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Going into print
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India's only literary agency, Jacaranda Press, is all set to turn publisher.
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INDIA'S ONLY literary agency, Jacaranda Press, is all set to turn publisher. Before 2003 is out, Mumbai-based advertising whiz Kiran Khalap's maiden novel should see the light of print under the imprint of Jacaranda Publishing, followed by four new titles in the coming year. That's the good word that emerged from its open house at Shankar's bookstore on May 5.
Once Bangalore-based, then run over the phone and through email when its co-founder Jayapriya Vasudevan shifted base to Mumbai, Jacaranda Press will assume global colours when she relocates to Beijing shortly. But its 25-strong woman-powered editorial team, with just a single man amidst them, will continue to work out of Bangalore, Pune, Mumbai, and London — especially now that the agency receives approximately a manuscript a day.
Global slants emerge doubly from Jacaranda's recent link-up with the Paul Marsh Agency in London, which will look after the European and American sales of its authors, besides handling translation transitions.
That links back to the Indian agency's initial foray into bridging the gap between publishers and budding writers in 2000 with Anita Nair's The Better Man, which has since seen editions in 19 varied languages. And Shreekumar Varma's The Lament of Mohini, and Rohini Nilekani's medical thriller Stillborn. US-based Pramila Jayapal's keen-eyed journey through India, titled Pilgrimage, and Biocon chief Kiran Majumdar's coffee-table book on beer titled Ale and Arty, followed in quick succession. The rest, to quote a cliché, is publishing history.
But to return to the publishing diversification, who is Kiran Khalap? He's the ex-CEO of an advertising agency, a former copywriter, and once a teacher at a primary school inspired by the savant J. Krishnamurthi. "I read Kiran's first draft about two years ago," recalls Jayapriya in Bangalore. "I couldn't fathom why no Indian publisher was willing to pick it up. Since my editors and I had complete faith in the book, which is now at the proofing and design stage, we decided to launch Jacaranda Publishing for books we're unable to place. I'm certain it will do well."
"Kiran's book kept coming back to us," recalls Ashwati Franklin, who is Jacaranda's key person in Bangalore. "I couldn't figure out why publishers didn't want to take it on."
Jacaranda Press, most of whose editors work out of home, built itself up to its present dimensions from very modest beginnings in the late 1990s, when Jayapriya and her friend, Hyderabad-based editor Amrita Chak, launched it. Once they chose a manuscript, they worked towards a writer's profile, a synopsis of their work, a passage from the book in progress revealing characters and plot, and its first three chapters.
"In five out of ten cases, this has been enough to work with," recalled Jayapriya three years ago. "First, we do a brief analysis of the book for free. Then comes a more detailed analysis of what's right and wrong with the manuscript. We take most books through from this stage to the rewriting, the proofing, and finding the right publisher."
But Jacaranda Publishing, she stresses, intends to remain small and accessible, not in competition with big league imprints such as Penguin or Rupa & Co. Significantly, they already have a distribution network in place, and are determined to launch each of their new titles with great energy. Today, they deal with manuscripts that have come their way from Australia, the US, even Korea, in addition to homegrown talent. That's in addition to scouting for new markets for tested talent like Kiran Nagarkar (Ravana and Eddie) and Shashi Warrier (Hangman's Journal).
How do Jacaranda's authors feel about routing their literary work through an agent, which is routine procedure abroad, but novel within the Indian framework, where a direct writer-publisher link is still possible? "Jacaranda gave me insights into facets of publishing a book and editorial aspects of a manuscript," responds Mysore-based Sunaad Raghuram, whose 2001-launched Veerappan: The Untold Story met with some commercial success. "They arranged interviews and took care of the launch for me."
Jacaranda today means many things to many individuals. To students of the Bombay Scottish School, it probably spells Travelling Circus, which brings reading and writing workshops to schoolchildren through literary professionals such as Arundhati Dasgupta and Shaiontoni Bose, both published Penguin authors. Through modules titled Spin a Yarn or Myths and Magic or Young Journalist, the young mind is led to befriend the written word. Perhaps the workshops will be available on a nationwide basis in the future.
How do Jacaranda staffers feel about their world of word wizardry? Ashwati, whose prior experience was in an administrative job with the IT industry, loves the interactive opportunities that come her way. Jayapriya Vasudevan, like Jacaranda in all its avatars, has kept the written word in focus ever since she ran the `Bookends' store at Chennai's Montieth Court from 1983-86, with her brother and sister. Then came the short-lived R&B bookstore-café on Dickenson Road in Bangalore. Jacaranda Press proved a natural corollary along the word trail, as numerous fledgling authors will testify.
Will the global market take to Jacaranda Publishing? Only readers can spell out the answers to that mystery at the moment.
ADITI DE
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