Page 17 - The Apu Trilogy_ Satyajit Ray and the Making of an Epic

4 The Apu Trilogy

scratch and he was like one of the family. Presenting Ramdohin
with a piece of paper with some squiggles on it, Manik would
announce: ‘This is for Sandesh.’ Ramdohin would solemnly wag
his head in agreement, ‘Of course, Khoka Babu [Little Master],
of course,’ and would lift the boy up to show him the upside-
down image of his drawing on the screen of the camera. But
somehow the drawing would never appear in Sandesh.
In early 1927, however, the firm had to be liquidated, because
there was no one in the family able to manage it competently.
The joint family had no option but to leave the house and split
up. Manik and his widowed mother were fortunate to be taken
in by one of her brothers, who lived in an up-and-coming part of
south Calcutta. Satyajit would live in this uncle’s various houses
for the rest of his childhood and youth until the age of 27, when
he acquired sufficient financial independence to move out.
While he was growing up he would never have much money.
He did not miss it, though; and in adult life he would simply
maintain the relatively spartan habits of his early years. In fact,
he felt himself to be rich and seemed surprised if one queried
this. ‘I mean I have no money worries as such,’ he said, ‘thanks
to my writing’ – he meant his dozens of best-selling stories and
young people’s novels starring his detective Felu Mitter, two of
which he filmed – ‘not from films really. I’m certainly not as rich
as Bombay actors – by no means; but I’m comfortable, I can buy
the books and records I want.’
Although the move was a drastic change, Manik did not feel
it as a wrench. ‘Adults treat all children in such a situation as
“poor little creatures”, but that is not how children see them-
selves’, he commented in his memoir, articulating his funda-
mental attitude as perhaps the most natural director of children
in cinema, beginning with the boy Apu and his sister Durga in
Pather Panchali.
Nevertheless, whether he thought of it or not as a child, he
was now thrown back on his own resources. He had been taken
from a world of writers, artists and musicians, where West mixed

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