Raj Kumar Baral is a lecturer at the Central Department of English, TU, Kritipur. He has an MPhil in English Literature and has edited Discovery Dynamics, a research journal. In an interview with the Post, Baral talks about his love for literature. Excerpts:

How did you first come to love books?

I can’t exactly recall the moment when I first fell in love with books. But I have faint recollections of days when I read the lines of Mahabharata and Ramayana for my grandmother and mother. I also vaguely remember reading stories collected in Sunaula Katha Sangraha and Nepali Katha Sangraha during my school days. It was probably then that the love for words was instilled in me.

What was the last book you read and how did you like it?

It was Escape from Baghdad!, written by Saad Z Hossain, a Bengali writer. It is a novel of contemporaneity because it raises issues such as the Iraq War and its consequences in the lives of people. Given that, however, the plotline this novel embodies is not particularly new—in a larger extent it is similar to Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five. The predicament of Billy Pilgrim, the protagonist of Vonnegut, and Dagar and Kinja of Hossain are almost the same; they want to escape.

Which book do you want to read next and why?

My next pick would be Nayan Raj Pandey’s Sallipir.

What is your favourite genre and why?

In case of Nepali literature, I read books irrespective of their genre. But in English I prefer fiction. As Russian critic Mikhail M Bakhtin argues, Fiction is the hero of literary theatre, and because of its influence other genres are in the process of novelisation. Moreover, it provides an arena for multiple voices and can represent larger groups.

Name a book that you would or would not recommend, and why?

I recommend The Power of Now, by Eckhart Tolle; the book’s claim—’the way to true happiness is through learning to live in the now, in this moment we are experiencing, without reliving the past or racing to the future—is especially noteworthy.

Do you prefer fiction or non-fiction? Why?

I prefer fiction to non-fiction; the aesthetics of fiction always lures me. By discipline and as a teacher of creative arts, I enjoy reading a novel or a story more than a report of a research. These days, I have been minutely observing the trends of Nepali fiction and comparing them with the trends of western fiction.

What is good writing for you? What would you say makes a good writer?

Gerald Weales once said, “Tastes change so rapidly that yesterday’s avant-garde becomes tomorrow’s old hat. Intellectual and political fashions become outmoded, then quaint, finally historical—all within a few years.” By saying so, Weales stresses on contemporaneity, which I think is one of the necessary features in writings of any time. Similarly, writing should be reader-centred. Rather than enjoying on self-aggrandisement, writers should address the psychology of the readers. They should sacrifice the ‘pride of greatness’ as well as the influence of ideologies of any kind because readers are the real judges. Slogan writers can’t be good writers.

How have books affected your life?

I agree with philosophers Horace, Sir Philip Sydney and critic-cum-poet Robert Frost: Literature is to teach and delight. When books carry messages, the knowledge if implemented in the life of an individual can change one’s life. And I am not an exception.

One book that inspired you a lot and why?

Life of a Yogi, by Paramahansa Yogananda. It is an autobiography of a Yogi, and has very much influenced me: I would say, it has altered my perspective at the world and life.