Remembering Ray through his Childhood Days

Satyajit Ray—affectionately called "Manik" by those closest to him—is celebrated as a titan of twentieth-century cinema. Yet, his memoir Childhood Days reveals a profoundly human side to the legend. Elegantly translated from Bengali by his wife, Bijoya Ray, the book is a candid and charming collection of memories that bridges the gap between the public icon and the private man. 

While global figures often seem distant or untouchable, Bijoya Ray emphasises her husband's remarkably grounded nature. As she observes in her Translator's Note: "To his family and friends, he was no different from other normal men—warm, affectionate, hospitable, helpful and as willing to have a laugh as anyone else."

This warmth permeates every page of the narrative, which is structured into two distinct halves: his formative years growing up in Calcutta and the behind-the-scenes adventures of his illustrious filmmaking career.

In the first half of the book, young Manik takes us on a nostalgic trip back to the Calcutta of the 1920s and 1930s. He writes purely from a child's point of view, noting that "children do not make a distinction between the ordinary and the extraordinary, anyway. Adults do."

We learn about his early exposure to art and moving images through viewing devices such as the stereoscope and the magic lantern. Ray grew up in a house in Gorpar that was also home to the U Ray & Sons printing press, a business founded by his grandfather.

The young Ray spent his formative hours immersed in the tactile world of the block-making department. Amidst the sharp, industrial scent of turpentine oil, he would sketch "amusing squiggles" that a worker named Ramdaheen would ceremoniously place under a massive process camera—treating a child's doodles with the professional gravity they would one day deserve.

These moments revealed the early seeds of an artistic genius. Bijoya Ray fondly recalls a drawing competition between them when they were children, where both attempted to copy a picture of a girl feeding a parrot. While Bijoya's page became a smudge of eraser marks and frustration, five-year-old Manik's strokes remained definitive and clean. He never once reached for an eraser, producing a version that surpassed the original in its clarity and confidence.

The memoir's most delightful quality, however, lies in its gallery of eccentric family members. His great-uncle, Dhon Dadu, possessed the uncanny ability to "resurrect" the deceased by expertly enlarging and retouching old photographs. He was also a man of theatrical bravery; once, when a ferocious bull charged the family on holiday, Dhon Dadu stood his ground and spun his walking stick like an aeroplane propeller—a display so baffling it sent the animal into a confused retreat. Equally unforgettable was his uncle Subimal, affectionately known as Chhoto Kaka, whose presence rounded out a household defined by warmth, whimsy, and an early, inevitable brush with the arts.

He chewed every mouthful of food exactly thirty-two times for digestion and kept a highly detailed, multi-coloured diary of his everyday life. He even categorised his daily cups of tea with amusing labels such as "a watchman's tea (stimulating, sleep-destroying tea)" and "tea fit for a constable (officious, self-important, supercilious tea)". Reading about these people makes one realise where Ray developed his wonderful sense of humour.

The second half of the book, titled Making Movies, shifts to his adult career as a renowned director. It provides a humorous, honest and gritty look at how films are actually made in India. Ray explains the basic truth of his profession very simply: "It is the shooting of a film that entails a lot of hard work and is the most difficult part of the job."

This section is packed with fascinating stories of survival and resourcefulness on a limited budget. For instance, his first film, Pather Panchali, took two and a half years to shoot because the crew constantly ran out of funds. During these long and difficult delays, both a pet dog named Bhulo and an actor playing a sweet-seller died. Ray had to discreetly replace both with lookalikes so that the audience would not notice. He also reveals the cinematic illusion behind a famous scene in which Apu and Durga run through a field to see a train for the first time. Because of delays, it took an entire year to film, and Ray notes, "When seeing the film, it is impossible to tell that three different trains were used at three different times during the day."

Ray also details the unpredictable volatility of directing animals and crowds. During the production of Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne, a circus tiger released into a bamboo grove bypassed its mark to charge a crowd of onlookers, sending hundreds of villagers fleeing in panic. This was no isolated incident; years later, while filming Hirak Rajar Deshey, a sedated tiger suddenly lunged at the camera, nearly shattering the lens and the crew's nerves alike.

The logistics of his detective film Shonar Kella proved equally taxing, requiring the precise synchronisation of camels and steam engines across the desert. A painstakingly choreographed chase was spoiled when the train arrived without its dramatic plume of smoke—the stoker had been too busy watching the film crew to shovel coal. In another instance, Ray's thousand-man army in Rajasthan staged a quiet mutiny, refusing to wear their vibrant costumes in favour of plain white. When he attempted to regain control, his loudspeaker failed, forcing the visionary to direct a cast of thousands through frantic, silent gestures.

Whether navigating the claustrophobic alleys of Varanasi at midnight for Joi Baba Felunath or wrestling with temperamental wildlife, Childhood Days serves as a vital humanising force. As Bijoya Ray observed, readers were "delighted to discover" that the creator of Feluda had been a normal child, no different from themselves. By blending the innocence of youth with the frantic, often absurd demands of his masterpieces, Ray offers a narrative that is both an engaging memoir and a gritty masterclass in the realities of Indian filmmaking.