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| June, Sidharth Pansari, Subodh Sarkar, Arindam Sil and Sharmila Roy cheer as Javed Akhtar cuts the Crossword birthday cake. Picture by Aranya Sen |
Crossword, that opened its doors to book lovers of Calcutta on April 16 2004, can now look back on an action-packed year well spent.
?We have been into all the retail formats. But we were sure that a retail outlet for books would be a learning and growing experience,? said managing director Sidharth Pansari on Saturday, as Crossword turned one. The birthday cake was cut by poet-lyricist Javed Akhtar.
Though the Calcutta crowd is well versed with book covers and knows its Roald Dahl from its O Henry, the initial response to the big and bright Elgin Road store came as a surprise to many.
?We were apprehensive of the response because we were trying to put up our might against the biggest book mart in Asia, College Street. But the first Sunday registered a footfall of 2,200. All our doubts were put to rest,? says Pansari.
With the initial push from Oxford and then Landmark, by the time Crossword came to town, Calcuttans seemed all too keen to shift allegiances from old-world streets to new-age stores.
Though the Elgin Road address boasts of many other attractions, books remain the anchor. ?The book racks draw the maximum crowd. As a result we always have to keep more than 80,000 books in stock at any point of time,? says Pansari.
?Demand for serious titles in Calcutta is more than in any other city. Autobiographies and books on art, culture and photography are much sought after as well,? he adds.
?A society is as civilised as its love for books and culture. So it does not come as a surprise that Crossword has completed one year successfully in the cultural capital of the country,? said Javed Akhtar even as he cut the book-shaped cake.
Paperback culture, however, topped the charts in the year that was with Dan Brown?s Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons registering record sales. Among the current crop, Shobhaa De?s Spouse is doing brisk business.
The other standout trend at Crossword has been children and young adults taking to books of all kinds. ?In fact, the parents encourage the kids. Instead of buying a Tintin CD for Rs 125, the parents urge them to go for books costing three times more,? observes Pansari.
The informal ambience goes a long way in attracting the youngsters. Crossword, in fact, transforms into a hangout by evening. Young people sipping on their cappuccinos, in the small cafeteria overlooking Elgin Road, and browsing through the books is a common sight.
?The idea was not just to create an informal atmosphere but also keep the privacy of the place intact. Many people do not want to be disturbed when they are browsing. The well-trained staff can make them feel at home,? feels Pansari.
But along with the success, come lessons to be learned. The racks for regional books, for example, will have to bear more load in the coming year. ?We already stock more than 10,000 books in Bengali. But the number is going to increase very soon,? reveals Pansari, promising to balance the Shobaa Des with the Sarat Chandras.
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| Thakurma?r Jhulie (top) and Tuntuni |
On the wings of wonder
As children?s tales penned by one of the masters of the genre, they captivated generations of young readers. Now, it?s time to catch the imagination of GenY, with a refreshingly new look.
The animated avatar of Upendrakishore Roy Chowdhury?s Tuntuni is slated to hit the small screen sometime later this year. And the makers hope the series featuring the shrewd sparrow will be able to repeat the success of Thakurma?r Jhulie, their previous animation project.
?Thakurma?r Jhulie became so popular that it spurred sales of the book by around 40 per cent at the Book Fair,? says V. C. Bhalotia, CEO of Dawsen Infotech, the company behind the two animated series. Zee Bangla (formerly Alpha Bangla), where Thakurma?r Jhulie has completed 80-odd episodes, has extended the run to 146 episodes.
Agrees the channel?s assistant vice-president Shubhojit Ganguly: ?It is the top children?s programme in the east in terms of viewership across all the channels.?
But while Thakurma?r? was a more direct adaptation of the Dakshinaranjan Mitra Majumdar classic, Tuntuni ? the bird will be ?inspired? by the tales in Upendrakishore?s Tuntunir Boi. ?There are only a few stories featuring Tuntuni in the book, so we are modifying the concept,? offers Bhalotia about the 52-episode series.
Tuntuni?s stories are delightful and fantastical tales of a world where a tiger not only speaks but also takes a human bride, Tuntuni the sparrow steals the king?s gold before teaching him a lesson and a jackal coaches a village simpleton to marry the king?s daughter. The stories are laced with Upendrakishore?s typical sense of humour that later flowed on as a tradition to the works of his son Sukumar and grandson Satyajit.
On board for the animated series are veterans such as cartoonist Chandi Lahiri, who has designed the characters and scriptwriter Priyo Chattopadhyay.
?Tuntuni? will be different from Thakurma?r? in many ways,? explains Bhalotia. ?The target age group is 3-8 years compared to Thakurma?r?s 4-11 years. This one is about everyday people with a moral at the end of each story while Thakurma?r? is a fantasy tale with demons and princes. On the technical front, the animation quality is much better.?
The work for the series is largely being done in-house by the 50-member team of the company which started in 2000. ?We only hire professionals for script, music, voices and lyrics and the entire production is done in Calcutta,? says Bhalotia. ?Only a completely Indian company will be able to deliver traditional content in its truest form.?
Both Dawsen?s Bhalotia and Zee Bangla?s Ganguly refuse to consider ventures based on Bengali children?s literature risky, despite the perception that kids hardly read nowadays, particularly the classics. ?On the contrary, these are tales all of us have read at some point or the other or have heard our grandmothers and mothers narrate,? points out Ganguly, while Bhalotia feels it?s also ?a responsibility to remind the children of our culture?.
Animation can never rival the imagination, but if Tuntuni? manages to capture even a bit of the magic of the book, it could well open doors to a world of fantasy and fun for today?s children.
