Katherine Russell Rich

illustration

Gaspar Tringale

SELECTED WOEKS

illustration Dreaming in Hindi (2009)

illustration The Red Devil: To Hell With Cancer - And Back (1999)

Inspiration In a word, fear. I do best with editors who have gravelly voices and hard, fixed stares. I once had an editor who said, “Really, just take all the time you need.” Well, what can I say? Turned out I needed six years.

Making Up for Lost Time I came late to writing; I didn't really begin till I was forty-two. Before that, I was a magazine editor and worked with writers. For years, I didn't really have a whole lot to say. And then when I did, as it turned out, I'd had this twenty-year apprenticeship in writing since I'd spent two decades observing writers up close. I think that helped me skip a certain number of errors. For instance, I knew that if you were going to write a book, you'd better feel a sense of urgency about the subject. Otherwise, you'd be in for a long, long slog. With both my books, The Red Devil and Dreaming in Hindi, I was urgently obsessed. This sounds pretentious I'm afraid, but with a book I have to feel like what I'm writing about is important. I could be just about to start a novel. I might have the plot and characters, but it won't be until I can feel that this book absolutely has to be written that I'll be able to begin.

The Celestial Tongue Since my book Dreaming in Hindi came out, I've been asked “What made you want to learn Hindi?” a lot. The real answer, “I dunno. I just did,” makes people squint. So I've come up with a list of the things I've loved about doing it. At different times, and sometimes all at once: I've loved the cadences of the language, the way that the singsong of Hindi reminds me that the language comes out of an oral tradition (as opposed to our Western, written one), out of a culture where most people didn't have books, so that sentences were lilting, had rhymes and repetitions. With that more poetic style of speaking, information is easier to remember. An Indian poet once told me that the ancient medical texts were written in poetry. “Our language is more celestial,” he said, referring to the fact that it seems shaped more by nature. I love that celestial tongue for the fact that it has one word for yesterday and today (kal), for how in Hindi, night spreads, it doesn't fall. You eat the sun (sunbathe), you eat a beating. I love the way it's allowed me access to people who couldn't speak English and whom I'd never have gotten to meet otherwise: an outcast activist, a middle-aged housewife who'd get so worked up at the fact I was speaking her language with her, she'd haul off and gleefully punch me in the arm. “Why, these samosas are very good.” Wham! “Yes, it sure is hot today.” Pow! Like getting repeatedly walloped by joy.

Influences on My Writing I have to say Robert Penn Warren. It was only after I signed a contract to write my first book, The Red Devil, that I realized I didn't know how to write a book. I was then struck mute with terror. Luckily for me, the book club I was in at the time chose that moment to read Robert Penn Warren's extraordinary novel, All the King's Men. The richness of his language coupled with his surety and the risks he took; it was, all of it, infectious and drained my fear. I just wanted to do what he was doing. Once I started the book, I wrote it in nine months.

MRS. BHARGAV MISTRY'S GUJARATI SALAD

Makes 6–8 servings

In the first half of Dreaming In Hindi, a book about a year I spent in India learning to speak Hindi, I write about living with an extended Jain family: two brothers, their wives, five children, and a tiny matriarch. The brothers owned a marble mine and had a sprawling house with many rooms, but everything happened in the kitchen. Afternoons, I'd sit with the wives in the kitchen and watch their choreographed dinner preparations. I'd haltingly answer their questions about life in the United States and when they'd comment, I was lost. I'd be lost during dinner with the children and wives and lost again an hour later, when the men came home and sat down to be served. Day after day, all those hours, everyone spoke to me, ignoring the fact that it was largely a preposterous undertaking. To this day, I marvel at the family's infinite patience with my baby Hindi — they'd speak gently, slowly, repeat things often, as if I were a child. I was cradled by their language, until one day, an astonishing but predictable thing happened: strings of words were suddenly just there, as if I'd known them all along.

It was about then that the wives began hinting broadly that it might be nice if I'd just for once cook them dinner. I suppose I seemed more adult to them, more like a woman, and one thing every woman in India can do is cook. When they'd not-so-subtly suggest this, I'd freeze, stricken, for I deeply wanted to make dinner for them and at the same time, I knew, there was no way to explain that in New York, whence I'd come, people use their slivers of kitchens to microwave, end of story. I'd never learned how to cook anything. So they'd hint and I'd stammer, until finally, the women tried to help me out. I'd made it clear I'd wanted to and now they tried to figure out what was the problem. “What do you cook at your house?” they asked, but again, I was at a loss for words. No sense going for the dictionary.

“Take out,” was not going to be in there.

“Mexican?” one of the wives offered helpfully. “Yes!” I exclaimed. At home, I had heated up rice. Other times, beans. “So you can cook Mexican for us here?” she said, glancing at the stove. Damn. “No, I need the book,” I said. “Book?” they repeated. “Yes, I need the book of the kitchen to cook Mexican,” I said and the senior wife gave me a nice-try smile. “Good answer,” I swear she said.

The upshot of this story is that months later, when I met a woman from Gujarat, the wife of the saroda player Bhargav Mistry, who said she'd be glad to teach me to cook, I leaped at the offer. I'd never been so happy to know anything in my life. All of Mrs. Mistry's recipes were magnificent and often intricate, but the one I liked the best, the one I present here, was the simplest.

Note: Poha, or white rice flakes, can be purchased at Indian grocers or ordered online.

Pomegranates are in season fall through mid-winter in the United States. After breaking open the fruit, you'll find many arils, or seed casings, which can be consumed raw (including the seed).

You're welcome to adjust amounts of ingredients to suit your taste. When Mrs. Mistry taught me, she'd just say things like, “Add some peanuts, oh, maybe two handfuls.” Every time I make this salad, I wing it.

1 20-ounce can pineapple rings, or fresh pineapple, cored

¾–1 cup salted peanuts

1 head of white or red cabbage

1–1½ cups sliced seedless green grapes

¾–1 cup poha (white rice flakes) (optional) (see note)

¾–1 cup pomegranate seeds (see note)

4–6 tablespoons chopped cilantro leaves

Juice of 1 lemon

Pinch of sugar

Salt to taste

1 Slice pineapple rings or cored pineapple into bite-sized pieces, until you have 1–1½ cups. Place peanuts in a small paper bag and use a mallet to smash into pieces.

2 Using a mandoline, food processor fitted with a slicing blade, or box grater, grate the cabbage into long pieces.

3 In a large salad bowl, combine pineapple, peanuts, cabbage, grapes, poha, pomegranate seeds, and cilantro. Add lemon juice, sugar, and salt to taste, and toss. The mix of textures and tastes make this like nothing you've ever tried.