In conversation.
Location: The Cherwell, University Parks, University of Oxford. Summers 2008

Q What is True Dummy to you?

A An attempt to move an inch closer to God; an attempt to liberate from the panoptic shackles of ambiguous existence.

Q What is True Dummy in terms of writing style?

A In my view, there can be four ways of storytelling:
1. Simple things said in a simple manner
2. Simple things said in a difficult manner
3. Difficult things said in a difficult manner
4. Difficult things said in a simple manner
I assume ‘True Dummy’ falls in the fourth category. However, in the hindsight, I should not rule out the possibility of writing that falls in the second category. After all, who does not like to win an award or two!

Q True Dummy took three years to finish!

A Auca sed matura (”few, but ripe”) - Carl Friedrich Gauss

Q Who are your favourite authors?

A I will tell you the books I like -

• ‘Panchatantra’ by Pt. Vishnu Sharma
• ‘One Thousand and One Nights’ (Arabian Nights)
• ‘The Trial’ (especially ‘Before the Law’ parable) by Franz Kafka
• ‘The Overcoat’ by Nikolai Gogol
• ‘The Guide’ by R.K. Narayan
• ‘Madame Bovary’ by Gustave Falubert
• ‘The Library of Babel’ by Jorge Luis Borges

Q How was it writing True Dummy?

A Like a micro-painter working on a two mile long canvas.
Q When did you realise that you can write?
A When Pooja presented me a Thomas Lyte.

Q Is there a sense of achievement to see True Dummy in print?

A ‘Mati kahe kumar se tu kia ronde moe;
ek din essa ayega me rondugi toe’
- Kabir (1398-1448)
My Translation:
‘Called the earth out to the potter, what you trample me;
Wait for that day to come when I trample you’

Q An idea that you dislike?

A Nihilism

Q If you have to educate someone in one line?

A It is a make-believe world.

Q What is Ashish Jaiswal at the end of the day?

A Bulla ki jaana main kaun (‘Bulla! To me, I am not known’) - Baba Bulle Shah (1680-1757)