Alphabetica: A Satire On Majoritarianism - Author Kaushik Roy Shares Motive Behind His Book

The book presents vowels as minority and consonants as the majority in a fictional world Alphabetica, taking a sarcastic dig at majoritarianism of the real world.

The book presents vowels as minority and consonants as the majority in a fictional world Alphabetica.

New Delhi: Author Kaushik Roy, during his visit to Jaipur Literature Fest 2022, spoke exclusively to ABP News to speak about his book Alphabetica: A Satire On Majoritarianism. 

To give you a brief, Alphabetica is a satirical fictional story that features the letters of the alphabet as 'characters' that live on the planet named 'Typewriter', in a country called 'Alphabetica'.

The book presents vowels as minority and consonants as the majority in a fictional world Alphabetica, taking a sarcastic dig at majoritarianism of the real world.

Speaking about the concept of the book, Roy said he got the idea of writing the book after he saw a dream where he was talking to a person about the ongoing fight between majority and minority across the world. 

He said, while speaking to the person (in his dream), Roy told him that same as we do, what if 21 consonants out of the 26 alphabets say that we do not need vowels (five) in our country, how will it work? What will happen to words? This is how Roy incepted the script of his book. 

During his conversation, Roy also said that he conceptualised the idea back in 2008, but was able to complete it in 2021. "I start writing the book in 2019 and the best part was that worst possible time, which was Coronavirus pandemic, became the best possible time for me to complete the book," Roy said.

Watch Full Conversation With Author Kaushik Roy Here:

Roy also explained that the fiction world in his book does not only belong to alphabets but also consists of numerics and punctuations etc and the role to combine them all is of '&' (ampersand). "Role of '&' in my book is just like that of Mahatma Gandhi - who was a symbol of peace, love and harmony," he said. 

The whole purpose of the book is to humanise the alphabets, numbers and punctuations so that people can relate to it, Roy said adding that even in real life vowels and consonants can't live separately as shown in the book.

Speaking about the purpose of writing the book, Roy said that the idea was to change people's thought process and even if one person after reading the book feels that both majority and minority are important for society, his purpose will be achieved. 

Launched in Kolkata's Oxford Book Store in November 2021, Alphabetica gives the message of inclusivity, optimism and togetherness.