His world of words

That William Dalrymple enjoys storytelling would be stating the obvious but the author really
thrives in going into storyteller mode when he is presented with a hall packed with a rapt audience ready to listen to him reading excerpts from his latest book, Return of a King —The battle for Afghanistan.

‘The story begins when a young British cavalry officer sees a group of cossacks…’ he starts
with a flourish and before you know it, you are pulled into reliving a part of the history of a country
that is as ridden with war today as it was in 1839, when the British first invaded it in the First
Anglo Afghan War.

‘It was just as the latest western invasion of Afghanistan was beginning to turn sour in the winter of 2006 that I had the idea of writing a new history of Britain’s first failed attempt at controlling
Afghanistan. After an easy conquest and the successful installation of a pro-western puppet
ruler, the regime was facing increasingly widespread resistance.

History was beginning to repeat itself…’ reads the author’s note clearly stating his motivation for
focussing on this 18th century war that’s also regarded as ‘Britain’s greatest military humiliation of the 19th century as the entire British army was routed by disunited, violent tribesmen led
by Dost Mohammad Khan’.

Now, even as the similarities between the Anglo-Afghan war and the present American invasion
are too uncanny, the question that begs to be asked is, “History repeats itself but why isn’t
anyone learning from it?” To which Dalrymple, whose extensive research for the book saw
him travelling right to Kandahar no less, with characteristic droll humour says, “Well, that is the
key thought here that those who haven’t learnt their history are bound to repeat it.”

“This is the reason why such stories are written and you ignore them at your own peril,” he adds with a grin.

While still on the topic of the assiduous research that went into the book, Dalrymple in his detailed author’s note makes a passing reference to an experience that can, at its most blasé form, be described as ‘a hit and miss’.

He writes, ‘On arrival in Kandahar, the car sent me to pick me up from the airport received a sniper
shot through its back window…’ If that wasn’t adventurous enough, he even managed to ‘see
an IED blow up a US patrol as it crossed the Arghandab River.’

Is the pursuit of a story so thrilling that he is ready to risk an arm and leg for it, we wanly
ask to which Dalrymple replies with commensurate ease, “I am a boy!” Flipping out his mobile to
show us a photo of the car with the sniper shot, he continues, “I have covered war before as a journalist and it’s all sort of an adventure until something bad like this happens when you go ‘what the ****!’ and realise that you really got into it.”

It is, however, when he says, “My wife would tell me that I would come back buzzing after these trips,” that you realise the latent thrill in the chase. Then getting into travel guide mode he gives his own spin to describing the Afghanistan cities he’s visited. “Kabul is as dangerous as walking on the main roads of Bangalore or Hyderabad. Herat is equally fine. Jalalabad is dodgy
and Kandahar is the assassination capital of Central Asia.”

Shifting focus from the book to the the event that has put India on the map as a literary hotspot
—the Jaipur Literature Festival, Dalrymple is quite kicked talking about it.

“We (Dalrymple and co-director, Namita Gokhale) are very proud that we’ve produced such a festival in six years,” he enthuses adding, “We see it as a win-win situation for all. The readers meet their favourite writers, the writers get to sell their books and reach out to more people… I
think it’s fantastic.” “The Jaipur Literature Festival is my little contribution to India and I feel
good that we were the first.”

In sight of the unwanted media attention the event recieved last year — thanks to a certain
Oprah Winfrey and Salman Rushdie — we wonder if he manages to detach himself from the
entire event and look at it all in a non-partisan way. “Well, no, I am not detached,” he outrightly states before adding, “It’s the centre of my life. The event is for a week (almost) but it’s a monster that takes about a quarter of our year. It is like any love affair, you have your frustrations, the low points along with the high points.”

Yet, even as he terms last year’s unfortunate controversy as ‘the most desperate moment’, he
is all gung ho discussing the future of the festival. “We are debating if we should charge fees
for it. It would mean that we will finally get paid (laughs) but then the essence of the festival would
be lost.We are also debating moving it to another venue but if we did that we would lose the cosy,
lovely home we have now,” he mulls before perking up to talk about the audiences. “The audience
turn out has doubled each year so if it was 1,20,000 last year, I wonder if we’ll be seeing
2,40,000 people this time?” he wonders with a loud laugh.

mahalakshmi.prabhakaran@dnaindia.net