VIKAS SWARUP SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE AND Q & A

Vikas Swarup Slumdog Millionaire and Q & A



Vikas Swarup Slumdog Millionaire and Q & A

Introduction

A high profile Indian diplomat who is away from his family on a foreign posting suddenly decides to write a book. And to his own surprise, he finds himself inundated with a mind-boggling response to his debut literary attempt. To be compared to great author Mark Haddon is no small achievement for a first time writer. Dashing diplomat Vikas Swarup's fiction novel Q & A has been translated into 34 languages. He was just getting used to the rave reviews by critics when BBC Radio 4 adapted his book. That was not the end of the long line of appreciation and applause. Film Four, UK, bought the movie rights, and leading Hollywood director Danny Boyle has directed the compelling book into a film. Before its release worldwide, the film titled Slumdog Millionaire has already caught the critics' attention, and has created quite a flutter at the international film festivals.

Analysis

The sensitive and persuasive book revolves around a reality quiz show. The protagonist, curiously named Ram Mohammad Thomas, a young orphan, working as a waiter and burdened by poverty, participates in a television quiz show—Who Will Win A Billion? Surprisingly, this uneducated and unlikely guy goes on to win the quiz but is arrested on suspicion of cheating. The book deals with the winner, poignantly explaining to the lawyer, how it was the real life situations he had dealt with that helped him answer all 12 questions correctly.

The author, for whom all the success and adulation coming his way still seems like a dream, talks about the unique experience. I never dreamt of being a writer. No one in my immediate family has written a novel though my grandfather and father have written several books on law. But I was always a voracious reader and that fascination with books perhaps led me eventually to try my hand at fiction. Finding a suitable theme and plot was the next challenge and he dealt with it adeptly.

He gushes, I wanted to write something offbeat, not the typical family saga. And then it struck me; why not tell a story through the medium of a quiz show. After all Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? was a top rated show in a number of countries across the world, and Kaun Banega Crorepati? literally redefined quiz shows in India. The issue was, who should be my contestant? I decided to make him an ill-educated waiter living in Asia's biggest slum. I wanted to show that book knowledge is not the only knowledge; sometimes 'street knowledge' can be equally important. This, in turn, was inspired by a news report of how children living in a Mumbai slum had begun using a mobile internet facility (tal.forum2.org). The diplomat accepts that the book and its after effects have changed the way people perceive him now. In fact, Swarup insists that he wasn't even expecting such an ...