‘Some of My Friends Say All My Work Is Fiction’

The well known Delhi-based sociologist who has written a whodunnit set in America under a pseudonym

It is unusual for one of Delhi’s public intellectuals to abstain from its immediate vicinity in their books; their concerns are usually terribly national, if not local, their subject the kind whose prime players often live within a ten kilometre radius of the India International Centre. An exception comes in the form of a good, old-fashioned crime novel set in Midwestern America about a young man named Robin Miller, who must avenge his father’s suspicious murder: Lead Tin Yellow (Partridge, 248 pages), a bright yellow paperback by the man behind the rather mysterious sounding Doug Gunnery, exotic on these shores. “As I was driving out to work I had no idea that violence would soon turn my life around,” says Robin, early on, and of course the setting could be anywhere, in that instance—only, it is Jericho Heights and Bradbury in Illinois the narrator wants to take us to.

Behind this story is a respected sociologist who has written and edited 18 books on ethnicity, public policy and social hierarchy, with over three decades of teaching experience at universities around the world—not too many guesses who this is.

The author speaks to Open about his motivation for setting his book in the West, father-son dynamics and the pain and pleasure of writing fiction. Excerpts:

Some may have guessed who you are. Why the use of a pen name?

The primary reason is that I want the book to be read as a work of fiction, without prejudgement. If you have read my other books, you might start with that in mind. I somehow didn’t want that. Take others, like Erle Stanley Gardner; he wrote under several pseudonyms (AA Fair, Kyle Corning, Charles M Green, Carleton Kendrake, Charles J Kenny, Less Tillray and Robert Parr.)

The name of the author, did it come from anyone in particular?

Yes, Doug was my first dog. And Gunnery was the name of my first principal.

Is this your first work of fiction?

Some of my friends say all my work is fiction. (Laughs)

There is definitely a base in the world that you know, too, of course.

Yes, though the story that came to me worked best in the American scenario. The father and the fact that he had another life; I have a friend who had a similar case, so I thought of that. That moment when the father jumps off the bridge and throws his suitcase full of papers over, just ahead of him—that actually happened.

Why America?

People keep asking why the book isn’t Indian. Writing on India for me I thought would be too easy, especially if I added all the ‘cute’ things: poverty, hunger, rich people and so on. I wanted to challenge myself: Americans write about India all the time, I thought, ‘Why can’t an Indian write about America?’ I have spent time there. If others can write a book like A Passage to India, why can’t we write about them? Why should we always be on the receiving end?

The Midwest in particular, the heart of America, is more unusual.

Yes, I wanted to relive that time, to show that experience.

Were you trying to avoid using recognisable characters?

It’s just the storyline that didn’t work with what I wanted to write here; America felt organic to its plot. People were telling me to write about a woman, for example, as this is topical, but it wasn’t what I had in mind.

Why ‘yellow’ in the title? And where did the title come from?

The one colour that you always see everywhere, that is most visible, is yellow. It is in everything. Yellow is a very important colour.

Who are your models when you write?

A lot of crime fiction; PD James, Dashiell Hammett. That was a different era. Classic crime fiction shows ordinary guys who have drug problems or sex problems, and so on.

The father and son are at the centre of the tragedy. How did their relationship evolve?

We live with people so closely, and we sometimes don’t know them. What does one leave behind, I asked myself— only memories.

Also, sometimes, a briefcase full of newspapers.

Yes, yes. (Laughs) One can’t leave bad memories behind. Robin’s father is alive in his mind. He dwells on this, on weakness and frailty.

There is the sense of a Greek tragedy, in how this is happening to an ordinary family. People are trying very hard to connect to family in America. And the nature of a father and son relationship is sometimes realised too late, everywhere. The relationship between a father and daughter can be different. A father and son sometimes can’t communicate.

Is there anything you have been on working on, parallel to this?

Yes, there is non-fiction I am writing. I can work on both, but when I wrote this book, I just wrote it in six months, though it remained at that stage for a while.

What happened after that?

It went on and on for two years. I had no option; publishers said you can’t sell this book in India because there is nothing Indian about it. The alternative was to find an agent. I thought, ‘These characters can’t just stay on my computer,’ so I decided to self-publish.

Is there a sequel planned?

I am planning a sequel of a different sort, yes. It has been very enjoyable writing fiction.

Was it easier to write fiction?

I enjoyed it. It’s obsessive, once you get into it: you live in another world. The good part about fiction is that this is a world that you have created. If something goes wrong, only you are to blame.

Doug GunneryLead Tin YellowRobin Miller