(Say ‘Ah Men!’ to that, shall we?)
Now that makes you wonder why writers haven’t been writing up a storm of female sleuths. Globally, a Miss Marple or a Modesty Blaise is a rarity. In India, they are practically non-existent.
Although I guess Bengalis might find some comfort in the late Suchitra Bhattacharya’s Mitin Mashi. But that’s about it. And she never quite got ahead of her male competitors. Shall we look at those noble men then?
The first name I invoke is that of Hemendra Kumar Roy (1888–1963), often credited (not without controversy though) with creating one of the first detectives in Bengali literature. The immensely popular (in his times) Jayanta–Manik tales had – not unlike the Feluda stories – three protagonists: the detective Jayanta, his assistant Manik and a police inspector called Sunder-babu.
But it was way before him when you had Panchkori Dey (1873–1945) and his desi Holmes–Watson team of Debendrabijoy and Arindam. Dey-babu is often credited with the honour of being the first Bengali translator of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories, which were eagerly lapped up at that time.
Even before him came a certain Priyanath Mukherjee and his enormously successful detective and suspense stories. In fact, Mukherjee’s writings are often considered to be Bengal’s earliest goenda kahini.
But let’s return to Hemendra Kumar Roy. His stories were most voraciously consumed by teenagers. And the best part is that his detective was a true-blue Bengali. While most of his predecessors were more interested (and who can fault them?) in creating fiction loosely based on the internationally famous exploits of Sherlock Holmes, Roy was a departure of sorts. He did not simply copy; he created his own sleuth with mannerisms that were Bengali in a sense.
The basic problem encountered by most writers in the nineteenth century pertained to the creation of the sleuth’s personality. How to make the sleuth original and not a mere derivation of Holmes? And no matter how hard you tried, the product somewhere down the line would look like a clone of the pipe-smoking maverick solving cases from in and out of his 221B Baker Street abode across the English Channel.
Which is why, the safer bet for most local (read Bengali) publishers would be to simply credit the source, print the translated lines or at most rope in someone to write them differently in the native language and collectively call them an ‘inspired series’. That way, one wouldn’t run the risk of having to do anything substandard. That’s what makes Hemendra Kumar Roy special because he at least tried to move away from the existing practice of creating yet another Holmes clone.
That said, the true fathers of the serious detective stories in Bengal were Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay with Byomkesh, Nihar Ranjan Gupta with Kiriti and, of course, Satyajit Ray with Feluda.
Beginning of a Love and Hate Relationship
My very ordinary middle-class, pre-teen years were mostly spent in a house lodged inside a narrow by-lane somewhere in the heart of the city. In those days, I really didn’t have too many modes of recreation. Television, hardly. Mostly the radio. I used to hate the fact that I would have to visit a neighbour to watch Buniyaad, Nukkad, Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi, and the other tele-dramas of the time. I dreaded the ‘Chalo niklo … khatam ho gaya … Ab ghar jaao sab’ order from my friends’ mothers and harangued my parents about why we didn’t own a television. As you can imagine, a visit to the movie theatre was then nothing short of an Eid. With ‘Top of the World’ by the Carpenters blaring in my head, I made my way to Majestic or Crown Cinema on the potholed and tramline-marked Rafi Ahmed Kidwai Road in central Calcutta.
It was better than even my dreams. Watching Amitabh Bachchan or Rajesh Khanna do their thing on the big screen; hot chips and popcorn in that air-conditioned hall … Just the balm a telly-starved soul needed. Nothing could match the charisma of those matinee idols. Until, that is, Feluda arrived on the scene.
I first met the sleuth at the school library. And like most of my friends – who knew only Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew and Famous Five – Ray’s detective stories were what sparked off my love for Bengali literature. I must confess here that I also loved Sashthipada Chatterjee’s ‘Pandav Goenda’ series almost as much.
Feluda’s Sonar Kella in a puja issue of Sandesh was first blood. Later on, I caught the blockbuster on a sultry Saturday evening on Doordarshan. And that love affair with Soumitra ‘Feluda’ Chatterjee took off like a forest on fire. I was addicted to this character. And though he was fictional, there was this constant hope that I might just bump into him in front of some local paan shop lighting a Charminar. Maybe I could see Feluda get off a taxi right in front of me and walk his way inside New Market to buy some fresh chanachur. Or better still, getting freshly ironed clothes from the laundry next door before embarking on his next trip. It was that real. Or should I add, surreal.
I came upon Byomkesh way later when I was in college. I did try reading it during my school days but, like many others, found it difficult to comprehend. The language was dense, and the themes too complex.
But with Feluda, it was an I-know-you-very-well zone I shared with no one else.
Oh, but I began this piece with the disclaimer that I dislike Mr Mitter. Now, am I not contradicting myself?
Perhaps not. Let me tell you why.
If I were to think about it, I’d say the radio had something to do with this dislike. More specifically, the storytelling of Sunday Suspense on FM radio – a revolutionary experiment far removed from its ancestor, AIR. In Sunday Suspense, we created audio versions of the most popular detective dramas and, as was expected, the biggest hits were the Feluda stories. The first show was aired almost three years ago and the programme remains one of the most tuned into ones in Bengal ever since.
But the journey hasn’t been easy. FM’s popularity was driven by its crystal-clear sound and music that was contemporary and fast-changing. How could one expect people to be patient with storytelling in the middle of all that roil? It was a menacing world, and remotes and the ability to switch off content the moment it bores the listener were only part of the new threat. The battle lines were drawn between competitors. Taking a risk that big was impractical. But Radio Mirchi still produced Sunday Suspense, and the show continues to have listeners all these years later.
The audiences were hooked, and we embarked on a beg-borrow-steal mission. Beg, borrow or steal from literature across the shores to characters closer home.
Choose an existing story that has dollops of mystery. Lay out a sound garden across the plot. Get killer voices on board – with the best of them voicing the detective.
Easier said than done.
And this is why I dislike Prodosh C. Mitter.
I have longed to be the voice of a detective in an audio drama.
With the backing of a superb team, I recorded both Byomkesh and Holmes. It was a stupendous experience. Unmatched since.
But Feluda was not meant for me.
Enter Benu-da aka Sabyasachi Chakrabarty
The radio station I work with has long been a part of Sandip Ray’s promotional plans for his Feluda blockbusters. And during these promotionals I’ve always found Sabyasachi Chakrabarty being bombarded with expectations of epic proportions. One of Bengal’s most talented actors, Chakrabarty has faced constant – often ruthless – comparisons with Maestro Manik’s choice, Soumitra Chatterjee.
Brand Feluda inspires that kind of passion. He is a fictional character who is more corporeal (in the Bengali imagination) than the actor playing him. Consider this: Soumitra Chatterjee acted in only two Feluda movies. But the shadow of those films loomed over what is perhaps the most sterling career in Indian/Bengali cinema.
Chakrabarty knew this was coming, and that kept him on his toes. ‘I’m going to do it my way,’ he said, and the new franchise gradually brought in a new age of Feluda movies. I still remember the session I had with him on Christmas Eve 2011. Royal Bengal Rahasya had released just the previous evening and the social media was abuzz with self-styled critics mocking the actor wi
th ruthless comments like ‘Feluda naaki Felu kaku?’
In three years, the actor would be replaced by a younger and fitter substitute, and his successor (Abir Chatterjee, who was already doing Byomkesh with another celebrated director) would face similar comparisons. Then again, the media was just doing its job.
To return to the Feluda adventures on radio, Chakrabarty was the obvious choice for it. His baritone and the fact that he was already playing the sleuth in junior Ray’s movies made our project that much stronger.
Chakrabarty reread all of the stories, reinventing himself to do justice to the character. Sort of reincarnation, one might say.
I heard him telling the director of the series, ‘Golpota besh koyek baar bhaalo kore pore nile better hoto … taarpor recording-e jetaam.’ I was taken aback for a bit, but then realized how important it is for an actor to get into the skin of the character. Even if it’s for an audio play. Even more so if the character is one of the most iconic characters in a cultural landscape – from Feluda to the low-key Topshe to the loveable goof-bag Jatayu, and indeed the villains, whether it is Maganlal Meghraj or Mandar Bose, and even walk-on characters like that hard-to-please boarder at the Calcutta Lodge (in Joi Baba Felunath).
Now when you’re playing out these characters on radio, the task becomes both challenging and interesting. How do you use a soundscape to bring a character to life when you hear Soumitra Chatterjee often comment on how he would use his eyes to bring Feluda to life?
Feluda was then fortunate to find a voice that matches gravity with elegance. Like Sabyasachi Chakrabarty’s.
Meanwhile, I hit upon a realization of my own. A fictional character can make you feel diminutive. Just the weight of his charisma was too much.
I realized that I was not the right person to voice Feluda. Why, you ask? How is it different from playing a Byomkesh or a Holmes? Honestly, I don’t know. But I have not had the courage to attempt a Feluda.
Perhaps for the first time I realized that I was lacking in many respects when it came to essaying the voice of the man on air. If someone were to question me about what’s different about playing a Byomkesh or a Holmes and a Feluda on air, I would still be searching for an answer. I have found myself voicing so many other characters in the stories. But never had the courage to attempt a Feluda. It is just too daunting. It is actually beyond my sense of perception to explain the ingredients required for being the voice of Feluda on radio. Will I ever do it? Rather, can I ever muster the courage to do it? Honestly, I don’t know. Maybe yes or maybe not. For the moment, however, it is best to listen to Sabyasachi and enjoy the other characters that I have lent my voice to. After all, they make the stories as much as Feluda and I am glad to have been part of the oeuvre.
So I pause and wonder how the actors who portray Feluda on screen prepare themselves for the guillotine. Because no matter how many times you face the media and say stuff like ‘I don’t believe in looking back’ and ‘I’m not influenced at all by what’s been done before me’, there is no escaping the original team of the creator and his Feluda.
Half a Century Later
Through five decades of his existence, Feluda has resisted modernization. True, in Sandip Ray’s films, there is some honest contemporization, but these changes are by and large cosmetic.
If we look at the Sherlock Holmes stories, in adaptations on television, the big screen, stage and radio, more than ninety actors have played the detective since the beginning of the twentieth century. A gentleman called Basil Rathbone portrayed Holmes in as many as twenty films and plays between the late 1930s and the mid-1950s. That’s a record by itself. But to my friends and me, growing up in the 1970s and ’80s, Jeremy Brett was Holmes personified. Brett would just hold you by the collar and have you follow the trail of the mystery like a bloodthirsty hound even if your ancestors had nothing to do with the Baskervilles. With all due respect, a Robert Downey Jr or a Benedict Cumberbatch could do with lessons from the man.
That’s what I think anyway. If I were to ask people around me, no single Holmes would get a clear majority. I’d like to think Brett stands the best chance. But the point I’m making here is that it is the stories and the plots that continue to capture fan imagination. Whoever plays Sherlock – from Brett to Lee Miller – will inevitably attract instant attention. The cult is such that people will watch and also, soon enough, they will criticize. The passion for these characters is such that they provoke charged reactions.
Likewise, Ian Fleming’s James Bond continues to set the box office afire irrespective of who is playing him – barring a George Lazenby, I guess. Look at Sean Connery (undoubtedly the most prolific 007 on screen) or Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan play Bond or, more recently, Daniel Craig, and you see the power of a brand that has endured for six decades and counting. So much so that Craig has recently spoken of the difficulties in playing Bond because of the superhero cult associated with the character.
Add to that, the Superman-Batman-Spiderman (and other superhero) barrage of movies. Hollywood has not only maintained a tradition of gloriously recreating literature on celluloid, it has also upgraded the promotional tools in keeping with the times. From memorabilia to souvenirs to theme parks … the publicity machine serves to grow the belief, or feeling, that these men of mystery and intrigue actually exist and are very much part of our everyday lives whether we like it or not.
They have not only taken their stories to the next level, they have also marketed their products like they were selling an actor of repute in the international bazaar. Yes, sometimes the exercise is very in-your-face but then that’s exactly how they have grown into gigantic proportions and that’s the method they have painstakingly developed to take their products to alien shores where they’ve been customized to suit the demands of the host, often non-English-speaking nation. The language barrier has ceased to exist in most cases. So whether it’s a detective character or a cartoon (Disney and Marvel being the kings in this sector), the product goes viral worldwide. Almost instantly. And now with digital platform opening up, even the sky is not the limit for such fascinating endeavours.
Lessons Waiting to Be Learned
Here let us take stock. We have great content in Feluda. We are actually in possession of a treasure trove waiting to be explored further. In order to transform the character into a national phenomenon (talking global would perhaps be a bit too ambitious at this point), we could strategically apply so many of our resources. It just requires a masterplan and the vision.
Nothing will survive the digital invasion (call it ‘onslaught’). Music and musicians have been thrashed left, right and centre. Not just the type of music but also the methods of sampling have completely changed. Those who have resisted on grounds of ethnicity and aesthetics have been bulldozed multiple times over. The fact that the music industry is bleeding points several fingers at systems that could have been reformed, situations that could have been pre-empted, decisions that could have been taken well in advance. Piracy today is not an unfortunate curse. It’s actually a by-product of our mediocrity that stalled or rather throttled the music companies one by one. Everybody saw the flood coming, but nobody stood up to build the dam.
Had Feluda been walking the streets of Kolkata in flesh and bones, his blood would have stoically whispered, ‘Byapar ta bhaalo thekchhe naa re, Topshe.’ (Things are not quite fine, Topshe.) And that’s because the gene of that character is so progressive. While leafing through his escapades, you get that huge sense of propriety that this man belongs to you and your family… and here is one man who just cannot go wrong. He never miscalculates, never misjudges his opponent, no matter how cunning the villain is. He is always in touch with the current and contemporary. And he seeks the truth without being impractical or loud in any way.
So, let’s make some more noise about the man, who in real life would have perhaps preferred to be very discreet. Heavy-duty merchandise. Feluda on T-shirts, Feluda on banners and streamers, sippers, coffee mugs … Online game
s with the animated Feluda shooting at his opponents. Comic strips. Audio books. Documentaries … the works! Let’s not stagnate with the comforting thought that Sandip Ray will be generous and gift us a film on Christmas every year. There is so much more to be done. In fact, there is so much more we can make Feluda do.
Bengalis face a lot of flak for not being enterprising enough, for being laid-back and for losing that cutting edge that separates the brilliant from the ‘just being there’. The confidence that Feluda can never lose to anything or anyone is something we Bengalis need as a tonic. A tonic that can cure you of all your prejudices, your worst fears … a magic potion that somehow makes you believe that when you ring that doorbell at his 21 Rajani Sen Road residence in Ballygunge, you will find a young lad called Topshe answering the door, courteously ushering you into the drawing room, seating you comfortably on a wooden sofa, soon to be joined by a 6'2", handsome man in his late twenties, hands folded, doing a polite nomoshkar, welcoming you officially by handing over his visiting card with the words ‘PRODOSH C. MITTER, Private Investigator’ in neat simple calligraphy and then, after ordering for liquor tea, offering you a Charminar, lighting both yours and his, observing you while gently drawing in the smoke and then finally exhaling with the first words of business: ‘Haan ebaar bolun … Ki korte paari…’ (Yes, tell me, what can I do for you?)
Feluda shob paare! Feluda can do anything.
And that’s one unshakeable belief we need to protect. Come what may. And at every cost.
* * *
Mir Afsar Ali aka just Mir is a radio jockey, master of ceremonies, television host, actor and singer. With more than 16,000 hours (over a period of twenty-one years) of radio programming experience, Mir is arguably the most popular FM Radio jockey in Bengal and eastern India. Mir is also the lead vocalist of a band called Bandage and has also been presenting his own brand of comedy on a show called Mirakkel on Zee Bangla for the last nine years. It has completed eight seasons.
Feluda @ 50 Page 10