Divya Dutta: My audio book is about my first book ‘Me And Ma’

Mumbai, April 23  For actress Divya Dutta, losing her mother was what made her pen her thoughts in her debut novel “Me And Maa”. She launched an audiobook version of her work recently.

“The audio book is about my first book, ‘Me And Ma’. It’s my journey with my mother, memoirs with her, her presence in my life from childhood and till the time she was with me. I mean she is always with me, but until she passed, how she impacted me to become who I became as a person, professional and how I manage situations,” she told IANS.

Talking about the thought process penning her thoughts, she says that it was her catharsis from dealing with the pain and trauma of losing her mother.

“My biggest fear was losing my mother. When I saw her going, I couldn’t deal with it. I needed a catharsis. I needed to share her with the world. I wanted to celebrate a mother who had been a perfect parent and a best friend. I wanted to tell how a good partnership between a parent and a child can make the child who he or she is and I wanted to share this with the world,” she says.

The actress’ association with writing goes way back.

“I think everything in our life is not planned. Some things just happen. I have been a columnist for a while and I started writing in college. I started writing for a few newspapers, my personalised columns and those were taken really well,” she says.

Divya has been lending her voice to books of other authors, which was what led her to do the same for her book.

“I came upon the idea because last year I was recording something for Shobha De’s book and I enjoyed it. I thought the idea was so amazing, to read out to the readers. I thought when I am recording for everyone, why don’t I do it for myself? My publisher also said let’s do the audio book. Everything has its right time. The audio book coming now is great, people are at home right now,” she says.

However, recording it, and reliving those challenging moments in her life, was not easy for Divya.

“It was tough as it was a catharsis for me. Some experiences were funny, some were cherished and some were overtly emotional and writing those was tough. It was difficult to relive and write from your heart. I was recording the audio for those two chapters and I broke down. My sound recordist had tears in his eyes and I thought let’s take a break, and he said no and that he wanted to keep it like that. We tried to keep it as organic as the book. the feelings are transparent and straight from the heart,” she says.