Bengaluru: For as long back as he can remember, fiction writer and translator, Bhaskar Chattopadhyay wanted to tell stories.
Hailing from the small town of Cooch Behar in West Bengal, the Bengaluru-based bestselling author of the fast-paced thriller Patang and the critically-acclaimed Penumbra series, both published in 2016, has also translated multiple works from Hindi and Bengali to English.
The author is currently in the final stages of editing the first sequel to Penumbra, which will hit the stands early next year.
An IT-professional-turned-author and translator in 2012, 38-year-old Chattopadhyay says that though his love affair with literature began when he was very young, he didn’t find encouragement immediately.
“I remember, as a child, I used to write short stories, very amateurish, of course. I distinctly remember my father asking me to concentrate on my studies rather than on writing. In fact, although he may have been aware that I used to write secretly, I have never showed any of my writing to my father.”
Translation was another aspect of it and it grew from his deep rooted desire to share, he adds. “There is a very simple, very basic and very deep-rooted need for sharing, and this is what makes one translate a piece of literary work, don’t you think? You’ve read something, you liked it, you want your best friend to enjoy it too, but hey, she doesn’t read the language. What do you do? You tell her the story in your own words, translating as you go along. Our country is a treasure trove of literature, but thanks to the different tongues we speak, 90% of this treasure seems to be of no value to us. Through translation, we can hope to make people see the absolutely remarkable pile of stories that they are sitting on, without even knowing of their existence.”
His latest translation Shiva, a heartwarming story about a poor boy who works in a tea-stall in a seedy neighbourhood of North Kolkata, originally written by veteran writer Moti Nandi in Bengali, is by far his favourite work, he remarks.
