Eshan Sharma was born in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh on 20th June, 2000 and grew up in IIT Kanpur. Ever since his childhood, he is an avid reader which motivated him to focus his expressions and pen it down. Writing is not just his hobby, it’s his passion as well. He is a blogger and a poet who can write in both English and Hindi. He enjoys learning foreign languages as well as Indian regional language. He has also written many essays and articles for many competitions and enjoys participating in competitions regardless of winning. School magazines gave him the platform for writing.
Having started writing from the age of 11, Eshan dedicated his first poem to his grandmother. He generally writes poems in Hindi as he thinks that one can express himself or herself only in one’s own language and already has titled more than 20 poems, essays, articles till now, in a span of five years. He is a jovial, carefree and fun loving person. His self-belief and selfless attitude are just a few good points about him. He firmly believes that if our country wants development we have to make certain changes in our education system, and youth personality development.
Eshan is also a good painter, and stood third in the Kanpur regional Postmaster General Stamp making competition. He has made winning a habit in the GK Quiz comptitions organized in IIT Kanpur and is one of the Top 50 artists in India in 2015 in the list released by Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan. He also got the Akhil Bharatiya Rashtrabhasha Vibhushan award for encouraging the expansion of Hindi language.
Chat with Eshan Sharma
It has been not long that Eshan Sharma’s The Teacher I Never Met has come out. And it was our great pleasure to have chat with one of the most promising novelists in the country. Here’s what the author had to say when Team Spectralhues met him over a cup of coffee.
Congratulations on your first book ‘The Teacher I Never Met’. So, what kind of feedback have you received till now?
Thank you so much. The kind of feedback I am getting for my debut ‘The Teacher I Never Met’ is really unbelievable for me. I got best wishes and appreciations from dignitaries like Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh Shri.Yogi Adityanath, Shri.Rajat Sharma EDITOR – IN – CHIEF INDIA TV, Padma Vibhushan Prof. Roddam Narasimha, Padma Vibhushan Prof. MS Swaminathan, Padma Vibhushan Prof.CR Rao, Padma Shri Dr. Pralhada Ramarao, member of British Parliament Mr.Virendra Sharma, and motivational author Sourabh Bandopadyay ‘Nirvikalp’. Some reviews from my readers are also very motivational. People often write to me that my book is ‘Life changing’ and inspirational and that gives me real happiness. So, I receive wonderful feedbacks and for that I am thankful to all my readers and family.
It’s always an exciting journey to see the manuscript coming out in a printed version. So how was the experience?
Yes, at the age of 16, seeing your name in print is a terrific experience which can’t be expressed in mere words. It was indeed an exciting journey from writing the manuscript on a random diary, then typing it and eventually sending samples to various publishers. However, when the publishers started rejecting my work, I even considered self-publishing my work. But I never had to and I am thankful to my publishers, IDEA Publishing India for taking it up with full attention and helping me at every step.
I started alone with the support of my family but made many new friends – some famous authors, poets, publishers, bloggers and many others. However, the editing phase was quite challenging for me but my editors made it easier for me. So, yes it was an exciting and unexpected journey.
Please tell us your experience with the publishing industry!
The publishing industry is pretty tangled in a sense for debut authors of my age. The process has quite a few complications. You need patience, will power, a never-say-die approach and good communication skills to talk to the publishers and editing it and then publishing it. It’s a log process and you have got to believe in yourself.
What was the kind of support that you got during this entire process?
My family has been a pillar of strength throughout the entire process; my parents, my sister, my grandfather (dadaji) Shri.B.L. Sharma, who was a shayar of his time and my nanaji, who was a poet too. Also, not to forget my cousin Shivi Pandey who has already made some name in this field courtesy to his publication Love Story Seriously?. My friends have also been enough supportive all this while. And Dr.Kalam’s family ‘House of Kalam’ deserves special mention as they have spent their valuebale in conversation with me throughout the phase of editing the manuscript.
When did you decide to become a writer? What inspired you?
I never intended to be a student of literature, neither did I aspired to be a writer when I was growing up. But I never disliked writing. And regarding my inspiration – it was never what, but a who. It was Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam’s vision for our nation’s youth and their development that inspired me a lot and it does now as well. And besides that, the brothers and sisters, the youth of my country of which I am a part of has always inspired me.
What are your ambitions for your writing career?
As I have mentioned earlier, I don’t have any plan to pursue writing as my career, I’ll keep it as my hobby, though I have not thought about my career as of now. I am working on one more manuscript lately but I’m not sure what future has got in store for it. So may be, in the next few years, I’ll figure out.
What are the reasons that you chose a genre which is entirely different from the other people of your age?
It’s an interesting and difficult question to answer. But I’ll try to answer it. I believe in ‘Write what you enjoy reading’. From a very early age I was into reading GK and IQ books, Quizzes, History books and biographies. And it was not too difficult to go such a genre instead of the more popular ones.
Genre of my debut is Self-help. We can’t categorize it as a biography as it contains some events of Dr.Kalam’s life with some of my personal experiences and quotes. The book includes poems which were written by Dr.APJ Abdul Kalam most of which have been from www.abdulkalam.nic.in. Eventually, it was fun, researching and writing this book. I like writing such books.
How easy or difficult is writing according to you? What is the hardest thing about writing?
It’s a mixture. Our brain never stops working, we always think and expressing what you think is writing. So if you can catch up with what you think then it’s easy to write in any language but if you miss that opportunity or thought then it becomes difficult to write. The hardest thing about writing is ‘Writing’. People often fail to write more than 700 words on a topic and a book is generally of 17k and more. So, I find ‘Writing’itself to be the hardest thing. In fact, I discarded many manuscripts but never lost hope. And my willingness to write somewhat helped me in never giving it up. So, Writing is surely a difficult task which can be turned into an easy one by not giving up.
What is your opinion about the standard of Indian writing in English?
I believe, I am not so thorough with Indian writings but yes I have read quite a few writers including Ruskin and Sudha Murthy. Standard is really wonderful. I am not a person who criticizes anyone, I respect each and every author I read and I like everyone’s style, because at the end of the day, we all are unique. So, I would like to appreciate each and every author I have read by now.
And lastly, if you have any suggestion for the budding writers or the young learners of the country.
It’s last but surely not the least. One piece of advice to all young learners and aspiring authors is ‘Lehron se darkar, nauka paar nahi hoti, Koshish karne walon ki kabhi haar nahi hoti, Asafalta ek chunauti hai, usko swikaar karo, kya kami rah gayi dekho aur sudhar karo’ . Never stop or limit yourself. Self-introspect, as we all are full of unexplored potentials and the need of the hour is to know our ‘Self’. Never give up, never stop trying and be Unique. I remember a line in hindi which says: ‘kaun kehta hai asmaan mein chhed nahi ho sakte, kabhi tabiyat se pathhar toh uthalo yaaron’. So that’s my piece of advice to my young friends and aspiring authors. And in case, you want to get in touch with me, just ping me on (www.facebook.com/officialeshansha) or drop an email in this address – (eshansha@gmail.com). I’ll give my best to help you out in any circumstance.
Also share a message with our readers.
Readers are the maker of an Author. My message to my readers is Thank you for reading my book and being a great support. I hope my book will reach to all my young citizens and will make a change in positive direction. Try to stay motivated even in the worst conditions and you never know, you might achieve your goal out of nowhere.
Send me your love and reviews through pictures and emails, I’ll be very happy and will surely revert back to you. All the very best to Team Spectral Hues, my readers, aspiring authors and each and every individual who want to make a change. Believe in yourself and have dreams. Thank you for giving me this opportunity. Interview is a medium to connect with my readers, I am really thankful of Spectral Hues for this interview.
Take care!
If you are intrigued to find out what Eshan has scripted in his novel, you can click here to order his book online. It’s already available in the bookstores. We advise you to place your order at earliest for later on you might have to rue the missed opportunity of going through an absolute masterclass!
Tags: author interview Chat with Eshan Sharma Eshan Sharma The Teacher I Never Met
