It has taken Deepti Kapoor nine years to publish her second novel. While her debut, A Bad Character, received a tepid welcome, her latest blasted into 2023 on a high note. Much of the literary world is in raptures: The Guardian called her crime novel Age of Vice “India’s answer to The Godfather”; it is on every notable must-read list for the year; and a TV deal (which brought in 20 bids) was snapped up by FX “with a bid in the range of high six figures against $2 million”, as the news site deadline.com reported.
Kapoor confidently captures Delhi’s circle of power in Age of Vice (Juggernaut) — the maddening play of sin, envy, corruption and pride — but she also effectively chronicles India’s contemporary socio-economic landscape. The characters are a tad familiar though, from a naive boy from India’s small town to a crime family’s aesthete son. And the action is consistently graphic: the book begins with a Mercedes ramming into five migrant workers sleeping on the pavement.
Author Deepti Kapoor | Photo Credit: Special arrangement
“A turning point for me was the rape and murder of Jyoti Singh in 2012,” says the former journalist, who is currently based in Lisbon. “In the aftermath, I was drawn to inquire about the specific circumstances: what led these men to operate the bus illegally, what kind of corruption was in place that enabled this. Once you start joining the dots as to how the system works, you understand that you have a responsibility as a writer to address it. Even if you do it in a masala potboiler. And maybe it’s better if you do that [a potboiler] because then more people will read you and you can smuggle in some serious ideas.”
Her cinematic style of writing has definitely helped, with most reviews commenting on how she skilfully balances the line between commercial and literary fiction (though Dwight Garner of The New York Times feels she rarely offers “the pleasures of subtlety”). Meanwhile, Kapoor is taking it all with “a lot of gratitude and a pinch of salt. I always have someone on my shoulder, whispering in my ear, telling me: none of this is true and it’s all going to end”, she says. In a conversation with The Hindu’s Sunday Magazine, she shares how she created the novel. Edited excerpts:
‘Age of Vice’ is markedly different from your debut, ‘A Bad Character’.
I wanted to move away from the solipsistic — even narcissistic — world of a single character. I wanted to inquire, instead, about the networks and processes of corruption, power, and complicity. And the small acts of rebellion you find within them. Age of Vice was born from that intention.
What went into the novel’s literary world-building?
Neda [Sunny Wadia’s journalist girlfriend] has parts of me. There’s a core of my life in the novel. I always find it useful to put extremely personal experiences right in the middle of things. In my 20s, I was a journalist, but at night I partied a lot, even quite recklessly. I had a group of very rich friends, and I was invited to their places. It was on those nights that [I noticed] we were always around servants — who not only made sure we were okay, but also saw us at our most vulnerable. I’ve always wondered about them. Years later, I changed my life around and I travelled a lot. In the Himalayas, in this small guest house, I met a young boy who told me that he had been sent to work there from somewhere in Bihar to pay off the family debt. It was then that the character of Ajay was born, by combining his life story and that of all those other men who used to work in those mansions in Delhi.
How did you structure the narrative? It’s very cinematic.
I honestly don’t know. I tend to have amnesia about how anything happened. Often, I will read something about what I’ve written, and if it’s quoted, I don’t believe I have said it! But I do have images in my head before anything else. I work in cinematic visuals that are then translated into prose. I also write in blocks — in moments that are dictated by a very clear picture in my head of the scene and the positioning of everyone involved. About the wider structure, I think it’s a lot of intuition and instinct. I just know when something feels right, and I follow it. I know this process can feel quite chaotic. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.
As a fiction writer, how do you approach writing ‘the other’?
With empathy, trepidation, and research. One has to be extremely mindful of one’s privileges and blind spots. For example, I know someone whose driver was forbidden to marry the person he loved. His life deteriorated after that. He became an alcoholic; he became cold and miserable. And this person just couldn’t understand why his driver was so upset, as if the latter had different, inferior emotions. He wasn’t allowed to have the interior life that we all do. I think if you open yourself to others’ pain, then you recognise that even with differences in class, caste, background, and religion, there’s a universality of emotion, and that’s what I’ve tried to do with Age of Vice. I think that being extremely curious about people and withholding judgments helps.
Deepti Kapoor | Photo Credit: Special arrangement
Was it difficult to pen the insider’s view of Tihar jail?
It was both technically and emotionally challenging. I tried a more prosaic approach, but then I found that a more fragmented style suited what was happening to everyone. I spoke to a few cops, and I also spoke to a guy who had been in jail for murder. He was out on bail. I picked up an attitude from him that I just couldn’t have imagined or made up. And that was really useful. Then, I did a lot of reading: prison memoirs, academic research, and the Human Rights Watch reports on prisons. Also, old news reports and little stories here and there to flesh out conversations. I purposely didn’t describe the prison in too many physical and geographical details because it’s a psychological prison. I wanted to convey a place that has no entry or exit.
FX, Fox 21, and Color Force have won the series-adaptation rights. What is it like to write against the backdrop of OTT possibilities?
If I started writing novels worrying about what would please TV executives, then I’d just be an idiot. In fact, the TV process is very challenging and complex. It has made me realise that when you’re writing a novel, it’s best for the medium to get your ideas across without diluting your vision. So, I want to keep my novels well away from TV. Moreover, the TV show is going to be very different from the novels, and I am perfectly happy with that.
You’ve mentioned how you feel like an outsider in the Indian literary scene. Has that changed?
I was never part of the scene and I still am not. I think I am glad for that, actually. There’s nothing more boring than a room full of writers, even when they are stabbing each other in the back. I think as a novelist, it’s really useful to hang out with people who are not writers. That really helped me. And just to travel, to put yourself in uncomfortable situations and see what comes out of that.
The Delhi-based queer writer and freelance journalist was trained as an engineer.
