There comes a point in everyone’s life where “no matter how ambitious you are or how successful you are, something has to give. And something does give. It is always a juggle.” Koel Purie Rinchet — actor, producer, TV presenter, mother and newly-turned author, couldn’t have put it better. At An Author’s Afternoon organised by Prabha Khaitan Foundation, Rinchet talked about how her life came to a standstill once motherhood commenced. This life event made her a newbie again, after she had made a name for herself in the film industry. Then came a move to Paris, where she had to rebuild her identity as a person and as a professional. Rinchet talked about all of this and more with Karishma Mehta, Ehsaas Woman of Mumbai, and took the audience from the bustling streets of Delhi to the enchanting avenues of Paris.
It is so common to get noticed in Delhi, and we are so used to people looking at us, from head to toe,” she said. “In Paris, everyone is minding their own business, and you crave for people to look at you because you think that’s how it ought to be!” Rinchet’s journey is proof of the indomitable spirit that leads one from the bright landscapes of one’s homeland to the attraction of foreign shores, all for self-expression and reinvention.
Her tryst with storytelling began during her childhood. As the middle child, she always used to seek attention, which led her to weave stories in an embellished fashion. She began writing as a teenager, and was soon writing columns about fitness, the teenage years and travel as well as several non-fiction articles. During the initial stages, she struggled to get words on paper. However things soon smoothened out, and she found her rhythm and flow.
Her first love, though, remains acting. But writing takes precedence because it grants her total control. She is the sole creator of each syllable that she writes. To write something from beginning to end makes her the master of what she creates. During her life in Paris, she was never short of ideas or stories. Thus, her book, Clearly Invisible in Paris, is the result of noticing a lot around you, and also about friendship. Rinchet considers herself a ‘method writer’ because she has experienced things before writing about them. Her book tells us the story of four immigrant friends, who are women from different socio-cultural backgrounds and ethnicities.
“No relationship is perfect, and if it is, then it is superficial,” she said. “Different people identify with different characters. Art is only complete when it is interpreted. Each person reading the book will interpret it differently, and this will always be very subjective. This is what makes an author a good one. My book has characters that are inspired by anecdotes from my own life.” Purie is married to Frenchman Laurent Rinchet, and the book happened five years after she moved to Paris. “Clearly Invisible in Paris is a work of fiction; however, there is a sense of my personal reality that gets manifested in the book,” said the author. “A lot of emotions, experiences and traits of all the characters have bits and pieces of me. But that is the beauty of fiction. You can weave your own stories.” She added that not a single character is inspired by a singular person; there are threads taken and reimagined and fleshed out wherever she felt it was needed. This is the power of writing fiction.
“Clearly Invisible in Paris will make you feel empathy, urgency, sisterhood, loneliness, nostalgia, and above all, hope,” she said. “In Europe, your expat status, wealth, skin colour, country and job matter a lot. An immigrant is someone who is longing to call a place home.”
The interaction was followed by a Q&A session with the audience. People shared their own experiences from Paris, and said they could resonate with Rinchet’s story. Once the discussions wrapped up, Anindita Chatterjee, Executive Trustee of the Foundation, thanked everyone, and Shefali Rawat Agarwal, Ehsaas Woman of Kolkata, felicitated the author with a dokra memento.