Our Incredible Cow by Mahasweta Devi, Illustrations Ruchi Shah

Our Incredible cow – by Mahasweta Devi

Mumma : “How was the book?”

Piku : “I am not going in front of any cow wearing blue!”

With that amusing answer as a review of a book, I didn’t know what to expect from the book.

We picked up this book at the recent children’s literature festival held in kolkata in Jan 2017. The author’s name rang a bell in our minds. We had read the ‘the why why girl’ from the same author and had liked it. An attractive blue cow cover-page illustration made us seal the deal immediately.

Why we like the book: This book surpassed our expectations that we had built from this book. This illustrated classic children’s book is amusing and comical. The story kept us in good humor from the first to the last line. The incredible cow not only is non-vegetarian, she has appetite for most unusual things.  She is radical and anti-police. She has preference for colors and chews up everything blue. The writer goes on to add a detail of mentioning that her father’s vests are till date not whitened in indigo blue against the usual practice. The little reader in my house giggled long reading that the cow’s vet had to be taken to the doctor. Ha ha! An idiom in Bengali says “Golper Goru Gaache uthe” which translates to the in a cock and bull story a cow may climb a tree. Forget trees, here she climbed up to 1^st floor.

Moreover, the equally creative illustrations by Ruchi Shah are upright to the story. They are unique, noteworthy and add up to the amusement of the story. Colorful materials like printed fabrics, sarees and embroideries from Bengal, measuring tapes, yarns ;  leaves and hay, bottles and fish and ‘what not’ has been used to form a silhouette of this incredible cow. Incredibly amusing indeed!

About the author and original story: The original story was written in Bengali. In the year 1964.

Satyajit Ray, in the year 1961, was trying to revive a children’s magazine ‘Sandesh’ which was started by his grandfather Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury (1913). ‘Sandesh’ the word means  ‘message’ and is also a much relished sweet in Bengal. Satyajit Ray, man who needs no introduction, was a visionary. He spotted the talent to write for children in ‘Khuku’. Khuku , the storyteller would write crazy tales of her family members and their pets. . ‘Amader Nyadosh’ the Bengali original title (translates to ‘Our Nyadosh ( name of the cow in the story;also means lazy plump and adorable) was one of her several contributions to Sandesh. She went on to become our famous writer Mahasweta Devi. Her distinguished legendary works ‘Hazar Chowrasi ki Ma’, ‘Rudaali’ is well known and were adapted to cinema. She eventually also became a social activist for the empowerment of the tribals.

Author: Mahasweta Devi

Illustrator: Ruchi Shah

No. Of Pages: 21

Reading level: 5 - 100 years

Paperback: 24 pages

Publisher: Tulika Publishers; 1 edition (2013)

Language: English and is available in 8 more languages ( Bengali, Hindi, Tamil, Malyalam, Kannada, Telugu, Marathi, Gujrati)

ISBN-10: 9350466759

ISBN-13: 978-9350466759

Product Dimensions: 24.1 x 21.6 x 0.5 cm

Goodreads rating : 4.5/5

Amazon rating: 4.5/5

The Crazy Tales of Pagla Dashu and co.

Pagla Dashu - by Sukumar Ray

Translation : Crazy Dashu 

Genre: Fiction, Fantasy 

Age recommendations : 7+ 

Pages : 194

Collection of 25 short stories

Translated into English by Sukanta Chaudhuri along with Jadavpur University Translators Collective

First published in Bengali in 1940. 

English translation published in 2012.

How correctly Mahithi Pillai puts it " Mischief is Timess and isn't limited by language. 

Pagla Dashu is a clever and mischievous, fictional character,  created by Sukumar Ray. He is a popular character in Bengali literature. He is often used as an idiom in popular language. He is a round eyed, curly haired boy. That cleverly mischievous boy that we have all had in our school. Very believable, yet Special, and adorable. And these stories, from the first one itself makes u fall in love with this crazy little fellow. 

In one of the stories, how Dashu plays with the fact that "too much curiosity not a good thing". The stories have a real life feel and tickles the true emotions of the children. 

It has Wisdom cleverly wrapped in Wit. Some may question whether a Bengali schoolboy conceptualised a century ago would be relatable to the modern kids of today. 

Yes, it does! 

And that is why Classics are classics! 

And in this case, mischief is timeless. 

As told to times of India, 

The biggest challenge before the group was to retain the humour while translating the colloquial dialogues written nearly a century ago. As the book's prologue admits: 'Pagla Dashu is too Bangla and to Pagla to be translated.' The book also features rare illustrations by the father-son duo of Sukumar Ray and Satyajit Ray. It also features the original cover of the book published in Bengali. 

The Bengali readers may not enjoy the English translation as much. They may find it stripped of its original Bengali colloquial content. However, for non Bengali readers it is still a good view into the world of Sukumar Ray.  

The book is available here

http://youngindiabooks.com/bookrev/crazy-tales-pagla-dashu-and-co

And here 

http://www.amazon.in/gp/aw/d/9350095416/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1453972402&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=crazy+tales+of+pagla+dashu&dpPl=1&dpID=41%2Bc7C2HTYL&ref=plSrch

AbOL taBOl - by Sukumar Ray

Abol taBOl ( translates to Gibberish) is reportedly the finest work of the much acclaimed children's writer Sukumar Ray. They say this Literary Nonsense is of the stature of 'Alice in Wonderland' and Ray is often compared to Lewis Caroll. This book of rhymes was published in the year 1923. In that decade, in India, I am not sure how many people were even thinking about children's literature, leave aside Nonsense Rhymes.  The historical highlights of India are only about nationalist movements for freedom from the British rule. Much higher political agenda, movements, and the Fight for freedom was the only thing people were discussing about. The songs and poetry mostly spoke about nationalism. To think about it, it was indeed quite revolutionary of Sukumar Ray to make sense out of nonsense rhymes for children. 

But he did! And we are glad he did! 

I can safely assure you that there would hardly be any Bengali child who grew up without reading 'Abol Tabol' - The classic pun riddle rhymes. 

It comprises of 46 nonsense rhymes along with illustrations by the man himself. 

The author was multitalented just like his father Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury of the Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne Fame. Just on his father's footsteps Sukumar excelled in children's fantasy litreture and poetry. He was an illustrator par excellence as well. His work of literature is relevant even today is evident from the fact that almost a century after his death,he remains the absolutely must read children's author in West Bengal and Bangladesh. Moreover, this literary work of his has been attempted for translations more than 4 times at various times during this century. The first  attempt was by his son The Satyajit Ray himself. This version is rare and difficult to find. Though few translated rhymes are posted on some blogs by literary researchers. 

1. Nonsense Rhymes - translated by Satyajit Ray in the Writers workshop in 1970. 

As mentioned before, this book is a rare find. 

2. The Select Nonsense of Sukumar Ray : Translated by Sukanta Choudhri in 1987. This version has a introduction  by Satyajit Ray. 

Publisher : Oxford University Press

Age recommendations: 12+ 

This book contains 44 translated rhymes and also translated version of the comical topsy turvy tale "Ha Ja Ba Ra La".  

Translations of poetry is considered to loose it's original essence. Having said that ,this translation by Chouduri is critically considered to be a better version than others. 

This book is available here: 

http://www.amazon.in/Select-Nonsense-Sukumar-Chaudhuri-Sukanta/dp/0195630394

3. WordygurdyBoom - Translated by Sampurna Chatarji. This book comes with an introduction by Ruskin Bond. 

Publisher : Puffin 

Pages: 170 

Age recommendations (by publisher) : 10+

Publication year : 2008

As reviewed by Coleen Demonte - In his foreword Ruskin Bond, writes "Sukumar Ray's forte was the nonsense verse and rhyme, but no less entertaining were his drawings---his sketches of fussy school teachers, pompous pundits, eccentric family members, and of course weird creatures such as the animals in Professor Chuckleonymous's hunting tales, or the wild-eyed monster with an elephant trunk, a lion's mane and a lizard tail. The creatures he created for his poem Mish-Mash are truly out of this world!"

The book is available here: 

http://www.amazon.in/gp/aw/d/0143330780/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1453563856&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=Wordygurdyboom&dpPl=1&dpID=51Qugtj-h5L&ref=plSrch

4. The Tenth Rasa : An Anthology of Indian Nonsense. 

Edited by Michael Heyman with Sumanyu  Satpathy and Anushka RaviShankar.

This volume includes, among other Indian nonsense texts, several Ray translations by Chattarji, including some that are not in her solo edition of Abol Tabol.

Publisher : Penguin 

Publication year : 2007

Age recommendations: 15+

Pages: 284 

Illustrations : 23 BW

And this book is available here: 

http://www.amazon.in/gp/aw/d/0143100866/ref=mp_s_a_1_fkmr0_1?qid=1453564189&sr=8-1-fkmr0&pi=AC_SX110_SY165_QL70&keywords=the+tenth+rasa+an+anthology+of+indian+nonsense