Manto & I by Nandita Das

Title: Manto & I
Author: Nandita Das
Publisher: Aleph Book Company
ISBN: 978-8194365747
Genre: Nonfiction, Film
Pages: 264
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

I remember watching a play in the year 2007. A friend and I on a lark went to Prithvi theatre and decided right there to watch the play, “Manto Ismat Hazir Hain”. It’s been thirteen years now since I was introduced to Manto, and yet there is so much left to read. So much left for translators to translate. So much left for the world to know the man he was, and is, as he continues to live on. Writers always do. Creative people always do.

I also remember watching Manto in a small theatre in 2018 with my mother. My mother always admired his short stories. She took time to warm up to his style, but it was worth the wait she says, and I believe her. Manto is an acquired taste, perhaps. And I was ecstatic to see a film made on a writer’s life. I was overjoyed because not many writers get that – not in India at least. Kudos to Nandita Das for bringing a part of Manto’s life and stories to our lives.

Manto, the film is a story of a writer who is unafraid to speak his mind and heart. He says what he wants to without regret or thinking twice. There is no self-censorship. There was no question of that. To know Manto, read his stories. Read as much as you can. To know more about the movie, and its intricacies and in knowing that to also know about Manto, read Manto & I by Nandita Das.

The book reached me about two days ago and I was honestly fascinated by the way it was done. A coffee table book, and yet to my mind not quite. Not a memoir either. Not a slice of life. Just a love letter of sorts, from Nandita to Manto – for how she has gotten to know the man, over the years – right from thinking about this movie to the research to everything the movie led to – the casting, the sound design, the costumes, the works, including how actors worked pro-bono, and other such stories from the film and Manto’s life.

I loved the part of how she integrated the stories in the film, and how some essence of Manto was captured. The way she so lovingly speaks of the film, the writing process, how she got Nawazuddin to act, how he became Manto, and more than ever how everyone else on set also became Manto.  The letter written to Manto by her moved me to tears. It isn’t just about the movie then, or about one book. To me, Manto and I is about Manto that exists in all of us. Thank you, Nandita for this book and for the film.

And it suddenly sprang on me while reading this book, that we need Mantoiyat today more than ever. We need voices who believe in unity than division. We need to believe that we will overcome. The divide that he tried to bring down through his stories and works must be worked on again with great vigour. Read Manto. Read Manto & I. Evoke the Manto in you. May he never die.