What makes a person write his/her autobiography? Or others to scribble on his biopic? Are the intentions in both the cases really honest and genuine or it’s just an exercise to allow everybody to peep into their past, this much and not more and that too from their point of view.
Most of the biopic/ autobiographies are full with the anecdotes those are far from the reality. In such a situation I would welcome someone like Shobha Dey who at the outset itself declares that they are ‘Selected memories! And thus gets away from the torrid details of her florid life that every soul on this side of the world knows but ‘she’ only selectively forgets them rather than putting them as her memoirs!
I did read most of the biographies when I was either in school or college so did not have access to the ones written in English. The ones I read afterward too did not strike me as there was no reference to the context, so they were just like reading another novel, notably that of Lee Iacocca.
Though it was in Marathi the most candid biography that was honest to the last ‘T’ was ‘Sangatye Eika’ [‘Listen to what I am telling’]. It was narrated [The protagonist was semiliterate so could not write her own memoirs till late in her life] by extremely controversial film actress of yesteryears Ms. Hansa Wadkar. Movie ‘Bhumika’ for which late Smita Patil received accolades and awards in dozens was loosely based on it. She was truthful, honest, candid and extremely blunt to the last detail and did not hesitate to take the names. The intellectual director who was supposed to be in her love and lured her away from her broken marriage promising the moon too wrote his biography later but did not have the guts to admit the folly on his part, thus making my point strong about the very purpose of writing the ‘Autobiography’.
There are two autobiographies by the same name but different [?] authors. One by the maestro of Hindi and Marathi cinema V. Shantaram and other, a semiautobiographical account by Australian ex-bank cheater G D Roberts. The 1st one by V. Shantaram conveniently omits many details that might have created a lot of furor, maybe, while the second one did create havoc by its lurid details of the soft underbelly of Mumbai, the details here too were denied by the ones mentioned! The question then arises, whom to believe!
The latest example is a biopic on Sanjay Dutt by Raju Hirani
Nothing matches the guts of the producer and the director,[ and of course? the script writer] who tried to whitewash the convicted criminal’s trials and tribulations with the kid’s gloves. For the crime which Mr. Dutt committed, he was left with much, much milder sentence. Mr. Dutt’s life is like an open book and everybody knows everything about his misdeeds and how he got away because of the connections at the higher levels. He did not stop at that but had the guts to appear on the national TV to vouch for his innocence. I won’t blame him. Because we don’t have honest national character, people like Mr. Dutt and his cronies could get away with encashing their cards on the way to the bank!
Of course, there are many more those could be worth a read but are they too not from the person’s point of view and may require to take with a pinch, at times with tonnes of salt? Nonetheless, they are readable. Is it because it arouses voyeur in us?
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