HOW DID I BECOME A WRITER?

HOW DID I BECOME A WRITER?


As I write this, I feel a bit of trepidation. Calling myself a writer! I have been a doctor and a professor and a lawyer alright. But, a writer? However, having written rather profusely over the years, whatever its worth, I think I can call myself a writer of sorts and thus qualify for writing this piece for the column, “How did you become a writer”.

The question “How did I become a writer?” would immediately involve the possibility that writing traits might be genetically determined to an extent. Let us ignore that aspect and dwell upon what known events helped me become a writer. Almost the entire credit for this little feat I give to three personalities: my eldest brother, my father, and my wife, in that time sequence, all of whom are now no more. Each of them shaped my writing in a different way. In addition, I owe quite a lot to this site, writing.com, in learning how to write poetry.


I shall present my “Writer’s autobiography” under the following heads:

A. WHO MADE A WRITER OUT OF ME?

This can be easily answered. Acknowledging foremost that what I am and have today, including my humble writing skills, is His gift, let me pay tributes to those whose contributions in shaping me as a writer are immense and invaluable:


1. MY BROTHER’S CONTRIBUTION—He retired as a professor of Hindi and Head of the Department of Hindi at the University of Delhi. He was a prolific writer and probably wrote more than 100 books. His academic forte was literary criticism and his creative forte was poetry. He was eight years elder to me and I used to admire and emulate his poetry writing. I even wrote at the age of about 11 or 12 years a collection of poems, in Hindi, which were considered good enough by a publisher to pay the royal sum of fifty one rupees, roughly equivalent to about ten dollars in those days. My brother was a great influence in my acquiring and retaining a deep interest in the study of languages and in writing in general. Under his guidance and through his encouragement, I wrote many books in Hindi. All of these pertained to science, mainly health science and medicine, because that is the field I chose as my career. I retired as a medical professor. My twin specialties, medicine and Hindi writing, were instrumental in my being appointed as the Chairman of the Hindi Committee of the ICMR [Indian Council of Medical Research]. God bless my brother’s soul. He happened to breathe his last at 63, due to disease.


2. MY FATHER’S CONTRIBUTION—My father was a teacher of English language in a senior secondary school. He was a very mild person and never believed in coercing or forcing or imposing anything upon others. He never taught English to me formally. But, I often looked upon him as my ideal and hence, somehow on my own, I took a fancy for English. Those were the days when English language was taught in schools with great pains, there being much emphasis on grammar. Gone are those days now, even in countries like England and the USA, where English is the first language. It really pains me to very often read on this site, writing.com, sentences like: “The ball came off of the wall”, or, “The book was laying on the shelf”. Every time I read flawed English, I thank my father for the thorough grounding in English that he managed to impart to me through subtle means. One of those means was his bringing plenty of books from the school library. I still remember that I had read Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield and Pickwick Papers while I was just about 14 years. And, both are about 1000 pages each! It was my thoroughness in English that later saw me sail with ease through my medical studies and, later, law studies, since the education in both these fields is largely imparted in India in English. My ease with both English and Hindi later saw me undertake Hindi translation of medical textbooks in English. One of these, published by the Ministry of Education, Government of India, was the translation of a textbook of surgery for medical students. Another, published by the Oxford University Press, was the translation of a textbook for nurses. My proficiency in English and my writing skills in general saw me write “A Textbook of Preventive and Social Medicine”, currently in its third edition, and a monograph titled “Health and Law”. For a few years, I also took fancy to learning French and Spanish and translated into English many scientific articles from medical journals in those languages!

3. MY WIFE’S CONTRIBUTION—This was, sadly, a posthumous contribution. Though she was my co-translator for the textbook for nurses, and though she helped me in many ways by way of encouragement when I was writing the voluminous medical textbook, my wife’s main contribution to my writing career was in making me a poet. She happened to leave this world the same year, 1996, in which we completed twenty five years of married life, I was just 54 then. I never remarried. Her memories were always in my mind, and I gave vent to them through the medium of poetry. I started writing poems in Hindi as well as in English. My brother always used to write in rhyme and meter, and I followed this tradition while writing poems myself. It is said that writing good prose in a foreign language may not be easy, but writing poetry in any language, especially in a foreign one, is decidedly much harder. I have written about 2750 poems in Hindi and about1750 in English so far, over a span of seven years. Some of my Hindi poetry can be viewed at "HINDI POETRY गज़ल" . However, I don’t find time to update this folder. In the above background, it is obvious that I owe my poetry writing to all the three personalities mentioned above.

4. WDC’s CONTRIBUTION—It is no sycophancy to state that my English poetry would have remained infantile without writing.com. My poetry flourished largely after my joining this site, which is a goldmine for learners and for those who want to improve their writing. The review system of this site, the various contests, and the plenty of articles about writing techniques, all these greatly help a budding author in honing his or her writing skills.


B. WHY DO I WRITE?

This question cannot be answered in one or even in a few sentences. I have written for several reasons. These are explained below:

1. TO STRENGHTHEN SCIENCE WRITING IN HINDI—I decided early in my career that I would take it up as a mission to write in Hindi on scientific topics. This decision was arrived at in the conscious belief that scientific temperament in a society can be developed only when books and articles related to science are written by experts in the language of the masses. Towards this end, I wrote more than 100 popular science articles that were published in various Hindi magazines and journals between 1960 and 1965. In addition, I wrote about ten books in Hindi on topics related to medicine and health. Two of these won first prizes in national competitions.

2. TO STRENGHTHEN SCIENTIFIC TRANSLATION—Translation of scientific works is a special area. I realized through experience that such translation, if done by non-scientists, is likely to have unintended serious mistakes because of lack of understanding of the subject by the translator. The only remedy in my mind was either original science writing in Hindi by scientists, or Hindi translation, by scientists, of existing high quality works in English. I was able to break new ground in this area.

3. TO STRENGHTHEN THE DISCIPLINEOF PUBLIC HEALTH—Public health, also known as preventive and social medicine, has never been the in thing for doctors. After acquiring my postgraduate degree in internal medicine, I realized that improving the health of the whole community is far more important than treating a few individual patients. The existing textbooks of public health in India were all written by non-clinicians and, hence, lacked the idiom of clinical medicine. To that extent, they were not very popular among medical students, most of whom join the medical course to become clinicians. I wrote a full fledged textbook of public health with the idea of presenting the subject with a bit of clinical orientation that was natural to me. I am glad to say that the effort has been successful.

4. TO STRENGHTHEN THE FIELD OF LEGAL MEDICINE—After spending a life time in medicine, I realized that litigation against the medical profession is fast increasing, but there are hardly any books that doctors may read to acquire a basic knowledge of law. Though some books are available, they are either written by lawyers (who do not know the language of medicine), or by doctors themselves, who do not know law. After I studied law and acquired LL.B. and LL.M. degrees, I have now committed to write a few more books on legal medicine besides the one already published. I have already signed up for three books with different publishers.

5. TO STRENGHTHEN TRADITIONAL STYLE OF POETRY—It is my belief that while poetry is of various types, including free verse, the real gems in poetry are those written in rhyme and meter. I agree that free verse has its own raison-de-etre, but, still, I believe that those who write free verse should first acquire proficiency in metered verse. I believe that this would make a poet a better writer of free verse. It is pursuant to such belief that I decided early in my poetic career to write mainly in rhyme and meter. Almost all my poems on this site follow this pattern. Also, I have been hosting a contest for this purpose for the past 55 months, the "POETRY IN RHYME - RHYTHM CONTEST-winner" , which has even been adjudged the best amongst contests. I later added two more contests: "FIVE STAR POETRY CONTEST:editor's choice"  and "SONNET AND GHAZAL CONTEST: Closed" .

6. TO STRENGHTHEN GHAZAL STYLE OF POETRY— The poetry that I write in Hindi is mainly of the ghazal variety. Two of my ghazal collections have already been published and a third one is just a month or two away. However, I am just a beginner in the field, there being a large number of established ghazal poets in Hindi. When I joined this site, I was surprised to note that there is a conspicuous focus on Japanese styles, such as haiku and rengay, to the exclusion of all other oriental styles, such as ghazal and rubaa’i. When I analyzed the reasons for this, I realized that apart from simple oversight and neglect, there might be another reason in relation to certain peculiarities of English that are probably not conducive to ghazal writing. There was a time when I even believed that writing English ghazal, maintaining the pure ghazal style along with all its rules, is well nigh an impossibility. I wanted to prove myself wrong and, hence, voluntarily took up the challenge of ghazal writing in English. I can say with some satisfaction that I have been successful. At present, I have about 60 English ghazals on this site. These are dispersed in various folders, though some can be viewed at "ENGLISH GHAZALS"  and "MY GHAZALS IN ENGLISH" . In general, my ghazals can be found in "ENGLISH GHAZALS" . The aim of promoting ghazal writing on this site is one that I can claim to have definitely fulfilled. When I joined this site, five years ago, search for the word “ghazal” yielded precisely 11 visible items. Today, the count is 710. I believe I can claim a little credit for this, through my own writing, as also through organizing ghazal writing contests from time to time. The item "WHAT IS A GHAZAL AND HOW TO WRITE IT?"  is one of my highly starred items.

7. TO STRENGHTHEN BILINGUAL POETRY—It is not common to find the same poet translating his poems into another language, the poems of both types being in rhyme and meter. This is especially difficult when the languages happen to be, unlike English and Spanish, totally different like English and Hindi. As a part of my challenge seeking nature, I ventured into this area, too, and have been able to write about 40 bilingual poems, most of them being translations into English from Hindi originals. These can be viewed at "BILINGUAL POETRY" .

8. TO WRITE POETRY WITH PURPOSE—It is certainly true that poetry is the language of the heart. But, when a doctor turned lawyer starts writing poems at the age of 60 after losing his wife, he just can’t start crooning love songs. Barring when I am bit by the emotional bug, I mainly write with a purpose. The most important purpose is to bring out a social awakening towards women’s rights and plights. My poetry in this area can be viewed at "WOMEN'S ISSUES" . Next is the issue of the elderly. I have written many poems highlighting the problems and thoughts of the elderly. These can be viewed at "ABOUT THE ELDERLY" . The third is the issue of the jingoistic and aggressive stance of the USA towards many other countries. My poems on this topic are a bit acidic and not palatable to some, though highly appreciated by others. These can be viewed at "ON WAR / USA--poems and articles" . The fourth purpose is to spread the message of god and spirituality in a general manner, not following any particular faith. My belonging to Hinduism, a highly tolerant religion, has helped in this. My inspirational poems can be viewed at "NATURE AND INSPIRATIONAL" . A last specific aim of mine has been to write poems on scientific and legal issues, since these are weakly developed areas in poetry. Such poems can be viewed at "CHILDREN, HUMOR, LAW, MEDICAL, SCIENCE" 


Whether I have been successful as a writer or not may be a difficult question to answer. Much would depend upon the parameters used for evaluation. It is well known that there have been great writers who have spent a life time in writing and have been national and international celebrities. I can only bow to their august excellence. However, I can take some little pride in my humble achievement that as of today, 264 items of mine have won various prizes/awards at this site. These can be viewed at "MY WINNING ITEMS" .

Nobody is perfect. No writer can ever be perfect. We can only strive towards perfection. For a writer, the readers are the best judges. I invite the readers of this item to spare some time to view "PLEASE REVIEW MY PORT" .

Lastly, the purpose of writing this autobiography would not be complete unless attention is drawn to a few existing autobiographical items:

MY WIFE, MY TEACHER: award winner—"Invalid Item" , 3 June 2003
[Bereaved husband reminisces about wife and thereby understands her more]

MY HATS—"MY HATS" , 12 July 2003
[The various hats I have worn—a chronicle of my academic and professional pursuits]

AN ODE TO MY MOTHER –award winner, "AN ODE TO MY MOTHER--award winner" 
28 August 2003
[A real dream describing how the spirit of my mother dying 12000 miles away visited me]

WHAT IS POETRY?—a sonnet. "WHAT IS POETRY?—a sonnet" , 13 February, 2005
[Poetry is that soothes the heart]

THE SECRET OF MY POEMS: Editor's choice--"THE SECRET OF MY POEMS--Editor's choice" , 29 March 2005
[How and why I write poetry]

BIRTHDAY THOUGHTS: a sonnet--award winner. "BIRTHDAY THOUGHTS: a sonnet-award winner" , 6 May 2007
[A birthday does not bring much of a cheer to an old man.]

A BEE IN HIS BONNET: a sonnet –"A BEE IN HIS BONNET: a sonnet" , 14 July 2007
[About oneself, looking back]

MY LIFE EVENTS: award winner--"MY LIFE EVENTS: award winner" , 24 July 2007
[The ups and downs in my life]

MY INTERVIEW: conducted by Mavis Moog –"MY INTERVIEW: conducted by Mavis Moog" , 22 January 2008
[Mavis Moog, WDC moderator, in England, interviewed me via e mail in May 2005.]

SHOULD I? –1429044, 22 May 2008
[Should I live more? If yes, how?]

MY INTERVIEW BY tm_lvn_nurse—"MY INTERVIEW BY tm_lvn_nurse"  , 30 August 2008
[My response to 10 questions about myself .]

WHY I WRITE?—"WHY I WRITE?"  , 13 November 2008
[My approach to writing poetry.]

I SERVED THE ARMY—[item:1502296} , 5 December 2008
[About my uniformed years.]

BETWEEN TWO STOOLS – "BETWEEN TWO STOOLS " , 24 September 2009
[An autobiographical account of managing between two careers--Medicine and Law.]

ON COMPLETING SIXTY EIGHT YEARS---" ON COMPLETING SIXTY EIGHT YEARS-Ed-pick" , 23 January 2010
[To Him, on this annual event.]



• Written for “How did you become a writer”, "Invalid Item"  organised by lizco252


M C Gupta
30 April 2008
(Revised, 9 May 2010)