d. interviews with the Anosh Irani

Living in Canada, do the objects you see there hold your past from India? What is it like to live and become a well-known writer in a country so different than that of your birth?

AI I don't know if objects have that effect on me, but the landscape of a place certainly does. When I see coconut trees, or railway tracks, or bougainvillea, or brothels (run-down ones), I think of Bombay. And I rarely see any of the above in Canada, except for the railway tracks. I'm sure there are brothels, but I haven't visited any.

When I first moved here, it was the absence of things that made it unbearable for me. The absence of heat, of crowds, of spicy food, of car horns, Hindi music, and so on. Absence can cut through you much harder than objects can.

I feel very lucky that my novels and plays have been so well received in Canada. I'm grateful that audiences have a hunger for my stories even though they are set in a landscape that is alien to most Canadians. Perhaps that's been an advantage.

EG Have you considered writing stories that take place in Canada?

AI I've considered it, but that's as far as I've gone.

http://www.eclectica.org/v10n3/glixman_irani.html