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Anushka Ravishankar | |
|---|---|
| Born | Nashik, India |
| Occupation | Author |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Genre | Children's literature |
Anushka Ravishankar is an author of children's books, and co-founder of Duckbill Books, a publishing house.
|
Anushka Ravishankar | |
|---|---|
| Born | Nashik, India |
| Occupation | Author |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Genre | Children's literature |
Anushka Ravishankar is an author of children's books, and co-founder of Duckbill Books, a publishing house.
Ravishankar was born in Nashik, and graduated in mathematics from Fergusson College, Pune in 1981. While at college, she was influenced by the works of Lewis Carroll, Edward Lear and Edward Gorey. After completing her post-graduation in operations research, Ravishankar worked with an IT firm in Nashik for a while. She became a full-time writer after the birth of her daughter. [1]
Ravishankar sent her first few stories to Tinkle, a comic book published by Amar Chitra Katha. When two of these stories won a contest organised by the magazine, the publisher of Tinkle offered her a job, but Ravishankar could only freelance for Tinkle as she was staying home to care for her young daughter. [1] When her family moved to Chennai in 1996, she was hired to be an editor at Tara Books, a children's publishing house in the city. There she authored Tiger on a Tree, a book of nonsense verse that was translated to Japanese, Korean and French. While the book only sold about 2500 copies in India, it sold over 10000 copies in the United States and over 7000 copies in France. [1] She also worked as Publishing Director at Scholastic India. [2]
She founded the Duckbill Publishing House in 2012 with Sayoni Basu. In 2019 Penguin Random House India acquired all book publishing assets of the company. [3] [4]
While Ravishankar writes both picture books and chapter books, her specialty lies in writing nonsense verse for children. While her work does contain some nonsensical elements, it is not always pure nonsense. In her own words, "To Market! To Market! has a frame that is 'sensical', but the verse itself is quite nonsensical. I rely a lot on sound. Sometimes the sound takes you away from the meaning. Then, some of my books are really nonsense. Excuse Me, Is This India? is nonsense in the Carrollian sense." [5]
A few of her books, like Catch that Crocodile!, Elephants Never Forget and Tiger on a Tree, were inspired by real-life events.
Ravishankar is also known to rewrite her verse on some occasions, after the illustrations are complete. She collaborates with artists from South Africa, Switzerland, Italy and India. While some of her books have an Indian flavour, most have a cross-cultural appeal.
Nonsense verse is a form of nonsense literature usually employing strong prosodic elements like rhythm and rhyme. It is often whimsical and humorous in tone and employs some of the techniques of nonsense literature.
The Cat in the Hat is a 1957 children's book written and illustrated by American author Theodor Geisel, using the pen name Dr. Seuss. The story centers on a tall anthropomorphic cat who wears a red and white-striped top hat and a red bow tie. The Cat shows up at the house of Sally and her brother one rainy day when their mother is away. Despite the repeated objections of the children's fish, the Cat shows the children a few of his tricks in an attempt to entertain them. In the process, he and his companions, Thing One and Thing Two, wreck the house. As the children and the fish become more alarmed, the Cat produces a machine that he uses to clean everything up and disappears just before the children's mother comes home.
Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by German media conglomerate Bertelsmann.
The Sneetches and Other Stories is a collection of stories by American children's author Dr. Seuss, published in 1961. It is composed of four separate stories with themes of tolerance, diversity, and compromise: "The Sneetches", "The Zax", "Too Many Daves", and "What Was I Scared Of?". Based on an online poll, the National Education Association listed the book as one of its "Teachers' Top 100 Books for Children". In 2012 it was ranked number 63 among the Top 100 Picture Books in a survey published by School Library Journal – the fifth of five Dr. Seuss books on the list.
Horton Hatches the Egg is a children's book written and illustrated by Theodor Geisel under the pen name Dr. Seuss and published in 1940 by Random House. The book tells the story of Horton the Elephant, who is tricked into sitting on a bird's egg while its mother, Mayzie, takes a permanent vacation to Palm Beach. Horton endures a number of hardships but persists, often stating, "I meant what I said, and I said what I meant. An elephant's faithful, one hundred percent!" Ultimately, the egg hatches, revealing an elephant-bird, a creature with a blend of Mayzie's and Horton's features.
And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street is Theodor Seuss Geisel's first children's book published under the pen name Dr. Seuss. First published by Vanguard Press in 1937, the story follows a boy named Marco, who describes a parade of imaginary people and vehicles traveling along a road, Mulberry Street, in an elaborate fantasy story he dreams up to tell his father at the end of his walk. However, when he arrives home, he decides instead to tell his father what he actually saw—a simple horse and wagon.
Children's poetry is poetry written for, appropriate for, or enjoyed by children.
The Seven Lady Godivas: The True Facts Concerning History's Barest Family is a picture book of the tale of Lady Godiva, written and illustrated by Dr. Seuss. One of Seuss's few books written for adults, its original 1939 publication by Random House was a failure and was eventually remaindered. However, it later gained popularity as Seuss himself grew in fame, and was republished in 1987 by "multitudinous demand".
Abol tabol is a collection of Bengali children's poems and rhymes composed by Sukumar Ray, first published on 19th September 1923 by U. Ray and Sons publishers. It consists of 46 titled and seven untitled short rhymes (quatrains), all considered to be in the genre of nonsense literature.
Govind Vinayak Karandikar, better known as Vindā, was an Indian poet, writer, literary critic, and translator in the Marathi-language.
Tinkle is an Indian weekly magazine for children in English, published from Mumbai. Originally owned by the India Book House, the Tinkle brand was acquired by ACK Media in 2007. The magazine contains comics, stories, puzzles, quizzes, contests and other features targeted at school children, although its readership includes many adults as well. It is published in English and syndicated in many Indian languages like Hindi, Bengali, and Malayalam.
Literary nonsense is a broad categorization of literature that balances elements that make sense with some that do not, with the effect of subverting language conventions or logical reasoning. Even though the most well-known form of literary nonsense is nonsense verse, the genre is present in many forms of literature.
Pulak Biswas is a leading artist and children's book illustrator from India.
Mangesh Keshav Padgaoankar was a legendary Marathi poet from Maharashtra, India.
Ramakrushna Nanda was an Indian writer, educator and author of children's literature. He composed the song Ahe Dayamaya Biswa Bihari, a favourite of Mahatma Gandhi when Gandhi was at Sabarmati Ashram. This song was included in his Odia-language textbook Sahitya Sopana.
Jerry Pinto is a Mumbai-based Indian-English poet, novelist, short story writer, translator, as well as journalist. Pinto's works include Helen: The Life and Times of an H-Bomb (2006), which won the Best Book on Cinema Award at the 54th National Film Awards, Surviving Women (2000) and Asylum and Other Poems (2003). His first novel Em and the Big Hoom was published in 2012. Pinto won the Windham-Campbell prize in 2016 for his fiction. He was awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award in 2016 for his novel Em and the Big Hoom.
The Russian names Anoushka, Anouska, Anuschka or, Annushka are diminutive forms of the female given name Anna, derived from the Russian diminutive Аннушка. Anoushka (انوشکا) also means "grace" or "a favour" in Persian. The Indian name Anushka (अनुष्का) means "ray of light" in Sanskrit. Notable people with the name include:
Penguin Random House LLC is an Anglo-American multinational conglomerate publishing company formed on July 1, 2013, with the merger of Penguin Group and Random House. Penguin Books was originally founded in 1935 and Random House was founded in 1927
Khyrunnisa A. is an award-winning Indian author of children's fiction, speaker, academic and columnist who also writes for adults. She created the comic book character 'Butterfingers'. The character first appeared in the Indian children's magazine Tinkle. Thirteen-year-old Amar Kishen, aka Butterfingers, now features in the eponymous Butterfingers series of novels and short story collections published by Puffin, the children's imprint of Penguin Random House India.
Gita Wolf is an Indian author, publisher, and curator, and one of the founders of Indian publishing house, Tara Books.
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