Keneally wanted 'Gandhi' team to do Schindler's List

Kolkata, Feb 13 (UNI) Aussie Booker winner Thomas Keneally, during his soujorn to the city, said Steven Spielberg was not the first choice director for his book ''Schindler's Ark''.

His book Schindler's Ark was made into Spielberg's Oscar hogger ''Schindler's List'' that had Liam Neeson as Oskar Schindler.

''I wanted Goldcrest production house, who made a film on Gandhi, to make the film. Spielberg was never my first choice as director of the film. After the film was made I was very satisfied,'' Keneally told UNI.

However, he reminded that the film did not go past without its share of controversy,''Mrs Scindler was not happy to see herself being depicted in the movie as an abused wife of Oskar Schindler, the protagonist of Schindlers Ark, and that created a lot of hullaballo.'' When asked about racism in Australia, he said, ''like other societies, Australia too had both angelic side and the other side.'' Keneally said the Australian identity was ever changing, ever evolving and was torn between the antiquity of the Australian society (the aborigines) and its modernity.

Stressing on the colonial past (rather sufferring) shared by both India and Australia, Keneally said both the nations should come out of their colonial hangover.

''Previously while writing we had to keep the British publishers in mind but now the situation is changing for the good.

I would welcome Indian publishers to publish my works in India,'' he added.

One of the most successful modern Australian writers, Keneally had been short-listed for the Booker prize on 4 occasions: in 1972 for ''The Chant of Jimme Blacksmith'', ''Gossip From the Forest'' in 1975 and ''Confederates'' in 1979, before winning the prize in 1982 with Schindler's Ark.

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