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BOOKS
Gentle
Victim
New beginning
to an old trend
By
Ravi Shankar
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THIS
IS SUKI
By Manjula Padmanabhan
Duckfoot Press
Price: Rs 180
Pages: 74
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The
art of the cartoon is supposed to be the fine art of dénouement.
Manjula Padmanabhan's This is Suki is precisely such an exercise. A loosely
connected collection of whimsical cartoons drawn over decades, Suki records
the adventures of Padmanabhan's protagonist by the same name (she hastily
disavows any autobiographical umbilicism) in a world populated by characters
who live in a special ethos of their own-Kundalini the Ravenous (a well-known
python) with Oz, the ostrich, wanders into the cartoon by mistake looking
for a cartoon-strip called Eggzooberance and nearly chokes Suki to death;
Jumnabai the domestic co-worker watches television with cable-zeal and
is distraught at the fates of CCji being angry with Mason baba and Kelly
memsahib being in hospital while Santana missie is on drugs; the great
Santa Barbantheon; and Doe-eyed Sweetie experiments with love potions
with disastrous consequences for Suki who is bemused by Miss Maidenhood,
Siren of the Middle East, the first Asian to perform nude on TV-but in
a burqa. Even plastic flowers have a voice, courted by bees who belong
to the Mitsubishi hive while some plants are snobs who do not converse
with potted cousins.
From the
days of the Bayeux tapestries, said to be the earliest origin of the cartoon,
the sense of narrative is part of the form. In fact, the successful cartoon
presupposes a sense of continuity with the portrayed situation. For example,the
ragged comfort blanket that Schulz's Linus is so attached to provokes
stories of its own in the reader's imagination. Thurber's women and Larson's
animals have the same myth about them. Like them, so particular to this
genre of narrative cartoon, Suki too is a gentle victim, her sensibilities
and person assaulted by the forces of the times she lives in.
India, though
rich in political cartooning, is poor in the area of visual social critique.
It has been pointed out that this could be because Indians don't like
looking inward and recording their idiosyncrasies, and loathe laughing
at themselves. Existing cartoon strips are too obscure: Abu Abraham's
Salt and Pepper is both puerile and senile while Rap's Newshound is dominantly
political. Ajit Ninan's Moochwaalah was fun, but is sadly extinct. Maybe,
Manjula's Suki is a new beginning to an old, much needed trend. Meanwhile,
like Oskar, who tells Suki she enjoys playing with a Barbie more than
is politically correct, enjoy!
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