"Just at the stroke of the half-hour, the floor under our feet shook, and in that very instant, the sphere exploded into a thousand bits and scattered on the floor. Then, from the ruins was heard an eerie, disembodied voice declaiming, ‘I know what comes after death!’".
In this last volume of Professor Shonku’s escapades, the brilliant and benevolent scientist travels around the world once more to face near-death situations. Each nerve-wracking experience is faithfully recorded in his diary. We learn of Shonku being outwitted by his own invention, the Tellus computer; his helplessness when his arch-rival in Rome deliberately misplaces his wonder drug, Miracurall; and the thrilling discovery of a three-and-a-half-thousand-
Now, you too can join Shonku on his many exhilarating adventures accompanied by his two long-time friends, his feline companion Newton, and his faithful retainer, Prahlad.
Presented in a brilliant translation by Indrani Majumdar and the late author Satyajit Ray, The Final Adventures Of Professor Shonku brings alive the wildly imaginative world of the weird and wonderful Professor Shonku.
The book, scheduled to release on May 2, will mark Satyajit Ray’s 99th birth anniversary and has been translated by Ray and Indrani Majumdar for the first time in English from the original collection of Shonku adventures. featuring stories that are funny, imaginative and exciting.
Imminent actor Dhritimaan Chaterji who portrayed the protagonist character of Professor Shonku in the Bengali sci-fi drama film has written the introduction to the book and comments, "It’s been as rewarding reading the translation as it was getting to play the character in the film. In Shonku, we have the finest writing for children anywhere in the world. And why just children, grown-ups are avid readers too… I have been a lover of crime fiction for the longest time, but even I was not aware of the pulp detective fiction [Satyajit Ray] introduced me to. He was also hugely interested in riddles, puzzles, stories about little-known but fascinating places. All of that shows in his writing for children. Though he was a relatively well-travelled man, given the many film festivals he had to go to, the places he brings to life in his pages, in Shonku stories—Mexico, China, the Pacific, the Amazon etc. are in many ways journeys of the mind".
"With this final volume, we now have the complete oeuvre of stories featuring the madcap Professor Shonku and his extraordinary adventures available for readers young and old. I am grateful to the late Satyajit Ray’s family, in particular to his son Sandip Ray, for giving us the opportunity to publish these stories in translation and for giving us access to the master’s original artworks that we have included in this volume," tells Sohini Mitra, publisher, children's division, Penguin India.