SHILLONG, NOV 3: A book entitled “People Called Shillong” is the first of its kind people place project in the North Eastern region to allow people from across the country to know more about the city and its people through a set of stories.
The few first lines in the introduction of the book clearly stated its objective and it read– “India is many Indias. Diverse and distinct. This has been said so many times, yet we fail to understand or encompass what lies within.”
Announcing the launching of the book, Nisha Nair-Gupta, the founder and principal curator of The People Place Project said the People Called Shillong is the third book done through the project and it will be launched at The Heritage Club, Tripura Castle on Saturday.
Before this, the project had successfully published two books – People Called Mumbai and People Called Ahmedabad.
Stating that the launch is to celebrate the process and plurality of the book and invariably the spirit of Shillong, Nisha said, “Shillong is a special project and it’s the first of its kind done in the NE states.”
She said the book, an exhaustive collection of 50 stories – and many beyond the conventional word limit – is a product of enthusiasm of its 15 writers.
“The book has 15 writers who have sifted the city for stories. Of these are eight who call the city their home, three who have had temporal but lasting relation with the city and four who were visiting writers last winter,” she said.
They include – Alethea O’Neal Kynta, Arjun Chaki, Auswyn Winter Japang, Eudora Khonglah, Jagriti Jhunjhunwala, Mayborn Lyngdoh, Prem Sarit Acharya , Nishiggandha Kerure, Priyanka Shimpi, Rajeev Laloo, Shriti Das, Shweta Raj Kanwar, Sriram Natarajan, Suchita Mundhra and Vancouver Shullai.
According to her, the range of perspective offered by these varying degrees of engagement with Shillong makes the book unique and a rich reading. Their writings have diverse styles, are introspective and inquisitive. What is more, they are intimate.
Having captured a vignette of the place through each story, they also come together to form the collective narrative of the city.
Speaking to reporters, Alethea, one of the authors from Shillong says that getting a chance to contribute for the book help her to rediscover her own city.
“I had chosen those people (for interviews) who have shaped Shillong be it music, beauty, tradition etc,” she adds.
On the other hand, Mayborn stressed on the need for people to venture into folk tales which now seems to have been substitute by mobile phones where parents do not have time to pass on such stories to their children.
By Our Reporter
+ There are no comments
Add yours