Satyajit Ray – Auteur Extraordinaire (Part 3)

While speaking about Ray’s contributions to the world of cinema, it is very easy to overlook, especially those who do not speak Bengali, his prolific literary output. In fact it can be safely said that, had he not been a filmmaker, he would still have been as famous, at least in Bengal – such was (and still is) his fame as a writer. I would venture so far as to state that you will find very few educated Bengalis who have never read any of the novels/short stories that Ray wrote in his capacity as an author.

 Two of Ray’s literary characters, Feluda and Professor Shonku, especially the former, have ingrained themselves in the popular conscience of Bengali teenagers as well as adults. Ray was a big admirer of the legendary British writer Arthur Conan Doyle. Sherlock Holmes, one of the greatest literary characters ever created, and Professor Challenger, were the major influences while creating the two characters named above. Prodosh Chandra Mitter, aka Feluda (‘Felu’ being his nickname, and ‘Da’ a a short form of ‘Dada’ or elder brother), was in many ways a reflection of the great man himself. Like Ray, Feluda was a chain smoker, over 6 feet tall, an avid reader, a travel addict, extremely knowledgeable on a wide array of topics ranging from history to hieroglyphics, a huge lover of ‘adda’ or chatting with like-minded people over cups of tea on everything under the sun and beyond, and in possession of a razor-sharp mind and a magnetic personality. Feluda was everything a true-blue Bengali always dreams of being like, and hence people belonging to this part of India, including yours truly, have fallen unabashedly in love with his character. With his nephew-cum-narrator Topshe and a writer of mystery and adventure fiction, Lal Mohon Ganguly aka ‘Jatayu’ (representing a typical middle-class Bengali) as sidekicks, Feluda’s thirty-five captivating detective and adventurous tales, written in a lucid and free-flowing style, is to Bengalis what the Harry Potter cult is to the rest of the world.

Professor Shonku’s forty-odd tales, on the other hand, were science fiction stories that took the protagonist and the readers to places and events that only someone like Ray could concoct and conjure. Ray also wrote numerous short stories, belonging to a vast variety of genres, ranging from chilling tales of the macabre to swashbuckling adventure stories to mild satires to poignant fables. His plots were refreshingly original and with amazing twists, indicating what a fertile mind he was in possession of. He also translated short stories by Doyle and others, and a number of limericks (including Louis Carrol’s Jabberwocky) to Bengali, and limericks written by Sukumar Ray, his father, to English – such was his command of both the languages.  Imagine, he initially started writing only to earn some extra money for his movies!

 Ray was in fact a huge lover of detective and science fiction tales. He adapted two of his Feluda stories, Sonar Kella (The Golden Fortress) and Joi Baba Felunath (The Elephant God), to screen with thrilling and utterly memorable effects. Science fiction vis-à-vis cinema, sadly, proved one of the great disappointments in his life. He had planned to make an elaborate Hollywood-style sc-fi movie called The Alien, from a short story of his. Columbia Pictures was supposed to produce it and Marlon Brando was supposed to star in the movie. However for various reasons the project fell through. And what disillusioned Ray even further was the fact that Steven Spielberg’s E.T., made around 15 years later, bore eerie similarities with what Ray had planned. It surely was not a mere coincidence that the Spielberg blockbuster was produced by the same studio, which incidentally still had with them Ray’s script and illustrations. I liked E.T. all right, but having read the original short story by Ray, as well as having seen the sketches and storyboards that Ray had made of the friendly alien, I can not really help but say that the Spielberg flick was blatant plagiarism of Ray’s idea.

Ray’s memoirs of his childhood years are as entertaining a read for the general populace as his book Bishoy Chalachitra and Our Films, Their Films are influential for film critics and enthusiasts. I wouldn’t be exaggerating when I say that the latter book, comprising of various essays Ray wrote on his filmmaking experiences as well as movies that greatly shaped his love for the medium, literally introduced me to the wonderful world of cinema and made me the cinephile that I’m today.

 Ray was also an accomplished illustrator. All his novels and short stories are adorned with wonderful pen-sketches – they managed to give shape to every character, place and situation contained in his stories with such aplomb as to leave one speechless. It should come as no surprise that at Santiniketan he studied painter from two of the most illustrious painters of India – Nandalal Bose and Binode Behari Mukherjee. It is also worth noting that his first job was as an employee at a British advertising firm, D. J. Keymer in Kolkata. It was roundabout during this time that he founded Calcutta Film Society (India’s first film society), assisted Jean Renoir when he came down to Kolkata to shoot a part of his movie The River, and went to London, where in a space of three months he watch around a hundred movies, including Vittorio De Sica’s neo-realist masterpiece Bicycle Thieves. And it was also here while working as a graphic designer and illustrator with complete abandon for books released by Signet Press (which was part of D.J. Keymer), that he worked on, among others, the children’s version of a classic novel by Bengali author Bibhuti Bhushan Bandopadhyay which went by the name Pather Panchali. The rest, as they say, was history.

Ray, befitting his stature as a filmmaker with few peers, has been conferred with a plethora of awards in his life, including but not limited to, Bharat Ratna (India’s highest civilian award), Lègion d'Honneur from the government of France (the then President of France Francois Mitterrand came to Kolkata to personally present the award to him), honorary D.Litt. degrees from a host of universities including Oxford University, Royal College of Art (London) and Calcutta University, and Berkeley Medal from University of California, Berkeley. He was also bestowed upon with such celebrated honorary awards as Special Golden Lion of St. Mark at the Venice Film Festival, Hommage à Satyajit Ray at the Cannes Film Festival, Special Award at the Berlin Film Festival, and Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement. In one of the most moving moments of Oscar history, a spontaneous standing ovation was given by the attendees at the Kodak Theatre while the video of a bed-ridden Ray being conferred the award by Audrey Hepburn, one of Ray’s favourite actresses, at the Belvue Nursing Home in Kolkata, was being played. As a personal gesture to express my profound respect and admiration for him, I feel he is easily one of the 10 greatest directors of all time, and one of the most towering and versatile geniuses the world has seen.

Ray was born in Kolkata (then known as Calcutta) on 2^nd May, 1921, and expired on 23^rd April, 1992. He married his childhood sweetheart, fellow enthusiast of Western Classical Music and (quite controversially) his first cousin, Bijoya Das in 1949. Their only son, Sandip Ray, is an active and respected filmmaker.

“Ray's magic, the simple poetry of his images and their emotional impact will always stay with me” – Martin Scorsese, American filmmaker

P.S. I would recommend the following two wonderful biographies to those interested– Portrait of a Director by Marie Seton, and The Inner Eye by Andrew Robinson. The latest edition of the latter is grandly illustrated with numerous rare and candid photographs of Ray, taken by Nemai Ghosh, a reputed Indian photographer.

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