Hindi | Jaya's blog

Guest post: Arundhati Deosthale writes about her collaboration with Julia Kaergel

Arundhati Deosthale, co-founder A&A Book Trust, writes about her experience in translating the Mimi series into Hindi and her collaboration with award-winning German illustrator Julia Kaergel.

A & A Book Trust feels privileged to have had this opportunity to introduce two extraordinarily talented women in children’s literature. In 2009, I met Doris Dorrie in Munich. All those who know German cinema know her as a maker of off-beat film maker, a novelist and a teacher in film institute. It was a pleasure to discover that she writes books for children too. She presented me copies of her Mimi picture books series illustrated by Julia Kaergel, and the rest is history. I had till then seen Julia’s work in children’s libraries and had heard about the various prizes she had been honoured with…

Mimi series just couldn’t have gone to any other illustrator other than Julia, her insights into child-psychology, her uncanny skills to go beyond the text, and sense of fun have contributed brilliantly to the success of the series in Germany, Switzerland and also in India. Mimi came in to Hindi directly from German, as a part of the ‘Girl- child’ special picture books project and went on straight to the villages through Room to Read libraries in 8 Indian states, including Uttaranchal. The acceptance of Mimi across the cultures; especially the interiors of India, among the first generation to see the picture books speaks of the vividness and universal appeal of Julia’s art. We did have to make two minor changes though, namely deleting the two references to pork and beef, when Mimi shops with her mother. But Julia accepted these willingly, appreciating the sensitivities of two communities in India. Chirag, an NGO working for education and rural development, runs a primary school in Shitala, a cluster of villages in the Nainital district of Uttaranchal. The Chirag school kids picked up Mimi for play-acting. It was such a pleasure watching the children draw and make paper pyjamas and a la Mimi to wear these upside down on their heads. They raised some really interesting questions for Julia and Doris, the makers of this series like Mimi who keeps things from parents for quite some time, is that OK?

How come that her parents don’t seem to be minding her being such a menace?

And

Is she a ‘good’ girl or a ‘naughty’ one?

These were the questions which made the teachers and parents think aloud on the difference in parenting and schooling between our two respective cultures. One could say that the children were a bit envious of Mimi whose imagination runs amok in both the books, and parents surely did some learning playfully. And this surely is an amazing response to a picture book!!

Arundhati Deosthale and Julia Kaergel will be in conversation on 29 August 2013 @ Jumpstart. Julia Kaergel will also be conducting an illustrator’s masterclass on 30 Aug 2013. Details available at http://www.jumpstartfest.com/home

(C) Arundhati Deosthale

23 Aug 2013

Jumpstart, “Speaking in Tongues”, 29-30 Aug 2013, New Delhi

18 08 , 2013 No Comments

Jumpstart is an annual platform provided in India by the German Book Office (GBO) that is targeted specifically at professionals within the children’s book industry, bringing together authors, publishers, illustrators, designers, booksellers and retailers, teachers and librarians. It began in 2009 with a small workshop for professionals. But over the years it has blossomed into a two-day event that is clearly demarcated by open sessions that include panel discussions and workshops/master classes. Each event revolves around a theme that is encapsulated well in three words — “Join the Dots” (2010); “Out of the Box” ( 2011); “Off the Page” (2012) and this year it is “Speaking in Tongues”. The event is scheduled to be held on 29-30 August 2013, the India International Centre, New Delhi. Since last year the Book Souk, matchmaking between publishers and authors, has become a key aspect of the festival too. Key publishers such as Scholastic India, National Book Trust, HarperCollins, Hachette, Young Zubaan, Tulika, Tara, Karadi Tales, Pratham, Eklavya and others have participated in past Jumpstart festivals with direct, positive outcomes. For instance Pratham Books has recently acquired the publishing rights to five books by the French artist Herve Tullet who participated in 2012.

According to Prashasti Rastogi, Director, German Book Office, Delhi “This year we will focus on language. The festival is organised by the German Book Office New and Frankfurt Academy with support from the Federal Foreign Office, Germany. Our partners are Pratham Books as are our Knowledge Partners along with India International Centre and CMYK Book Store. Pratham Books is partnering for a session with language teachers and librarians.”

The focus on publishing children’s literature in different languages, the challenges and the thrill of doing so are what are to be discussed at the end of August. One of the panel discussions during the open session will be “Translation is tricky. Dialogue is difficult.” Some of the questions being raised are “How can we know that a book that works in one language will work in another? Which stories travel? Which ones ‘stick’? Why are there so few children’s books translated from one Indian language to another? Are illustrations just as culture-bound as words? ” The other Open Sessions that sound fascinating are “Art as language, designer as author” where award-winning illustrators Julia Kaergel, Emily Gravett will be co-panelists with publisher Arundhati Deosthali and Dorling Kindersley Design Director Stuart Jackman; “What is your bhasha? What is your language?” A workshop for teachers and librarians where panel of speakers who have experiences to share about the teaching and learning of different languages and its impact on learning as a whole. Authors will share experiences on why they choose to write in a particular language and their own experiments with it. To the right is a photograph that I took last year from the open session when Herve Tullet was on stage.

Such an event is important given that of 1.1 billion people in India, only 2 per cent are able to read and write English. The number of young people below the age of thirty is 550 million who are not only literate in English, but prefer to communicate in the language . The per capita number of book titles published in India is around 8 per 1,00,000 population. This number is much lower in comparison to those of the countries like the United Kingdom, the United States of America, France, and Germany. According to Rubin D’Cruz, Asst Editor, Malayalam, NBT, in terms of languages, the per capita number of titles published per 1,00,000 persons is 6.3 in Bengali, 6.2 in Gujarati, 5 in Hindi, 4.8 in Kannada, 4.2 in Telugu, 3.9 in Urdu, and 7.7 in Assamese (the highest). The publishing industry in Tamil and Malayalam are extremely active and although the Assamese speaking population is relatively low, the publishing industry in Assamese is a lot more active than it is in Marathi, Bengali, Telugu, Gujarati or Kannada. Some of the statistics from 2012 are:

• Hindi (422 million)
• Bangla (83 million)
• Telugu (74 million)
• Marathi (74 million)
• Tamil (60 million)
• Urdu (51 million)
• Gujarati (46 million)
• Kannada (38 million)
• Malayalam (33 million)
• Oriya (33 million)
• Punjabi (29 million)
• Assamiya (13 million)

From the National Youth Readership Survey, National Book Trust, 2010:
1. Of 1.1 billion people in India, only 2 per cent are able to read and write English.
2. 42% of India’s book-buyers are habitual readers; per capita consumption is Rs 80
3. Literate youth=333 m (2009) = 27.4% of total Indian pop or 73% of total youth pop. Signif: Rural (62%; 206.6m) and Urban (126.1m)
4. Pop of literate youth (2001-9) has grown 2.49% higher than the overall pop growth (2.08%)
5. Growth more rapid in Urban (3.15% p.a) than Rural (2.11% p.a.) areas.
6. Hindi is the principal medium of instruction, however as the youth go for higher education the proportion of Hindi as the medium of instruction declines.
7. Approx 25% literate youth read books for pleasure, relaxation and knowledge enhancement; more females read (27%) for leisure than males.
8. Schools are imp for readership development. 59% developed a reading habit in schools. Peer influence is also an important factor.

Actually publishing in India is exciting. As long as you understand the peculiarities of India like the multi-lingual character of the territory, the reverence Indian readers have for the written word. There exists a thriving middle class; increasing amounts of disposable income coupled with a disposition to read for pleasure rather than to clear an examination (a noticeable shift in recent years). Earlier the inclination was to buy books for children, but slowly between the ages of 8+ till graduation from university the casual reader disappeared, so there were no books available for this segment too. Today there is still a considerable vacuum in this age-group, but the market is slowly being transformed as is evident by the appearance of at least three new imprints for young adults in the past year – Inked (Penguin India), Red Turtle (Rupa Publications) and Scholastic Nova (Scholastic India).

As the first Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, also patron of Sahitya Akademi, said in a speech he delivered extempore in 1962. “…to think that a language is crushed or suppressed by another language, is not quite correct. It is enriched by another language. So also our languages will be enriched the more they get into touch with each other … .” (p.319-320 Best of Indian Literature 1957-2007, Vol 1 Book 1, Sahitya Akademi. Eds, Nirmal Kanti Bhattacharjee and A. J. Thomas.)

If the previous editions of Jumpstart are anything to go by, Jumpstart 2013 sounds very promising. I am definitely going to attend this year too!

Jumpstart: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpK_38mScEg
Website and registeration: http://www.jumpstartfest.com/home

18 Aug 2013

Jaya Bhattacharji Rose is an international publishing consultant. She has a monthly column on the business of publishing called “PubSpeak” in BusinessWorld online.

Twitter: @JBhattacharji

Ira Pande comments on her translation of Prabha Khaitan’s “A Life Apart”

06 05 , 2013 No Comments

I wrote a comment about the wonderful translation Ira Pande had done of A Life Apart ( https://www.jayabhattacharjirose.com/jaya/2013/05/03/prabha-khaitan-a-life-apart-an-autobiography-translated-from-the-hindi-original-by-ira-pande/ ), ruing the fact it was sans a translator’s note. The very next morning I received the following note from Ira Pande. Thank you!
6 May 2013

On translating Prabha Khaitan
I have always been fascinated by autobiographies because they reveal unknown sides of the person behind the narrative. These are often not visible even to the author of the autobiography, yet they appear to the reader quite clearly. I found this when translating my mother’s writing, even though I thought I knew all about her.

I did not know Prabha Khaitan personally but her story touched something in me. For one, here was a woman who was fearless about revealing the most intimate details of her life and one looked at herself with a dispassionate eye. I tried to get a sense of her when her foster son, Sundeep Bhatoria, asked me to translate her autobiography, but he said he had never been able to get himself to read it and refused to be drawn into a discussion. So her life was a mystery locked in a story she had left behind.

What first struck me was that, despite the honesty and courage, Prabha Khaitan was unable to stand up to a man who appeared petty, petulant and unworthy of her: her lover, Dr Saraf. To me, the original Anya se Ananya, the Hindi version, brought two strange truths together: one was her courage and indomitable will to succeed and defy her Marwari clan and Calcutta society; the other was her disturbing sense of low self-esteem.

I feel there is something that a language bestows by its vocabulary to a narrative. Hindi, by its very nature and political history, is the language of the powerless and the exploited. So it lends itself very easily to self-pity. English, on the other hand, is the language of confidence and power just as Urdu is the language of romantic longing and lyric grace, of tragedy and requiems. Translating from one into another requires not just a strong understanding of the cultural predisposition of these languages but the ability to reconcile the two halves. For me, bringing out the courage and the weakness of Prabha’s persona was the problem to grapple with for both had their own place in her life’s story. I am glad that many readers have seen these two strands in my translation.

Ira Pande
4 May 2013

Prabha Khaitan “A Life Apart: An Autobiography” Translated from the Hindi original by Ira Pande

03 05 , 2013 No Comments

I recently read Prabha Khaitan’s autobiography A Life Apart, translated from Hindi, Anya se Ananya. Prabha Khaitan was from Calcutta, belonged to a prosperous family but chose to be an entrepreneur, a leather exporter. She was also a well-known Hindi writer. According to the information on the internet, her leather business was a multi-crore business. A Life Apart is a memoir that recounts her childhood, the sexual abuse that she suffered as a child (she was advised to hush it up), her experiences in America and the culture shock she experienced but she concentrates predominantly upon her lifelong relationship with Dr Saraf. She was obviously devoted to the man and his family. She remarks “my life was divided into three areas: business, creative writing and my emotional involvement. the first two were on track but my personal life gave me neither peace nor joy.” Dr Saraf’s son had become a part of her business and yet “instead of being praised for my generosity, I had to constantly hear his sarcastic comments about my passionate involvement in business matters.” Dr Saraf would complain “You are becoming like a man. All you can think of is profit and loss.’ Then, as a final barb, he’d say, ‘And why not? After all, this is how a successful business is run.’ Namita Gokhale writes in her introduction says “Pratibha Khaitan’s writing for me, lies precisely in this unwavering, unblinking, truthfulness.”

What is curious is that Prabha Khaitan was obviously a successful independent single woman, at a time when it was unusual and rarely heard of. Yet her memoir reflects the dichotomy in her life. Instead of being a balanced view of her writing, business and her personal life, it is wholly preoccupied with Dr Saraf and ends with his death on 10 Jan 1993. The last para is:

“At the memorial meeting held for him, he was remembered by several prominent personalities for his many qualities. He was called one of Calcutta’s most eminent citizens, a philanthropoist and a brilliant doctor who was survived by his wife and children.
Of a woman called Prabha Khaitan, there was no mention.”

The translation is super. Unfortunately the translator, Ira Pande has not written a word about her engagement with the text. A pity, since it would have been a pleasure to read what Ira Pande had to say about the process. She is always so informative and interesting about translation methodologies, including about the tricky area of transliteration, transcreation and/or translation. For someone like her, who is an accomplished translator ( Diddi and T’Ta Professor ) and fluent in Hindi and English, it is always a delight to hear her discuss translations and literature. She lives it. She breathes it. Hence it was very disappointing not to have a note by her. Making a text available in English for a larger market is I think insufficient, especially when it involves a translated text. The original writer has been heard, but the translator is an equally important part of the process. They too must be given space in the printed word.

3 May 2013

Prabha Khaitan A Life Apart: An Autobiography Translated from the Hindi original by Ira Pande. Zubaan, New Delhi, 2013. Pb. pp. 280. Rs. 395

Hindi Posts

Guest post: Arundhati Deosthale writes about her collaboration with Julia Kaergel

Jumpstart, “Speaking in Tongues”, 29-30 Aug 2013, New Delhi

Ira Pande comments on her translation of Prabha Khaitan’s “A Life Apart”

Prabha Khaitan “A Life Apart: An Autobiography” Translated from the Hindi original by Ira Pande

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