In June, 2020, in the midst of the lockdown, I started a new blog - 845show.com - where I wanted to document about what was happening around me and in my own life. From films I was watching and books I was reading to how the pandemic is reshaping the world, I wanted to understand life as it was unfolding. This was my first post :

Why We Write...

Few days ago, I was reading Joe Moran’s book, First You Write A Sentence, about the art of writing among other things, and there was a passage where Joe broke down the process of writing to its bare elements. First you write a sentence. And then another one. And then another one. Till it means something to you and anyone who’s going to read it. That’s all there is when you think about writing. But it’s also one of the most gruelling, and often soul-crushing exercises that one could take up because what you want to say is as important as how you articulate your ideas. 

Writing is one thing, but writing during a pandemic is a whole different ball game. Between April, 2020 to mid-June 2020, I’ve hesitated to write like I used to before the world went into a lockdown mode. It’s amazing what, as Karen Ho calls, doom scrolling can do you to your mind. I was consuming so much information about how Covid-19 was spreading around the world, and how different countries and communities were coping up with it. The ticker about the death toll and number of positive cases filled me with a lot of grief, that I don’t think I’ve processed completely. And as the virus inches closer, I have had to come to terms with the uncertainty not just about my work but also life itself. 

I’ve been advised by several well-wishers to read and watch positive news at least for sometime to cope up with the world that’s simply crumbling around us. Even if everything seems intact, there’s a growing sense of anxiety among us because we don’t know how to live with the new normal. The psychological effects of the pandemic are going to lurk in dark corners of our lives just like the toxic air that we breathe everyday. The good thing is, I’ve made peace, at least to an extent, that there’s no escaping this situation. And I’m reading books more than ever before and trying to watch TV series and movies on the internet. The media industry has taken a major toll due to the financial turmoil, and independent journalists and freelancers have had to ask themselves, what’s next? The only answer I can think of is to keep doing what I’ve been doing since 2009. Keep writing.

As some of you might know, I used to write a blog, which was active between 2007-15, and then one fine day, I lost all the data for which I had no backup. I got over it pretty quickly and then in 2019, I started another blog to publish my weekly short stories, and even that turned out to be an uphill task after three months (I did write a few short stories though, which you can read here). 

That brings me to a fundamental question – Why we write – which has led me to take this plunge, which is sort of a return to blogging after a long time. There’s something different this time, though. The burden of having to win over your readers is secondary. I’m writing for myself and hoping that some of you will like what I write about a wide range of topics, although it’ll still be primarily about movies and books. I’ve taken an active interest in learning more about history and even enrolled in a long distance MA History programme to understand parts of history in an academic framework. I’m reading a lot more about science, climate change, food, environment, sports, and internet culture. In fact, I believe the best thing I did in the past three months was not reading anything about cinema and it felt great to look at life from a different perspective. And it’s something that I’ve learnt over the years that’s given me a sense of purpose about why we write.

Writing is an act of resistance.

Writing is an act of love.

Writing is self-care in the times of a pandemic.

Writing is us telling life that long after we are gone, our voices will prevail.

Writing is being able to express our joy, sorrow, grief, empathy, and kindness.

Writing is documenting the world we live in.

Writing is giving nostalgia a voice.

Writing is finding meaning in laughter and tears.

Writing is a sentence after another sentence after another one…

I still don’t know where my writing is going to fit into these aforementioned ideas of expression, but I do have a thing for nostalgia. But I do hope to write for the joy of writing. A beautifully framed sentence is like a gentle stroke of brush in a painting. You might not see it, but it’s there, and once you notice what it has done to the painting, you gush over it. The blog is a sincere attempt to learn how to paint and perhaps, it’ll teach me a thing or two about writing in the process.

Before I conclude, I wanted to add something about the domain name, one of the most dreadful exercises anyone can undertake, and why I chose this one in particular. If you are from Hyderabad and are obsessed with Telugu movies, the earliest show timing for a movie used to be at 8.45 am in Prasads Multiplex, Hyderabad. Friday @ 8:45, Prasads was a ritual where you met your friends to watch a movie, be overwhelmed or disappointed with what you saw on the big screen. And after having spent a great deal of such Friday mornings at the altar of cinema, it was my window to a world that will always fascinate me. Now, it feels like a distant past. But nostalgia is so potent. It’s like a Kodak Carousel, as Don Draper puts it across in Mad Men, a time machine into our past. A part of me will continue to yearn for that phase in our lives where we felt so alive. 

I know quite well that I don’t have the time and resources to make this blog so big that it’ll be an alternative to whatever websites and blogs you follow. There will be no daily news and updates (which you’ll get in any popular Telugu film (or any other language) websites or social media); there will be no galleries; there will be no gossip or rumours. Even after writing about Telugu cinema for over 10 years now, I’m still not used to ‘breaking news’, and I’m often clueless about what’s happening in the industry. Instead, this blog will solely focus on books I’ve been reading, movies/TV series I’ll be watching, reviews, interviews of people. And with time, I hope you’ll find some value in what I have to say. 

For now, I’ll start writing. A sentence first. And then another one. And then another one.

#Writing #TeluguCinema #Movies #Books