Category Archives: Obscure Feluda facts and references

February 22, 2010 · 6:07 pm

Sidhujyatha.com – the dangers of modernizing Feluda’s world

In an earlier review of how Sandip Ray’s cinematic version of Tintorettor Jishu stacks up against the book, I pointed out the extensive  makeover that Feluda has undergone since the Seventies. In Sandip Ray’s Feluda films, Lalmohan Ganguly’s green Ambassador has given way to a green Hyundai Santro. Characters move about in the present day. As Sandip Ray mentioned in an interview with the Telegraph taken during the shooting of Tintorettor Jishu, even though Feluda himself does not use a cell-phone, others around him do. I think this transition to modernity is a very bold move.

Sandip Ray has made clear his desire to make a film based on Gorosthane Shabdhan! in modern Kolkata. As I review in my commentary of this book, in the middle of the adventure, Feluda is entrusted with finding out exactly what a Perigal Repeater is. As customary in many of the Feluda stories, he seeks information from Sidhu Jyatha. In this case, Sidhu Jyatha cannot help him out because he doesn’t know the answer to his question. Feluda, Topshe, Jotayu, and the readers have to find out the hard way and it is an enriching experience!

The use of Sidhu Jyatha as a reliable compendium of information works brilliantly in a world that predates the internet. Sidhu Jyatha becomes anachronistic and redundant in today’s world – the world of internet search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo. In my opinion, this is the primary danger that Sandip Ray faces in completely updating the series. It took me under five minutes to find out what a Perigal Repeater was from Google. Do we want Feluda to live in a world where antiquated books can be accessed through Google Books and up-to-date maps through Google Maps thereby making travel through time and space essentially an armchair feat?

What would be the role of Sidhu Jyatha as a  purveyor of rare information? Would he be asked to peer through well-worn volumes of newspapers clippings or would Feluda do a search for articles by year on Google News instead?

Sidhujyatha.com!

Of course, in a world filled with “crowd-sourcing”,  Sidhu Jyatha might be a contemporary equivalent of Yahoo Answers or Ask.com (formerly better known as “Ask Jeeves” and named after the fictional valet of Bertie Wooster from P.G. Wodehouse’s works). Sidhu Jyatha could provide expert insight along with opinion through his website Sidhujyatha.com.

Still, one cannot help but be anguished by the role that Sidhu Jyatha would play brushing shoulders against members of Generation X and Y who tread easily on the information superhighway.

©2010-2012 Feluda.net. All rights reserved.

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February 20, 2010 · 8:11 pm

Feluda – where are the women? ফেলুদা সিরিজে নারীচরিত্র কোথায়?

I was reading some of the old Sherlock Holmes stories after a long time. As you may know Irene Adler from Scandal in Bohemia was the woman in Sherlock’s life.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while. Who was the woman in Feluda’s life? Did he never fall in love? Or was he completely obsessed with his profession?

One explanation is that even if he did have a girlfriend or fiancee, he hid it very well from Topshe. Or maybe Topshe was forbidden from writing about personal matters? In fact that there were cases that Feluda worked on that were too violent or racy for Topshe (as Satyajit Ray mentions in Noyon Rahasya).

This brings me to a second point. There are a lot of female fans of the sleuth in the real world but there are very few female characters in Feluda’s world. A very-well researched post in Calcutta Chromosome confirms and expands on the topic of female characters (or lack thereof) in Feluda’s world.

I highly recommend that you read the piece. This complements Lila Mazumdar’s spot-on observation on the dearth of major roles for any of the relatives of Feluda and Topshe in the series.

Until next time, keep reading.

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Filed under Basic information on Feluda, Characters in Feluda books and films, Obscure Feluda facts and references, Random thoughts concerning Feluda

December 22, 2009 · 9:39 pm

References to Sukumar Ray in Satyajit Ray’s Feluda movies – সোনার কেল্লা এবং জয় বাবা ফেলুনাথে ‘হ য ব র ল’

You may already know that many Hollywood blockbuster film dvds contain hidden features that are known as Easter eggs. As far as I know, the dvds of the Feluda films of Satyajit Ray, Sonar Kella (সোনার কেল্লা) and Joi Baba Felunath (জয় বাবা ফেলুনাথ)  do not contain any Easter eggs. However, in my opinion, they are also not necessary.

Like die-hard fans, I’ve seen both films countless times, and each time I’ve discovered new layers that add a rich subtext to the script, plot, and overall experience. If you watch the films carefully, you will notice that Satyajit Ray planted some very ingenious references to his father, Sukumar Ray’s classic book HaJaBaRaLa (হ য ব র ল).

From my childhood, HaJaBaRaLa has been one of my favorite books. Even today I get mildly upset when I hear it referred to as only a “book  full of nonsense” or “nonsensical book.” Just as Alice in Wonderland is not a book of “nonsense only for children” HaJaBaRaLa is not either.

I suspect that HaJaBaRaLa was a book that Satyajit Ray loved dearly too. Indeed, one of the characters in the book, Hijibijbij (হিজিবিজবিজ) took on a dark form in one of Satyajit Ray’s short stories, “Professor Hijibijbij.”

Both Sonar Kella and Joi Baba Felunath have references that the viewer will miss unless he or she is familiar with HaJaBaRaLa. For example, in the train-scene in Sonar Kella when Lalmohan Ganguly (Jotayu) first meets Feluda and Topshe, he asks Feluda his vital statistics to see if they match up with his own literary creation, Prokhor Rudra. Feluda nonchalantly answers that his waist measures “26 inches”, his chest measures “26 inches” and his wrist is also “26 inches.” This is a clear reference to the old man (বুড়ো) and the raven ( কাক্কেশ্বর কুচকুচে)  who mark 26 inches as the measurement of all the statistics of the protagonist in HaJaBaRaLa.  In HaJaBaRaLa, the pained response of the protagonist was “am I a pig?” Jotayu is beyond himself and asks Feluda if “he is a pig”. Jotayu and Topshe both get the reference in the film, though I suspect many viewers will not.

Later in the film, in a crucial scene when Mandar Bose, one of the bad guys, is apprehended for the first time, Feluda mentions that he will get “three months in jail, and seven days hanging.” This is the punishment meted out to Nyara at the end of HaJaBaRaLa.

Similarly, HaJaBaRaLa is referenced in Joi Baba Felunath too. Just before the trio discover that Sashibabu, an old artist has been stabbed, Feluda can be heard reciting the Sojaru-Mojaru verse that Nyara sings in HaJaBaRaLa:

Finally, in one of the “Eureka!” moments in the film, when Feluda is piecing together the different threads of the mystery , Jotayu displays his confusion quoting a very famous line from HaJaBaRaLa  (Chandrabindu-r cha, biral-er talobo shyo, aar rumaal-er ma)

Clearly, like the rest of us, Satyajit Ray was a huge fan of his father’s fantastic creation!

©2010-2012 Feluda.net. Please seek permission prior to reproducing. Screen-shot from Sonar Kella is very low-resolution and believed to fall under a “fair-use” rationale. It is used only for the purpose of demonstration.

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