Piya Kashyap's weblog chronicles a trip
to India—and captures a literary prize.
Last summer, while reporting a story on the evolution of information gathering ("Modern Times," fall 2004), I had a lengthy discussion with Middlebury writing lecturer Barbara Ganley about the role of Weblogs, or blogs, in academic discourse. "It's only a matter of time," she said then, "before a student's blog wins one of the College literary awards." When reminded of the statement this spring, Ganley laughs. "I knew it would happen," she says. "But I didn't think it would happen this soon."
Ganley proved prophetic this March when Piya Kashyap '07 was awarded the Alison Fraker Prize for her blog "A Journey Back," which chronicled the sophomore's travels in India during winter term. A first-generation American, Kashyap was enrolled in a creative writing independent study when she embarked on a month-long trip to India with her parents and brother on January 5. "A Journey Back" would be her chronicle of the experience, but it would also trace a far more meaningful journey—Kashyap's attempt to discover and trace her sense of self.
"Growing up in Ridgewood, New Jersey, I never really considered myself different," Kashyap wrote in an entry titled "Nerves." "My family was a lot more progressive than other Indian families, and my life at that time seemed pretty similar to all my Catholic friends. In all the insecurities and doubts that I struggled with through high school was that intense fear of being different. It wasn't that I was actively denying my roots, but I was far from embracing them.
"I want to develop a bond with India," she concluded, "with its great past, its millions of people, their customs, their stories, their traditions, but I know that I cannot force it. I want something in me to change, I feel like it is supposed to, and I am terrified that it won't."
"The magic of a blog is that you can catalog and express your thoughts in real time and share them with anyone who has access to the Internet," Ganley says. "But this is also what makes this form of writing so terrifying."
Indeed, Kashyap's writing becomes bolder and stronger as the month progresses; you can feel her confidence growing as she becomes more comfortable with her surroundings—and with her writing. As she travels from Bangalore to Cochin, Calcutta, and New Delhi, Kashyap not only catalogs the sights and sounds she encounters, but uses narrative to delve into deeper topics. "I have never been a religious person," she writes from Bangalore in an entry titled "Faith and Fear." "The idea of God has scared and puzzled me. I have doubted my capacity to believe. . . . Recently, I have experienced a longing to connect with the idea of faith; to find refuge in a higher being, a power, an energy. Being in India has intensified this desire inside of me."
Sitting in the Grille on a rainy March afternoon, Kashyap takes a moment to reflect on the experience. "I had never been in a situation where I was writing every day," she says. "And I was surprised at how much of an impact readers' comments had on my writing. Not only did the entries encourage me, but they brought up issues that might not have surfaced and allowed me to explore these avenues of thought and incorporate them into my writing."
"And that's what a blog can do," Ganley says. "It's a living document, and that's what makes the writing so rich. I think Piya would have won the Fraker, no matter what form she had chosen to use; her writing is that good. But a blog allowed her to do so much more. Not only was it exceptional writing, but it was exceptional blogging." —Matt Jennings
"A Journey Back" can be found at http://mt.middlebury.edu/middblogs/pkashyap/India/