Bengaluru in the recent past, Bengaluru into the future; Bengaluru in India Coffee House, Bengaluru by the night. Come July-end, there will be a brand new, colourful addition to the small, but growing, number of books with Bengaluru as the central subject.
“Bangalore: A Graphic Novel,” a collection of nine stories, will hit the stands as the second from the “Every City is a Story” stable. An initiative from Syenagiri, a Hyderabad-based graphic-novel studio, the book “from and about” Bengaluru follows a similar attempt in 2014 which had Hyderabad as the subject matter.
It was the interest in “Hyderabad Graphic Novel” in Bengaluru during one of the Comic Con events that was among the factors that triggered off the book on Bengaluru. The studio was originally looking at bringing a second volume on Hyderabad.
“My cousin was studying in Bengaluru and she suggested that we expand our options. Mumbai, New Delhi, and Kolkata have been extensively written about, though Chennai has been touched lesser,” said Jai Undurti, creative head of Syenagiri, who conceived the “Every City is a Story” initiative.
The makers of the novel have also consciously avoided any clichés attached to the cities covered: Charminar and biriyani for Hyderabad, pubs, beer, and IT for Bengaluru, and beaches for Goa, which is going to be their next project.
“When you are dealing with a subject visually, sticking to those clichés is like impoverishing yourself. Why reduce the city to that?” Mr. Undurti asked. There are nine stories for the Bengaluru volume and the studio says no prompts were given to the writers and artists as to who they should team up with or what they should write about. “Yet, thematically everything comes together,” he said.
Zac O’Yeah is doing what he is best known for — a detective story. For the Bengaluru anthology, he has teamed up with comic book artist Harsho Mohan Chattoraj to bring alive the mystery involving an ATM.
Mr. Undurti has also contributed to the anthology with Rupesh Arvindakshan, an automobile designer. Though Mr. Undurti prefers walking in Bengaluru, Mr. Arvindakshan’s passion for cars comes into play in the story that tracks a man whose hobby is to go on late-night drives.
The book, priced at ₹400, will be launched at Goobe’s Book Republic on July 28.
