A Janus Proposition
Janus: Roman god identified with doors, gates, and all beginnings and depicted with two opposite faces.
Janus words: Words that are contronyms, antagonyms, or auto-antonyms. A word that is its own opposite — like fast, peruse, cleave, sanction. Like ‘fast,’ which can refer both to moving very quickly and to staying put.
I write to you on New Years’ Eve. This is paradoxical, too, because what is New Year’s Eve in a country like ours, of so many cultures? The Bengali New Year is on Poila Boisakh while the Odia New Year is on Pana Sankranti usually falling on the 14th or 15th of April. Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Assam are other states that follow the Solar Calendar and celebrate the advent of the new year as Puthandu, Vishu and Bihu respectively. Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Maharashtra and Karnataka, which follow the Lunar Calendar, celebrate their new year in March-April as Ugadi or Gudi Padwa. In some western and northern regions, it is the day after Diwali. It is fascinating how this plurality still merges in the great celebration of new beginnings on January 1 across India. Still fascinating is how this worldwide tradition began. The Roman king Numa Pompilius revised the Roman Republican calendar to replace March with January as the first month, since January was named after Janus, the Roman god of all beginnings. The date fell out of favor following the fall of the Roman Empire, but was restored by Pope Gregory XIII (hence the name Gregorian calendar) in 1582 and accepted by several countries almost immediately. Great Britain and its American colonies only used it starting in 1752 and China in 1912.
What’s the point of a new year if we’re not starting anything new. 2023, strictly as a date, is off to being exceptional because it begins on a Sunday, the start of the week, and the globally accepted work holiday. I’m glad we’ll all be home to spend time together. I’m sure writers are making resolutions and setting goals just as I write. Pasting those on walls and desks or simply shoving them into a drawer hoping, rather sheepishly, never to see them again. You might be making none, and that’s excellent too. Twain wrote: “Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink and swore his last oath. Today, we are a pious and exemplary community. Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings considerably shorter than ever.” For those who do set targets for the year ahead, at least some of those goals, I am dead sure, will be kept because I believe writers, whose business is to weave worlds in the liminal spaces between truth and falsehood, are some of the most sincere and honest in the world today.
Many will be looking to start anew, a longer work, or a project, or a different genre, as T.S. Eliot says in “Little Gidding:” For last year’s words belong to last year’s language / And next year’s words await another voice. / And to make an end is to make a beginning. You may also be looking to change the way you look at your writing and submission process, what aspect needs to be worked on, and what you’re reasonably good at. Or, you may just like to stay ‘fast’!
During an interview recently, I was asked, as a writer and editor, how do I perceive styles of writing and the literary world to change in the coming months. It got me thinking in an objective fashion. What I perfectly see upcoming and buzzing over the next year are five trends. Number one is brevity — think Twitter-thread essays and/or stories, think online journaling, think capsule content, both individually and as a group (for example within bird watchers’ community, travelers' groups, etc.). Number two is translations — books, poems, plays — the more the merrier, as it reaches new readers, and also, more awards bagged by them. Number three is shrinking of the print publishing industry and some amount of chaos regarding online publishing and its impermanence vis-à-vis sustainability. Number four is definitely the opening up to more hybrids and experimentation in writing. And number five is more readership across media — whether through newsletters, free platforms, or through paying patrons model.
So, on the whole, in spite of projections of global doom, the writing community seems set to thrive, which is good news. In the new year, let’s hope we remain curious, remain open to making mistakes and continue to discover newness in everything. Happy New Year!
