Authors as Performers in the Digital Era: The Self-Branding of R Rajasree, Amish Tripathi and J K Rowling

This article focuses on the changing role of authors in the present era of social media. It tries to explain how three authors R Rajasree, Amish Tripathi, and J K Rowling, belonging to different geographical and cultural backgrounds, mediate with social media. It can be said that in today’s world authors have a lot of exposure and liberty than the authors in the earlier period and they use the technology to interact, influence, and market themselves and their works to the targeted groups. They are not any more isolated writers, but are the ones who always want to communicate with the expected readers on a daily basis. For that they use websites, social media like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, X (former Twitter), etc. The authors are self-branding themselves and becoming performers in the liberalised world of opportunities. The capitalist publishers have found a huge market in the publishing industry and open up new venues for selling using the authors. This article attempts to depict the ways these three writers adopt to address and use the technological world in their creative writing. In this context, one can substitute the word “pen” in the proverb “pen is mightier than the sword,” with the word “virtual world” and rephrase it as “virtual world is mightier than the sword” as it drives public opinion and movements, and becomes a cohesive force. The three authors, one from the regional and another from the national level, and one from the Western world, are taken for discussion as they have been unique or have gone to an exponential level, in exploring the possibilities of the digital space.

Authors/performers, digital space, digital narratives, production, publication and marketing

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