"Just A Transcultural Cock-Up"

Well, what would have been most dismal is no reaction at all. I've just seen three major notices. Padgaonkar's piece was lukewarm. The Indian Express piece can hardly qualify as a review—it was a sad attempt at social satire. And then there was Alok Rai's review which was well crafted and coherent and contained a few points that made me think. But I think it was written with undue spleen.

Do you think what you have run up against is the burden of very high expectations?

You are probably very right. But then, expectations are very strange things, and I certainly wasn't stoking them. I feel there may have been an expectation that this Granta issue would be largely generated in India. That it would be a defining statement of Indian writing at this point in time.

Don't you think this expectation was justified?

Well, I agree it would probably have been a good idea to have more Indian writers, but then it doesn't always work like this. You think, let's have a piece on Indian art, but then who's going to write it? Or you decide it would be wonderful to have a piece on the changing political and economic culture of urban India—and I did commission such a piece, but it didn't work. The second important issue is that of audience—who's it for? The fact is that it's printed and produced in England, and two-thirds of its sales are in the US. So there is a tightrope to be walked. The point is that it was meant to be as much a look at India as a look at Indian writing.

There is criticism that most of the reportage, the hallmark of Granta,was cornered by whites, and it sort of smacks of an old colonial attitude.

Now let me word this carefully so that it isn't taken amiss. Indian journalism has changed incredibly in the last 15 years, and it's become very impressive. But there's the kind of narrative journalism, as inGrantaorNew Yorker,that kind of standing-back journalism where no knowledge on the part of readers is assumed, that kind still doesn't exist in India. And in any case the idea that India is stashed through with wonderful writers is untrue, there's not as much good writing here as hype in London would have you believe.

I think part of the problem is that a number of readers feel Grantadid not attempt to break new ground, as it has been known to do.

Well, I can tell you it's certainly not for lack of effort. We spoke to every important writer, apart from Upamanyu Chatterjee and I regret that. We also tried hard to unearth new writers, but sadly there was not that much to pick from. I just think people expected too much—a big celebration of new Indian writing in English. And the point is there is some of it happening—Arundhati Roy, Amit Chaudhuri—but it's not as if they are lying about under every stone.

There were some inclusions that seemed patronisingly token, and excited immediate derision—such as V.S. Naipaul's diaries, and Vikram Seth's 13-word sonnet.

I accept the criticism that to flog Vikram in such a way was a mistake. I plead guilty to jesting. It was meant to be a joke—a joke that hasn't worked. I mean, just 13 words from Vikram, author of the longest novel this century! Anyway Vikram is very upset too, for carrying that explanatory note. Which it seems he had added on only for our consumption at Granta,and was not to be printed.

And Naipaul? I believe he refused to contribute?

The fact is Naipaul was never asked to contribute. I remembered from a meeting many many years ago how impressed I was by the notebooks Naipaul kept. There was a lesson in it for all of us. So I contacted the university that had the rights to them. Naipaul's great, and I'm very pleased to have carried his diaries.

What about the fact that you've included hardly any writing from other Indian languages?

Well this is going to be a prickly thing to say, but on the evidence of existing translations I found hardly any great writing in other Indian languages. A lot of it seemed a kind of sociology rather than literary fiction. The point is that the writing must work in English for us to carry it. It's possible the translations were just not up to scratch.

Are there any writers that you now regret not having been able to accommodate?

P. Sainath's dispatches, and then there was one Anwar Iqbal who's writing about being a Mohajir in Karachi.

Anything you would like differently, given a second chance?

If I was doing such a book again I would publicise widely the fact that it was happening in the hope of getting some good unsolicited stuff.

What about the cover?

I cannot but agree that for India the cover was a mistake. I remember Zamir Ansari, marketing chief of Penguin India, called me up and cried, "What have you done to me? The cover is horrible!" The point is I was fed up with the usual Granta monochrome covers and wanted something warm and engaging, and it has been liked in the UK and the US. But in hindsight what I should have done is used Salgado's Churchgate picture. What can one say, it's just another example of some kind of transcultural cock-up.