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Journalism of Courage
Ruskin Bond is storytelling once again, this time for children
There8217;s a limit to my friendliness, says Ruskin Bond. 8220;There8217;s a monkey who frequents my house and the other day, I found him in the bathroom, sitting on the toilet seat,8221; says Bond chattily, over a cup of tea at Hotel 33 in South Delhi. So will the monkey feature in a story soon? 8220;Well, now that8217;s an idea,8221; says Bond contemplating, just for a moment. In town to release The Parrot Who Wouldn8217;t Talk Puffin, Rs 125, Bond spoke at length about writing for children, new stories and future celluloid projects.
Writing for children has always been a rather difficult task, he acknowledges, no matter how effortless it may seem. 8220;Earlier the problem was that nobody published children8217;s books and there wasn8217;t really a reading culture. Now, the problem is that children have plenty of distractions. But I do think parents are more enlightened now and work hard on inculcating the reading habit,8221; says Bond.
As a young boy, Bond says he always knew that he wanted to be a writer and tell stories. 8220;My first advance was 50 pounds, the standard sum for book advances in those days. And it was a princely sum. I sailed back to India from England, soon after and freelanced from Dehradun for a few years while I was writing my books,8221; says Bond. The Room of the Roof, written when he was 17 years old, won the prestigious John Llewellyn Rhys Memorial Prize in 1957. 8220;The prize money was 50 pounds too and that was a good year, I made a 100 pounds,8221; chuckles Bond.
Having just completed two film scripts for Vishal Bharadwaj who also adapted his novella The Blue Umbrella to a movie last year, Bond is looking forward to seeing some new film projects take off.
8220;Bharadwaj is extremely gifted and kept the charm of The Blue Umbrella intact in his film. We8217;re working together on two scripts, one is a thriller set in Lucknow and the other is a black comedy located in Meerut. In today8217;s small town India, anything can happen,8221; says Bond. He quotes his own little experience with a local reporter in Doon. 8220;I don8217;t think we communicated very well, given my broken Hindi and his limited English. When I told him of the scripts, the next day his report said that I was acting in a film!8221; laughs Bond.
