In an exclusive interview with HT Lifestyle, Priya Malik revealed why she chose to bring Ishq Hai to an end and opened up about love, healing and making poetry relevant in the age of reels. She is currently on a 21-city farewell India tour of her critically acclaimed show, ‘Ishq Hai: The Final Chapter. Hailing from Dehradun, Priya Malik is an Indian actor, poet and storyteller, popularly known for her poetry and musical storytelling show Ishq Hai, which is set to come to an end in a few days.
It feels like a homecoming to me,” revealed Priya. ‘Ishq Hai’ is not just another poetry show; it is a story that touched thousands of people and resonated so deeply that it eventually became a part of every listener’s own story. “It is beautiful to end and give a beautiful full stop to a beautiful sentence. I felt that it was time that we say farewell to this show and start working on a new show. For Malik, ‘ Ishq Hai ’ holds a very special place in her heart. “It starts with an idea of home and ends with the idea of finding a home right within and in someone else. “This show has evolved a lot in the past three years and has shown me the power of love. When I started, it was a narration of my own journey, but eventually it became everyone else’s story,” expressed Malik. There can be nothing more beautiful to happen with art when it is no longer just the artist’s art; it becomes the audience’s art as well. After performing for decades, Priya highlighted that most people assume that poetry is boring. Spoken word poetry is different from stage poetry. Poetry is more than just a combination of words spoken in the most relatable way. At times, it can teach us about love, life and relationships in ways that reality cannot. In real life, you get caught up in the practicality of everyday life . But when your expectations of love are created from the foundation of literature, they go beyond the practicalities of everyday life. I think if I had not grown up believing so much in poetry, stories and novels, my standards would have been a lot lower. So, yeah, it taught me to raise my standards. It is often believed that those who suffer write the best poetry, but Priya Malik has a different take on the creative process. “I personally like to write after something happens in order to heal from it. So, my writing process is somewhere in the middle. I only write about things after I have processed the grief, happiness or joy. Then I begin the writing process, and once I have performed it, the full circle has happened.
In a world driven by technology and quick 30-second videos, having the patience to listen and embrace a two-hour-long poem seems challenging. Because you have to capture someone’s attention right away, i think that is so important in this day and age. Because that is what it is, you can call it the hook of a reel or give it different names, but I call it the gateway into the poem. Because part of my brain is recording the experience, knowing that I’m going to write about it in order to heal from it, i can’t write when I’m experiencing something.
When asked why she chose to bring the show to an end, Priya Malik said that every beautiful chapter deserves a meaningful closure. I think this needed a full closure from me,” she said. “There is something I call the ‘gateway line’, which is the first few lines of a poem, according to Priya. “But the fact that it has been picked from a page to the stage, the whole idea is to make sure it is not boring,” added Malik. “The poetry that I do is not a poem that you read in books; it is performance poetry, which has its punchlines, humour , and more, and is meant for a live audience,” elaborated Priya. On sharing what poetry has taught her about love and life, Priya Malik said, “I think poetry taught me to dream more, which real-life relationships can’t. That’s when the healing has taken place,” she said.
