?” he asks. Almost all hands go up. “Do you still want me to read?” The consensus is a shouted, “No!” Bhagat then takes charge of a panel discussion, keeping it short and breezy, before getting to what the audience really wants—to talk to him. They share personal stories, seek advice, ask after characters in his books as if they were real people. Bhagat keeps things moving easily. He banters, he counsels, he cuts in with a joke when someone gets too serious. There is much laughter and applause through the evening. When at last it is time to wind up, Bhagat is thronged by fans unwilling to let go.
My afternoon has mostly been spent waiting futilely for Bhagat in the lobby of the ultra-posh—it even has a helipad—Oakwood serviced apartments where the bookstore has put him up. My wait is the result of being unable to establish contact with Bhagat’s sensationally elusive PR, and it gives me the opportunity to explore United Breweries—or UB—City, the ‘development’ in which Oakwood stands. If there were to be a poster place of Indian middle-class success, a place that could represent the upper reaches of celebrating sufficiency through consumption, an über-mall of sorts, it is this, it is this. UB City is “skyline defining” and “the new jewel of the city” according to its website. Besides the serviced apartments, it has corporate offices, a food court and a swanky shopping area—a high-ceilinged marble affair with shops bearing formidable European names like Ermenegildo Zegna, or deceptively simple ones like Tod’s. Much of the merchandise does not carry price tags, and when it does, the figures are hair-raising. The windows of the Louis Vuitton store have large, gilded birdcages with shoes, handbags and clutches locked inside. The birds are on the outside, looking longingly into the cages.
At the launch, I manage to wriggle in through the throng of fans that surrounds Bhagat and ask him if there’s any way I could get some time with him. He rues the miscommunication and invites me to join him on his way back to UB City. After the fans have had their fill, Bhagat and I squeeze into the boot seat of a Chevrolet Tavera; his wife, twin sons and in-laws occupy the middle and front seats. I congratulate him on the liveliest book launch I have ever been to. This is nothing, he says. “If you want to see a real Chetan Bhagat event, you have to come to a small town. I did one in Bhubaneswar and 2,500 people came. In Indore they had to hire a basketball stadium. That’s where the real action is.”
Bhagat is the author of four novels—Five Point Someone (2004), One Night @ the Call Centre (2005), The 3 Mistakes of My Life (2008), 2 States: The Story of My Marriage (2009)—that have collectively sold a few million copies, numbers that are astronomical for the world of Indian English fiction. Bhagat’s books have found readers in mofussil towns and he enjoys unprecedented reach for someone who writes in English. Many of his readers have read no writer besides Bhagat; some do not realise his books are fiction. Two commercial Hindi films have been made from his books—Hello and the spectacularly successful 3 Idiots—with a third in the making. Bhagat writes columns in the editorial pages of the Times of India and Dainik Bhaskar, the country’s largest-selling English and Hindi newspapers respectively. He is often invited to air his views on television, and he is a frequent motivational speaker at colleges. He is quite accurately termed a ‘youth icon’ by the media, and unlike other icons who tend to be sportspersons or actors, Bhagat is particularly influential since his ideas reach a large number of impressionable minds.
Bhagat quotes a psychiatrist he met in Delhi after his third book was published: “Chetan, you don’t realise the power you have over young people. It’s very rare that an educated celebrity has been given this stage. There’s more you can do.” Since then Bhagat has quit his bank job and speaks with fervour of being an ‘agent of change.’ “I now know my writing is powerful enough to create bestsellers. But is it powerful enough to alter behaviour and thinking? That is the ultimate level. Can I create a revolution? I don’t know.”
To what end would this revolution be? “I just want a country which is developed, which has money and an affluent standard of living. A fair society where talent matters, not connections. I see these restaurants in UB City with smart waiters who speak perfect English, and they are serving bread. They are not getting better because the system is not lifting talent, not creating opportunities.” As we enter UB City, Bhagat is indignant about the lack of good jobs for young people. He allows himself an expletive after his family has alighted. “Big city, big pedigree, good English—people like you and me can find a job. What about those other kids? They’re going to be waiters, work in a fucking call centre, sell insurance on the streets. This is not a country.”
Bhagat has said he thinks of himself as 90 percent entertainer, ten percent reformer. This mix ensures that his novels occupy a strange literary register, one in which stories dealing with social concerns are written using the conventions of pulp fiction. In the tradition of pulp, Bhagat’s books employ linear plotlines, simple language and short sentences. Readers speak fondly about how quick-paced Bhagat’s books are and how they never get boring, something achieved by never requiring the reader to pause. Characters do not aspire to the complexities of realism, but are constituted of a few clearly defined characteristics in rough accordance with which they behave. They often behave in disjointed fashion, hurtling along from one mood to the next before the reader’s attention can wander. And they never respond to situations in nuanced ways which might require the reader to pause and reflect; their responses are clearly communicated through word, gesture or expression. To whatever extent possible, plausible stereotypes are employed over fresh and telling detail, freeing the reader from having to rely too heavily on the text. Events in the books can sometimes take melodramatic turns, and depending on what one is used to, this can require a significant ability to suspend disbelief.
None of these attributes of Bhagat’s fiction are new to Indian audiences, having been in use in commercial Indian cinema for decades. Bhagat’s sensibility—including the whistle-eliciting, coin-chucking jingoism—draws not from any literary tradition, but from classic Bollywood. Bhagat half-acknowledges this heritage when he speaks disparagingly of critics who pan his books “and then give the film Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani four stars and say it was really fun.” Another peeve Bhagat has is with those who claim his books sell only because they are priced at a modest 95 rupees: “It is not soap that it will sell if you reduce the price. This is not a must-have product. You only read a book if you want to.” Readers spoken to for this piece agree. In general they feel the low price is appealing but they don’t buy the books just for that reason.
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Readers' Comments |
Total Comments
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yogesh
4 May 2010
01:23 AM
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I am wondering whether this is an out pour of a chetan's fan who outdid everyone in foolishly doting him or a glaring case of disgusting sycophancy at its best. It can be a deadly combination of both to brand Chetan as a writer with a reformist streaks. Or an honest effort to tell the world : India needs more Chetans.
The success of Chetan is mainly because of his books meant for those who want books that are easy on mind and pocket. His talent to churn out best sellers is cloyingly enormous.
I am so thankful, SRINATH that while praising Chetan,he did not moot the idea that Chetan should give some free tuition in English-novel writing to writers Amitav Ghosh, Vikram Seth and also that knackered old man, V S Naipaul who seldom sells or read.
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