“Our aim is to introduce the new generation to the genius of Satyajit Ray by bringing his stories of Feluda, the professional detective with a super-sharp brain, in comic book form,” said Subhadra Sengupta at the launch of “Murder by the Sea” at Eureka Book Store in DLF Mall, Saket, the other day. The comic book is targeted at children in the age group of nine years and above and is the third in the series that has been launched by Penguin in the last few months, with two more in the pipeline.
The launch was attended by a group of enthusiastic children with their parents in tow, out for a fun-filled Sunday afternoon. To make the occasion interesting, an interactive session was introduced where children were given a series of illustrations with blank boxes. They were asked to interpret the dialogues and “make their own comic”
Their work was evaluated by Tapas Guha, who has done artwork for the comic book. Said Guha, “Ray had already illustrated the character of Feluda and other prominent characters in the series, like his cousin Topshe and friend Lalmohan Ganguli; I kept these illustrations in mind while giving it final shape.”
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Sengupta, who has scripted the comic series from the original in Bengali, is enthused by the response. She said, “Satyajit Ray's adventures of Feluda have been avidly read by children for years. Now this sleuth with a razor-sharp brain appears in an exciting new comic book series.”
She also read sections of the book on the occasion, as children listened with rapt attention about the escapades of Feluda, Topshe and Lalmohan Babu, who, while on a holiday in Puri, discover a body on the beach. Here on, the holiday turns into an edge-of-the-seat hunt for the killer, a murderer with many faces who will not hesitate to kill again.
Sengupta was full of optimism about the comic book series providing a platform for young children to move on to other works by the master, Satyajit Ray, including his novels, poems and music.
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