BCC Shines A Light On: Mugdhaa Ranade
Name of the piece published by BCC:
When/where was it originally published:
Tigers Zine, July 2022
What is the background of the piece? What led you to write it? What’s your process?
It started as the beginning of a longer psychological drama-tragedy narrative and was written from a third person perspective. I wanted to explore grief of a kind I personally haven’t experienced. After writing it, I forgot about it for a long while, and when I came back to it, it took the form it is in now, from the perspective of the lost lover observing the scene, and for me, that truly brought it together from all perspectives because it captured the pain of everyone involved.
When an idea forms in my mind, I let it marinate. I let my thoughts flow and add to or subtract from the idea. I try to think about it while trying to fall asleep, because often in that half-awake state, my subconscious does its thing and works on the idea for me. If I have dreamed up enough details, I write them down as points (that usually proves to be counter-productive, because in the quest to make sure I don’t forget the idea, I lose steam and rarely get to fleshing them out), or, sometimes when the inspiration is lightning sharp, I just start writing the piece. I rarely edit a piece unless I want to radically change it. So, more often than not, what one sees on paper of my writing is fresh brain–vomit. LOL.
How did you feel when it was first published and how have your thoughts or feelings on the piece changed from then to now?
Is it weird to say I don’t think about my pieces after writing them? Of course, having someone find merit in them enough to put them out there in the world for everyone else to read is a feeling akin to what walking on clouds would feel like, I guess. But you can’t walk on clouds forever, can you? I certainly wouldn’t want to—I like the cold, hard ground. So, ultimately, while the happiness of publication is a beautiful, but fleeting thing, the joy of having written the piece in the first place remains fresh in my mind at all times.
For When It Rains—I’m very grateful for every kind word of appreciation that has come its way via BBC. My feelings about the piece itself have not changed. I enjoyed writing it, I enjoy seeing it as a product of my mind. More importantly, the BBC publication has certainly reminded me of the potential of the larger narrative that gave birth to When It Rains; hopefully my brain will cooperate with me on fleshing it out.
Is there a specific message you'd like readers to take away from reading this piece?
As long as they don’t feel they wasted their time reading When It Rains, I’m happy.
Where can readers find more of your work? (Website/social media, etc)
https://chillsubs.com/user/swxchhxnd
