Haegwan Kim: Let’s start out by defining your personal definition of success.
Pritish Nandy: I don’t believe in success. I don’t believe that success is anything of value. I do not trust success as a parameter of well-being. I do not believe in success. I’ve lived my life in the pursuit of my dreams, in the pursuit of excellence, in the pursuit of ideas, in the pursuit of faith. I have not lived my life in the pursuit of success. Success is only a by-product. It comes to you; it doesn’t come to you. It does not matter. You’re destined to chase your destiny.
You must chase what you dream to chase. You must go for what you want in life. If you’re good at it success will come to you. If you are a cook you can become the biggest chef in the world. If you are a farmer you could become the biggest agriculturist in the world. So, success is a by-product; success is not something you pursue. You pursue excellence, you pursue your dreams, and if success has to come it will come to you.
HK: That’s a really interesting point. You have achieved a lot of those by-products, as a filmmaker, writer, editor, entrepreneur, and poet, whatever. At first let me ask why you do so many things?
PN: For me it is one thing, which is chasing my dream. My dream was to talk to people, to communicate, to share my ideas, to find and help create a better world. That’s what I work for. These are all different ways to reaching the same goal. The goal is to leave the planet a little better than I found it when I was born.
HK: Wow, inspiring. I’m eager to change the world for the better as well. Can you tell me your philosophy or idea on how we can make our planet better?
PN: Many things. First of all, this mad chase for success must give way to pursuit of a better life. A better life means a more inclusive society, a society in which there are not so many divisions, not such huge divisions between the rich and the poor. A society where there’s not such huge divisions between those who consume and those who provide. A society where there’s not such a huge difference between the winners and the losers.
That is the tragedy, that we have converted our society into a race where the winner takes all. In India 10% – not even 10% – 5% of people own all the resources of India, or 95% of the resources of India is owned by 5% of the people. America consumes more than the whole world put together. This is not fairness; this is not how the planet should be. It is our job to try and ensure through our life, through our work, that there’s greater equity, greater justice, greater freedom and greater integration between people all over the world.
You see, when we judge a nation we are constantly judging it by its GDP growth rate. China is the fastest growing; India is the second fastest growing. We are judging it by the stock market. That’s all nonsense. You judge a nation by its talent, by its creativity, by its intelligence. You judge a nation by its writers, its musicians, its thinkers, its poets, and its painters. That is how you judge a nation because those are the talents that define the future of a nation.
HK: When you create articles or films or whatever, do you consider to put your philosophy into it?
PN: I try to. My writing says that, my poetry says that. My films often say that, not always. Everything that I do reflects my beliefs.
HK: What do you most care about when you produce new things into our society?
PN: I want to see if I can change the way people think.
HK: Talk about success again. I came here India, so I want to talk about Indian things. Is there a particular form of success in India?
PN: Yes, like everywhere else in the world. Particularly now under the influence of the western world our notion of success has become very materialistic, it is about money. A successful painter is not the best painter; it’s the painter who sells at the highest price. A successful cricketer is not our best cricketer; it’s the cricketer who gets the highest sponsorship. A successful musician is not the best musician; it’s the musician who commands the highest price. So, money has become the sole determinant. Fee has become the sole determinant of excellence, which is nonsense.
HK: I totally agree with you that money shouldn’t be the judge of the goodness of humanity. Do you think, for example, that Japan or the United States or one of the most economically advanced countries will solve those materialistic issues? I’m wondering about the tendency of humanity. Do you think that we can solve this materialistic tendency in the future?
PN: I think you’re right. But I think also that we have converted our society into that. Till about three years ago Bangladesh was one of the poorest nations of the world, but on the happiness index it was number one.
HK: Happiness index? That sounds interesting.
PN: Yes. It was number one. The point is it is not always money; it’s how a society looks at itself. What makes a society happy? If there is enough recognition for your talent, if there is enough opportunity, or at least equal opportunity for everyone or most people, a society creates happiness. If an entire society is poor, nobody minds. But if a few people are very rich and the rest of society is poor then everybody minds.
HK: So it’s kind of a relative thing, rather than an absolute. How you feel about your rich and poor is a comparison with society, isn’t it?
PN: You can be happy if the society in which you live gives you the freedom to chase your ideals and your dreams. You may not want a Ferrari; you may just want access to books that can change your life. You may want access to a great library, to books. You may want access to a publisher who will publish what you think. You may want access to a small radio station where you can speak your mind. Not everybody wants a Ferrari, not everybody wants to own an island in the Caribbean, and not everybody wants a private jet.
HK: Let’s alk about your professional life again. In general you challenge lots of things, what was your lesson from your total career?
MN: Keep struggling. The day you stop struggling, you die. You lose your creativity, your zest, your passion, and you die. It’s about being passionate. It’s like a woman, life is like a woman. If you don’t constantly seduce her she will leave you and go away. You must constantly be on top of life. You must constantly be in charge of life. You must be struggling to make the relationship work between you and the planet, just like you struggle to make the relationship work between you and your girlfriend or your wife. You must make it work between you and the planet. You must make it work between you and other species. You must make it work between you and the environment. It’s not enough to do the big things, it’s important even to do the small things.
HK: That’s an interesting point. Thank you so much. The final question, talking about success again, and not as a professional journalist, filmmaker or poet, but, generally, as an individual, as Pritish Nandy, can you give us your advice to be successful?
PN: I say go out and chase your dreams, success will come. We have two goddesses in India. We have 330 million goddesses, actually, in India. Out of them, two are very frequently worshipped as sisters, Lakshmi and Saraswati. Lakshmi is the goddess of wealth who everybody worships, and Saraswati is the goddess of knowledge who I worship. I believe that if you worship Saraswati she will bring Lakshmi along with her. But if you worship Lakshmi, you may never enjoy the pleasure of knowing Saraswati.
Pritish Nandy is a producer, poet, journalist, and activist.
Haegwan Kim is a writer who was born in Osaka, Japan in 1989 and grew up near Tokyo where went to a Korean school for 12 years.
