bhubaneswar home confinement owing to the lockdown has not made much of a difference to prativa ray a jnanpith awardee as it helps her put her thoughts together for writingshe imposed a selfstyled confinement on herself from march 9 owing to the novel coronavirus outbreak after she returned from the all india womens writers conference in agartala organised on international womens day even back then i had used a mask and was the only one to do so in the entire flight says rayshe also cancelled her visit to kochi for the diamond jubilee function of kerala writers cooperative society on february 14 after cases surfaced in the southern state it was followed by the cancellation of her march 12 visit to guwahati where she was the state guest for a book fair the pandemic also prevented her from going to paris on march 24 as part of the indian delegation to the world paris book fair that was called offthe change in schedule has not disturbed ray as she herself puts it since i have long retired from work i largely stay home and go around shopping in the city for traditional saris at times she is using the time to integrate facts about the pandemic with philosophy to express her understanding of the situation through a column in an odia newspaper she is also working on her new novel the subject of which she would rather not reveal until its publication my literature has always been lockdown literature i write in solitude when everyone has retired for the day says raythe writer who is an indulgent grandmother is savouring every moment of making gulab jamun and rasagullas for her teenage granddaughter who is preparing for competitive exams i make sure she takes her orange juice every day says the healthconscious ray who herself spends at least an hour walking and 30 minutes gardening at home every morning