I found Topshe rather boring, in fact. My favourite Feluda character will always be Lalmohanbabu, followed by Maganlal Meghraj (as played by Utpal Dutt).
The sexlessness of Bengali children's literature is worth a post on its own; it has its upsides and its downsides.
Oh, oh, oh! Another topic very close to my heart! I see the downsides more often, I'm afraid. Bengali children's literature is curiously sexless and *girl-less*, because women are sexual subjects, and *only* sexual subjects, and little girls are worthy of being the topic only of 'social message' fiction (like, you know, stories about marriage and sati and dowry and so on) - because those are the only stories that can be told about women, because women are awesome heroines (and let me digress to express my complete and undying love for the many fabulous women in our texts) who can suffer and cry and die (so that their men can reflect and react). Because the sexless world of the boy hero and the asexual image of the macho Feluda are a part of a world where the man is self-sufficient and awesome, and women are present as annoying little sisters and distant parental figures and never, ever *people*, with individual subjectivities (which is why Byomkesh Bakshi is awesome). Because it is a part of the fantasy of the brahmachari/vagabond (baundule is a better word) hero, while the woman is defined in terms of home and nurturing and Mother Earth. And I will shut up now, because I'm rambling incoherently at this point.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2009-01-20 09:05 am (UTC)The sexlessness of Bengali children's literature is worth a post on its own; it has its upsides and its downsides.
Oh, oh, oh! Another topic very close to my heart! I see the downsides more often, I'm afraid. Bengali children's literature is curiously sexless and *girl-less*, because women are sexual subjects, and *only* sexual subjects, and little girls are worthy of being the topic only of 'social message' fiction (like, you know, stories about marriage and sati and dowry and so on) - because those are the only stories that can be told about women, because women are awesome heroines (and let me digress to express my complete and undying love for the many fabulous women in our texts) who can suffer and cry and die (so that their men can reflect and react). Because the sexless world of the boy hero and the asexual image of the macho Feluda are a part of a world where the man is self-sufficient and awesome, and women are present as annoying little sisters and distant parental figures and never, ever *people*, with individual subjectivities (which is why Byomkesh Bakshi is awesome). Because it is a part of the fantasy of the brahmachari/vagabond (baundule is a better word) hero, while the woman is defined in terms of home and nurturing and Mother Earth. And I will shut up now, because I'm rambling incoherently at this point.