Let me confess something and get the guilt off my chest. I am also one of those who finished Salman Rushdie’s Joseph Anton before reading Manu Joseph’s brilliant work, The Illicit Happiness of Other People. In hindsight, I can say that in the pecking order of back-to-back reading, Manu Joseph’ s second novel deserved to be read ahead of Rushdie’s memoir. I should have gone by the form of the writer.

Having found Manu Joseph in top form in his debut novel, Serious Men (2010) he could be expected to be one of the few writers who have more than one book in them. His second offering is even more accomplished, and is perhaps the most important work of fiction by an Indian journalist writing in English. It’s ironic (though not surprising) that when an Indian journalist has come up with such a seminal work of outstanding literary merit, the mainstream English media didn’t have the measure of the importance of the work. It had the pre-launch and launch rituals of celebrity cult to perform for a memoir in London, but such is the nature of the daily beast. And it has to work with the template of what Manu Joseph himself once memorably described as a “third-rate virtue called practicality”.

Let us consider three simple aspects within the media space of the country. First, why is Manu Joseph’s multi-layered narrative The Illicit Happiness of Other People important for journalistic engagements of our time? It’s important because it redefines context and provides a new canvas to banal and not-so-banal happenings around us. In times when journalistic premium is being placed on making sense of things around us, Manu Joseph’s work dissects, reframes and even refutes the idea of that “sense”. In the process, it explores the pointlessness of things, and challenges the very nature of reality through an investigation into the suicide of a 17-year-old boy, Unni Chacko. It has the makings of a journalistic report that has dared to follow the story through the labyrinths of the human mind (nature of reality and existential crisis), notions of sanity, social configurations and cultural undercurrents. It does all this with the observational gaze of a sharp report and detached prose of a socio-psychological thriller (to quote a line from the book: “The misanthrope alone has clarity”). Yet, it does not get cynical and is a remarkable work of restrained hope. It’s dark, but the writer has, in an unforced manner, juxtaposed tragedy with the humour that flows out of it.

You can find one thing for sure in this work. The editor in Manu Joseph has carried with him something very substantial to offer to the world of fiction. And it seems to have helped him in some ways, as he said in a recent interview to The Hindu (September 15, 2012): “Being the editor of a magazine helps me be less naïve, so I don’t start respecting things unnecessarily, for no reason, or saying simplistic things like dictators are bad and people are good. And I try to use that as a writer. I use everybody and everything for my process of writing…I think journalism is strongest when you don’t convert everything into lament”.

Second, Joseph’s work is significant for the way in which he has reconstructed the Madras of the 1980s and left it in 1990. Those were times when non-Madrasis visualised Madras with MRF, Brilliant Tutorials and Chepauk. Joseph’s narrative has honestly sought to capture the pre-liberalisation period in the life of Madras, though with mixed results – from authentic to some jarring anachronistic notes. For instance, the use of the word “motormouth” seems misplaced in the Madras of that period. Yet, the sincerity of effort shines through and Joseph’s achievement lies in putting the routine engagements of the Madras of those times, in the bigger frame of a largely unchronicled period of the city’s history. From a journalistic point of view, it’s a great asset to have, particularly in a news magazine editor (Manu Joseph edits Open). In November 2010, in Outlook’s 15th Anniversary issue, political scientist Pratap Bhanu Mehta had observed that all great magazines must also take a longer view of history and the current flux of events to remain relevant beyond the days they hit the stands. Judging by that yardstick, Open seems to have an editor who can widen the historical canvas of its journalistic narratives.

Third, one of the valuable takeaways for journalistic discourse from Joseph’s work is how he brings out the dangers and even stupidities of certitudes, the consensus or any assumed set of beliefs or ideas. He weaves together the characters’ beliefs, limitations and situations into a number of questions and issues, and what follows has only one word for it: absurdity. In attacking the “givens” in our thought, value and belief system, Joseph has left a lot for media narratives to introspect about too. A Bagchi (The Beliefs That Never Were, Outlook) has taken note of this significant aspect of this novel, as he remarks: “The author puts those who are happy to live within ideology on notice with the idea that a belief that can be shared is a delusion because ‘the truth is not consistent, it changes from brain to brain’. In fact, the single contribution of this work is that it flags mindless consensus as a danger to our species, and lives its beliefs by staying clear of political correctness.”

Such refreshing takes on the frozen ideas of our times are evident when Joseph addresses the gender relations through characters like Chacko’s mother. He may be willing to accept “personal is political”, but wants his own definition for what is “personal” in context of gender for it to be “political”. Ideas and words ring differently and find different responses in different minds. That’s an important thing for media discourse to be aware of.

I remember when historian Patrick French and writer Pankaj Mishra had a spat last year, someone interestingly commented that their views and behaviour suffer because neither of them has worked in an office. Manu Joseph has no such handicap. Having worked at various levels in journalism and now holding the office of Open’s editor, he is an interesting figure for how he has straddled two worlds in his writings. The Illicit Happiness of Other People has as much to offer to journalistic narratives as Joseph’s journalistic pursuits have found presence in this work. In many ways, his new novel is journalism’s great gift to quality fiction, marked by a refreshing originality. I will not err again, I know he has a third one in him too. When it’s there, it will be read before anything else.

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