Paradox of Equilibrium — How Angst and Hopelessness Power My Writing

by Mandira Pattnaik

Mahmoud Sulaiman

After my last column, I did not expect to talk about witnessing again so soon. In a different context though, but equally miserable and malevolent. Ukraine-Russia, India-Pakistan, and now Iran-Israel. I did not expect us to be in a long dark tunnel of anxiety so enormous that we traverse through it without knowing whither its light, whither its end. I did not foresee such a disavowal of human tragedy no matter where we stand. And surely, we pretend everything is normal and go about our daily lives, without revealing ourselves.

The writer in me feels that is a revelation — not to be able to reveal what I want, ’cause it is pretty obvious that no one wants to hear the side of peace. I mean, when the headline says: ‘Give peace a chance’ UN chief urges Israel and Iran — it tells a lot about our world today.

Have you seen how they attack people who want to apply logic and rationale? Activists including environmental campaigner Greta Thunberg were sent home after their vessel was intercepted. Ms. Thunberg has been an outspoken opponent of Israel’s blockade of supplies to Gaza.

Those two things — peace and rationale — are extinct from today’s world. How is it logical to kill people for whatever stated end?

Anyway, having to shield myself, and not de novo vocalizing my thoughts, is not exactly a compulsion but a choice. Why should that be? My answer to that is: I do not want to reveal more about myself than say, to use Murakami’s metaphor in his brilliant essay “Always on the Side of the Eggs,” that I am on the side of the egg too. The battle is between the egg and the wall. It is a childishly simple metaphor. If I am to choose between hypersonic missiles and bombers (the solid wall) and unarmed civilians (eggs with a living softness inside of them and only a brittle calcium exterior), it is easily the eggs on whose side I am. I do not need to observe which side of the border the eggs are, and which side is the wall. I do not care if the egg is wrong or the wall is right. As writers, I think we are born that way — talking rare sense to deaf earth.

Instead of revealing my angst and hopelessness, I find joy in what I have — my meagre, dull life, my family, and my writing. In my spare moments, as a (mostly) fiction writer, I choose lies in which to trap the truths of our contemporary times. Our authentic stories in little dramatic packages. Perhaps when someone chronicles our times, the truths will become lesser and the falsehoods will shine brighter.

History, as they say, is written by conquerors. On the subject of conquerors and how they treat those below them, I find our generation highly trivialized. Perhaps to the extreme. Powers in political and trade worlds do not recognize the existence of lesser mortals like us — as citizens, or as workers or writers. We seem manoeuvrable, easily replaceable, and still easily, disposable. I read a report in an Indian daily that said the president of the US wanted to get money back for the billions of dollars sent to support Ukraine’s war against Russia. What about those that died? And the living dead?

The-power-that-rules tallies the costs of war in dollars, and not in body counts — such is the level of trivialization of common men and women and children. I do not know for sure, but this common-general-human-redundancy might be a subject matter of academic research in a world under crisis anyway.

In a situation of chaos, being without hope and being in a state where there is nothing more to lose is a state of equilibrium. It might seem paradoxical, but I have come to the conclusion that it is so. My proof is the way we pretend everything is normal, as I’ve said before. People are going about their daily lives, even in Iran, Gaza and Israel. Imagine spending the night in a bomb shelter and reporting for work on time the next morning. It is true. Happening as of now. I can only explain this in one manner: this is a position so precarious in the larger context that the world population has accepted it as a state of equilibrium.

I am adjusting myself to this state of mind too — and it is giving me benefits. I have newly discovered that writing is entirely a factor of the creator’s state of mind. A state of equilibrium, where one expects nothing, is perhaps the most fertile a mind will ever be. It is a sense of numbing calm that is elusive, but when it prevails, I can write four or five stories in the space of a week.

This state of disenchanted acceptance of the chaotic world around me emboldens me to take risks in my work. I have no emotion whatsoever with acceptances and rejection mails. I feel no sense of persuasion when writing to an editor, and no sense of obligation for the readers’ taste or interests.

I veer away from realism, and write speculative. The realm of the speculative is boundless so it is even more alluring when the real, physical world is in shreds. I return only to face a more convulsed world.

I am glad I have no deadlines and compulsions as a writer. I keep thinking about reporters on the ground — who have both deadlines and compulsions. Reporters are trained not to reveal their feelings and nothing about themselves in their writings. Which, in today’s dire situation, does not seem to hold cent-per-cent true — even media is divided, on this side or that. Which is not surprising especially when we see the stats of reporters punished for saying this way or that. The head of the Committee to Protect Journalists stated in 2024, “Israel’s war on Gaza is more deadly to journalists than any previous war.” It is another sad reality. Which does not seem contradictory when powers conduct themselves like fiction peddlers, spinning narratives as suits them, ignoring, and again, trivializing, the common intellect of the people. They should, instead, ensure peace and livelihood, take stands and maintain them, speak truth, and reveal about their feelings in all sincerity. Which seems absurd to expect. Particularly when the underlying population is hungry for anything that diverts their attention and real missiles seem like Diwali fireworks to them. Powers seem to be goading on their side like spectators in a gladiatorial blood sport — as the world economy seems to be sliding into recession, and each one of us struggling. Which again, is where, after my last column, I did not expect to find myself witnessing: a crisis spiralling out, into and beyond.