Kubra Sait talks about becoming a writer with ‘Open Book: Not Quite a Memoir’

In 2020, when his circle joined the lockdown trend from making Dalgona coffee to baking banana bread, the actor took up the pen to find the purpose of life.

Though she is not clear about it, Kubra Sait seems to be an optimist. She prefers to see a spot of light, no matter how small, rather than being gripped by darkness at the end of a tunnel. When I call her to discuss her ironically titled memoir, Open Book: Not a Memoir (HarperCollins), she is in Udhaipur, Rajasthan, taking care of a bent elbow that resulted from an accident. He is unsure whether he should return home to Mumbai or wait longer to recover. He is guilty of stopping the shooting. Still, despite the accident, she chooses to focus on the “special feeling” of writing a book (which was released earlier this week).

“I’m excited and happy. I’m also nervous about doing something for the first time,” she says, “some people who have read the book call it honest.”

Even the way this book has been conceived reflects a sense of optimism. During the pandemic, Kubbra, like most people, was trapped inside the house. The people she followed online were either making banana bread or Dalgona coffee. “I was happy with Americano. I tried baking bread. But it wasn’t adding purpose to my life.”

Everything seemed uncertain. “Most people weren’t sure if they were going to make it through the pandemic, right? So, if I had to die, I realized I had a story to tell before that.”

After deciding to write a book, he immediately asked his literary agent for a ghostwriter because he thought all memoirs were written that way. but his literary agent, who had read nuggets of some of his biographies communeA group of artists advised him to write himself.

“I wrote the first few lines about my teeth. About wisdom teeth is not at all. I don’t even have roots for them. So, I wrote, ‘Everything you are going to read in this book is the stupidest decision I have made in my life.’ When I sent it to HarperCollins, he was delighted.”

Kubbra writes about some of the darkest moments in her life, including her bullying at school and experiencing sexual abuse by an acquaintance. “But when these events were hard to remember, I wrote some more and returned when I felt more comfortable writing about them. I knew no one was forcing me to write. I wanted to to tell my story. ,

advice from him commune helped too. “He told me, ‘Never tell a story when you’re not finishing it.’ When you’re working with a story, you always have strong emotions attached to your mind. And, you don’t want your readers to go through the same feelings that you’re going through. They need to be free to make their own decisions. that’s how they Get a feel for your story. So, I remembered that even while writing some of the most difficult chapters in the book. ,

An excerpt from the book is about the abuse she went through. Kubbra clarifies that, this is not about the entire book. “It can give people the feeling that things are doomed forever. But if you read the whole book, you know that there is always a chance to turn things around – but that’s only possible if you take things into your own hands.”

There are not many memoirs of mid-career artists in India. Female actors are rare. Priyanka Chopra’s incomplete, which Kubbra liked is in a handful of people. “Somehow it’s an unwritten rule that you have to write a memoir only when you’re about to hit the grave. I do not believe so. I feel like I’ve lived and lived many different lives in this lifetime and it’s worth sharing now. I didn’t write it because I had a point to prove. I just had a story to tell. And, that was a good enough reason.”