Dear Kaavya,<\/p>\n\n
This is your Akka writing. The fact that you have never met me is immaterial; we are brown and we don\u00c2\u2019t live in the land our parents were born in\u00c2\u2014that alone means that you probably have relatives you\u00c2\u2019ve never met, just like I do, so Akka it easily is.<\/p>\n\n
Paavum Kaavya (let\u00c2\u2019s call you PK for short), there is something I want you to know, but before I disclose that, I have to admit a fault of which I am rather ashamed, a fault which I hope you\u00c2\u2019ll forgive your imperfect Akka for.<\/p>\n\n
I was jealous of you.<\/p>\n\n
Just a bissel, but it was enough to make me loathe myself for a few minutes. Green looks fabulous on me, but envy surely does not flatter. Wait, don\u00c2\u2019t frown\u00c2\u2014I promise that once I was aware that I was being a twat, I earnestly called myself out on it and owned my jealousy. Long before I admitted that my \u00c2\u201cunlikely-fantasy-if-wishes-came-true\u00c2\u201d job was acting, I cherished what to me seemed an even more far-fetched aspiration: to write. Getting a book deal seemed like the greatest thing which could possibly happen to someone. To get paid to write? Wow. And that you did, with a stunning advance, which everyone bandies about ad nauseum, since it makes your \u00c2\u201cfall\u00c2\u201d all the more violent.<\/p>\n\n
Sigh. How I wished that my parents had been savvy enough to enroll me in an Ivy-League-Prep-Camp-Thing. Where my counselor, who just happened to be a published author, would discover me as if I were some na\u00c3\u00afve starlet in a \u00c2\u201840s era soda shop and then pluck me out of the sweaty, freaked-out ranks of cloned overachievers and marvel at my genuine uniqueness. My parents made me turn down Columbia for U.C. Davis. My parents are SO not your parents. Your parents gave you everything, including an inadvertent star-making opp that made me want to howl. You\u00c2\u2019re nearly half my age. It\u00c2\u2019s like watching your little sister get married before you do. It\u00c2\u2019s a little humiliating to endure, in this obsessed with chronological-milestones culture we share.<\/p>\n\n
So, whenever this group blog of mine did a post about you, I\u00c2\u2019d look down and notice that my skin suddenly looked wayyy more olive than usual. Then I\u00c2\u2019d take a deep breath and tell myself that you deserved it. That you had hustled for it, working on your writing when in comparison, 17-year old me probably would\u00c2\u2019ve been brooding over which Smiths or Ultravox LP to spin next. My skin would go back to the shade my mother calls \u00c2\u201cirrantharam\u00c2\u201d and I\u00c2\u2019d exhale with relief. It felt good to be silently proud of you.<\/p>\n\n
Here\u00c2\u2019s the thing my little PK: I still am. And I\u00c2\u2019m a little appalled at how many people are crowing elatedly about your alleged toppling. The first thing I thought of when I read the \u00c2\u201cCrimson\u00c2\u201d writing on the blog was that tragically accurate, snarktastic story about the pet shop with international crabs. You\u00c2\u2019re looking at me blankly. I\u00c2\u2019m sure you haven\u00c2\u2019t slept. Tut-tut. That won\u00c2\u2019t do. You know brown girls are predisposed to developing those nasty under eye circles. Take a benadryl, bachi. Your skin and, well, everything will thank you. Hell, take a nap right now. I\u00c2\u2019ll dispel your probably non-existent curiosity about crabs for you, like a wee bedtime story.<\/p>\n\n
So, there was this pet store and it was renowned for carrying the most exhaustive selection of crabs around\u00c2\u2026there were specimens from Mexico, Japan, Russia\u00c2\u2026almost everywhere, really. Each tank had a very secure looking cover to hold in the precious crab-cargo. All, but one, that is. Perplexed, a customer pointed to the open cage and asked the pet store proprietor why it didn\u00c2\u2019t have a lid.<\/p>\n\n
\u00c2\u201cOh. Those are the crabs from India. A lid isn\u00c2\u2019t required, because as soon as one of them climbs up, all of the others furiously yank it back down. So they never get out.\u00c2\u201d<\/p>\n\n
Look at you, almost asleep. And I haven\u00c2\u2019t even come to my main point yet! No wonder you got the book deal and I didn\u00c2\u2019t. We hadn\u00c2\u2019t met, so I have no way of knowing if we have this in common, but something tells me we just might\u00c2\u2014you see, I have a near photographic memory for all things useless. Didn\u00c2\u2019t help me with German vocab, but it does help me recall conversations I\u00c2\u2019ve had almost flawlessly, even if it\u00c2\u2019s been some time since the words were originally spoken (as you can imagine, this makes me a terrifying girlfriend, since it\u00c2\u2019s exceptionally easy to destroy my boyfriends in arguments\u00c2\u2026but we won\u00c2\u2019t go there, in case your parents are reading. Wha-? OH. Hi Viswanathan Uncle and Auntie! I promise I\u00c2\u2019m a virgin who\u00c2\u2019s never conversed with men, even ones I\u00c2\u2019m related to\u00c2\u2014I\u00c2\u2019m totally safe to keep around Kaavya!) Whew, that was close.<\/p>\n\n
Anyway, I remember lots of other things as well. I can remember what my very best friend Eileen Perfume was wearing the day Los Angeles exploded in to riots over the Rodney King verdict. (Maroon boucle turtleneck sweater, black crinkle skirt with blood red roses here and there and black knee-high boots, which she had folded down slightly. She had her hair half-up and half-down, eyeliner on the lower lids, ruby lips and no other makeup.) Like you probably are, I\u00c2\u2019m a devoted bibliophile who can\u00c2\u2019t bear to be without something to read at all times. My memory kicks in here, too, since as edifying as Gita Mehta or Vikram Seth might be, knowing what either of them wrote at some point ain\u00c2\u2019t gonna get me an \u00c2\u201cA\u00c2\u201d on anything.<\/p>\n\n
So this memory of mine, which I suspect you got too\u00c2\u2014sometimes, it is almost dangerous, yes? I can remember being in graduate school (has it already been five years since I graduated? Mein Gott.) and being so exhausted, because I worked full-time (as required by my program) AND took all my classes from 7-10 pm each night. I\u00c2\u2019d read books and articles throughout the entire day and then sit at my computer around 1 am, after the dinner dishes had been washed and my then-boyfriend had been tended to like some entitled Maharajah who keeps asking for \u00c2\u201cpani!\u00c2\u201d when he\u00c2\u2019s supposed to be asleep. Then, exhausted to the point of sleeping mid-keystroke, I would type. And sometimes, I\u00c2\u2019d go back and see a sentence and think, \u00c2\u201cweird\u00c2\u201d.<\/p>\n\n
I\u00c2\u2019d feel that odd tingle that unmoored recognition evokes. And then slightly horrified and suddenly awake, I\u00c2\u2019d realize that I had typed, almost verbatim, something I had read earlier in the day. Sometimes, what I had borrowed wasn\u00c2\u2019t even brilliant. I\u00c2\u2019d shake my head then. I was terrified of getting caught, since I was certain that one day I\u00c2\u2019d turn in a paper that contained a sentence that I hadn\u00c2\u2019t \u00c2\u201cre-recognized\u00c2\u201d in time. \u00c2\u201cDear Lord, please don\u00c2\u2019t let it be something craptacular\u00c2\u2026if I get in trouble, at least let me parrot something genius.\u00c2\u201d But that\u00c2\u2019s not how my little universe works, PK. When I was in third grade, my dramatic ascent up the Spelling Bee ladder was destroyed when I misspelled a word so simple, I\u00c2\u2019m too ashamed to even type it. It\u00c2\u2019s always the little things that I trip over, in the end.<\/p>\n\n
I don\u00c2\u2019t believe that you are the torment-deserving fraud that many of my fellow pajamahadeen think you are. I don\u00c2\u2019t think you copied those words, that you\u00c2\u2019re a plagiarist. I think that either one of two things occurred, neither of which is really your fault:<\/p>\n\n
1) You pulled an \u00c2\u201cAkka\u00c2\u201d and regurgitated something that was playing on your mind. Like the number \u00c2\u201c170\u00c2\u201d. Even if this is true, I blame your handlers for not vetting a manuscript that had received sooo much attention, in this post-Frey era. Perhaps I am mistaken, but aren\u00c2\u2019t they supposed to read, re-read and triple read what they\u00c2\u2019re hawking? I can\u00c2\u2019t help but believe that this is quite common in terms of the writing process, this borrowing a phrase or voice. If this public flogging hasn\u00c2\u2019t happened often to other writers, then I feel like some critical step was missed in this entire process. Even if I\u00c2\u2019m wrong, and the process allows that manuscripts DON\u00c2\u2019T get vetted as carefully as a cabinet-level appointment (WTF?) I think you didn\u00c2\u2019t intend to lift such craptacular writing. If you were pushed over the ethical edge by exhaustion, pressure and your Ivied obligations, I think you would\u00c2\u2019ve chosen someone better to borrow from.<\/p>\n\n
2) And this one is the more sinister, more galling and I think, most possible. I keep reading that your book was initially quite different. Darker. Truer. Kaavya-er. I heard that THAT manuscript wasn\u00c2\u2019t \u00c2\u201cmarketable\u00c2\u201d, not with a pinkish cover and some strappy stilettos. I heard that lots of Kaavya disappeared and in its place, fluff was stuffed in to Opal Mehta. I don\u00c2\u2019t know if you\u00c2\u2019re being set up (that would be even MORE sinister! Perish the thought!) but I do think that someone else did that heavy lifting, dear girl. And I think you\u00c2\u2019re the one who\u00c2\u2019s getting marched up to Golgotha for it.<\/p>\n\n
Speaking of Golgotha, perhaps the reason I have so much faith in you is because I suddenly have a lot in me, quite literally. I spent enough time in church last week to qualify being religious as a part-time job, potentially with bennies, if it\u00c2\u2019s like Starbucks. I emerged from my week of holiness, calmer, stronger, fortified with light. Buoyed by hope and a renewed determination to see good everywhere, in everyone, in all things. If I can have faith that bread and wine when consecrated by a priest, become the body and blood of my savior, I can give my PK the benefit of my doubt. Let people trash and thrash you, Kaavya. Blogging has thoroughly taught me that the bile which they spew (my sinful self included, natch) indicates more about them then you, anyway. You deserve to be innocent until proven otherwise. And I believe that you might just be exonerated of these heavy, back-breaking charges which lay now on your similarly irrantharam shoulders. And if you should fall, while on your way, no matter what causes you to stumble, you will have my prayers and support. We are all human, pots and kettles the lot of us and we all deserve a little bit of compassion.<\/p>\n\n
Sincerely,<\/p>\n\n
Anna-akka<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dear Kaavya, This is your Akka writing. The fact that you have never met me is immaterial; we are brown and we don\u00c2\u2019t live in the land our parents were born in\u00c2\u2014that alone means that you probably have relatives you\u00c2\u2019ve … Continue reading