For filmmaker Mira Nair, the most “healing thing is the ocean”, while for author Ben Macintyre, it’s travel. Last month, they undoubtedly felt right at home in Soneva Fushi at the Jaipur Literature Festival pitstop in the Maldives. But coming as it did on the heels of a two-year pandemic, conversations about books were, predictably, interspersed with moments of nostalgia and plans for the future. What did they miss the most during lockdown? What works best as a mental reset? Dinner parties said some. Cricket, said others. But many at the luxury island resort said they came out of isolation with great projects in hand. A few, like Macintyre’s, are even timely. “It is ironic that the film Operation Mincemeat [based on my 2010 book] is coming at a time when we are engaged in another European war, and that this story now has obvious modern relevance,” he says.
At a time when summer getaways are being planned — or monsoon breaks, depending on which part of the world you are in — six celebrated authors and creatives share what they are looking forward to in 2022, the themes that interest them now, and how they plan to refresh and refocus.
Portraits: Rohit Chawla; Location courtesy: Soneva Fushi and JLF
Peter Frankopan
Historian and author of The Silk Roads
Themes for now: As is so often in history, the themes that are picked by ancient writers are the ones that are still most relevant. If you read the Vedic texts, the old classical Greek texts, the scholars are always thinking about human interaction with nature. One of the things that’s frustrating when we read about climate, resources, disease, or war is that we think we are the first generation to deal with these problems.
Most of the world is in need of a bit of optimism. When I pick something vintage, it is to bring back specific memories. For example, the voice of Lata Mangeshkar — whom I first discovered when on a holiday with my wife in Nepal — while having breakfast on the shores of Lake Pokhara. I replay her song every two months as that has great resonance for me.
Even the fact that we refer to clean technologies is ironic — we forget that the entire human history was powered by sunlight, wind power, and water for millennia. My job as a historian is to put on the table the facts of how we got to where we are.
Reset: I play cricket. I play with a bunch of authors and we’ve been to India as a team on tour. I remember we played against an under-17 team at the Mumbai Gymkhana who took one look at us middle-aged men and put their ballers to bat first.
Mira Nair
Filmmaker, producer and director of A Suitable Boy
Themes for now:Monsoon Wedding will be premiering as a stage musical in November. What I am longing to do is to make my film on painter Amrita Shergill, which I have written, if I can raise the money. I want to learn more about Indian painting, Urdu poetry, and music. I want to give time and attention to the study of the Vedas: the Rig Veda, the Upanishads. I want to delve deep into knowledge.
I carry music everywhere. Chopin’s Raindrop Prelude, Miles Davies, Ustad Vilayat Khan — I listen to a lot from the classical traditions. But it is not nostalgia, it is what you want to nourish your soul with.
Reset: For me, the most healing thing is the ocean. After every film, I am usually exhausted and the only thing I do is go into the ocean. You are buffeted by the waves and you are nothing compared to the elements. On a daily basis, I practice Iyengar yoga. It keeps me strong and enables me to understand resistance and surrender. That is the core of creativity, so yoga helps me stay the path.
Patrick Radden Keefe
Investigative journalist and author of Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
Themes for now: I am drawn to intrigue. There continue to be rogues, charlatans, and fraudsters in our world, so I will always have their stories to tell. Thematically, intrigue is elemental in the pieces that I am doing now [for The New Yorker]. I like to tap into surprise when doing investigative pieces. If I am surprised then the reader will be too.
Reset: I always thought people who ran were crazy, but during the pandemic I had to get out of the house. It was the only escape, and I finally discovered the runner’s high.
André Aciman
Academic and author of Call Me by Your Name and Find Me
Themes for now: I like to write something that is in my gut. I have just published an audio book — a story of two people who meet in their middle 60s. Nothing happens in the middle 60s. I mean, what do you talk about? Your grandchildren? Or how to spend the time you have left, together? I wanted to write about a couple who meets late in life.
Reset: For some people, a reset is a moment of opportunity, for me it’s a scary thing because it means that you abrogate everything that you have in order to open your doors to something new.
Huma Abedin
U.S. political adviser and author of Both/And
Themes for now: Lifting up other women. The notion of mentorship is so important right now. I was recently at a global conference where successful women professionals over 50 were interacting with women under 30 — sharing their learnings, wisdom, experience, and offering guidance. I realised this is a subject that greatly interests me. I received it from my ex-boss, Hilary Clinton, who was an inspiring mentor to me. I feel, hearing stories of women lifting up other women is what the world needs a lot more of.
My guilty pleasure has always been Jane Austen. The way she wrote, I used to memorise lines. I read a lot. The last book I read was Big Guns, a satire and mockery of the gun industry in the U.S. Mostly, I love memoirs and personal stories about women.
Reset: Reading and prayer. I have struggled with it. Particularly with the war in Ukraine, the inflation, the state of democracy in the world and mid-term elections in the USA, it feels like there is so much uncertainty.
Ben Macintyre
Historian, columnist, and author of Agent Sonya: Moscow’s Most Daring Wartime Spy
Themes now: I am fascinated by the world of espionage. Not just deception, but the whole operation of the secret world. Intelligence and espionage are as important to the world today as they have ever been, perhaps arguably even more important than they used to be. Open any newspaper and a lot of it is about secrets being revealed or being kept. There are competing narratives, competing ways of framing a story and competing histories taking place as well. That I find fascinating.
Reset: Travel. I am very lucky — I have a place on the far west coast of Scotland, a rural place, idyllic, isolated, miles from anywhere. That’s where I go to start again.
The writer is a Delhi-based media professional and content and programming director. Rohit Chawla is a photographer and artist.
“In photographing an author, I am working with an interesting paradox. On the one hand, I am tapping into their vanity, but on the other, authors are self-effacing people. As a photographer then, the playfulness of the moment was in inviting that part of the author who would be interested in the portrait. Each portrait carries a story of the brief yet acutely intimate literary moment I shared with them.”Rohit ChawlaPhotographer
