One of the most queasy books I remember is Ubhochor Manob (Amphibian Man, I later borrowed the title for an essay on Syed Mujtaba Ali), which itself had borrowed elements from, perhaps, Little Mermaid and Frankenstein. Kashtanka is a name that sticks in my head, was it a story about a dog? I vaguely recall an epic drawing on the cover. Then there were Russian folk tales. The old soldier who rests in the haunted house, and when the ghosts come he starts eating peanuts from a sack and when they ask what it is, he says they are bullets. “ore baba go, ma go” and they run off.

One of the translators I recall was Noni Bhoumik, I think he had moved to Moscow with family. There were others. Wonder what happened to them when that bloc-aligned translation industry died?

Then there were small picture books, which were basically gels/stills from Russian animated cartoons with some perfunctory read-along text. I would pick these up at the Soviet Cultural Center, which was down the block on Dhanmondi Road 7.

One of these had an image with “second hand goods” sign which was untranslated. I looked up at mother and said, “eta mane ki? ditiyo haat bhalo?”. Oh they laughed. I was seven.

I loved reading this passage. this passage brought sooo many flash backs. As i read this passage i can see how many things we as in Bangladeshi’s overcame, although i was no where at that time, meaning i wasn’t even born. But the thing i don’t understand, if we can overcome and win a war den y cant we bring these political parties together and just united Bangladesh as a whole instead of 2 parties, having fights after fights and just plainly killing ourselves, and y cant we stop all the corruptions in this small tiny country. I’m not trying to attack anyone here in my writing or point the finger, if any one felt attacked on or feel hurt…. i’m sorry. i just want to no y CANT WE BE UNITED AS ONE BENGLADESH.

Regards and congratulations for your book,
Silvia (Italy)