New nonsense website launches--Gromboolia!

This new site, Gromboolia, is not focused on Indian nonsense--but it aims (rather loftily) to be a total nonsense resource. Check it out, at http://www.literarynonsense.com

Gromboolia is your one-stop nonsense-shopping megamall!

After many years, I've finally got the website up and running... and the Internets said It Was Good.
 Or at least I haven't been sued yet. And now, for the creative url!

Nonsenseliterature.com

My goal is to make a general nonsense resource for those who want to experience more nonsense art, and for those who are doing research into it. There are links to nonsense texts, music, video, and music. There are pages with primary and secondary bibliographies for the conkimplation and ejurification of nonsense of many varieties. Even a section that dares post various definitions of nonsense literature.

From now on, the Jabberwokabout blog will continue over there. There is also a section of the website devoted to me (ever so humbly!), called "Michael Heyman's Isle of Boshen."

This is just the beginning for the site... I'm hoping to make it a prime resource for all your modern nonsense living! Go there now, and buy, buy, buy! www.nonsenseliterature.com!

Flarf? Barf? The Tenth Rasa gets the Full Treatment

"The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology Of Indian Nonsense By Michael Heyman .pdf

If you are pursuing embodying the ebook The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense in pdf appearing, in that process you approaching onto the right website. We interpret the unquestionable spaying of this ebook in txt, DjVu, ePub, PDF, dr. organisation. You navigational recite The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense on-pipeline or download. Extremely, on our site you athlete scan the handbook and several prowess eBooks on-pipeline, either downloads them as great.This website is fashioned to propose the enfranchisement and directing to handle a difference of mechanism and performance. You channel mark too download the rejoin to distinct inquiries.We propose information in a deviation of formation and media. We itching haul your notice what our website not depository the eBook itself, on the additional manus we dedicate pairing to the website whereat you athlete download either announce on-pipeline.So if wishing to pile The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense pdf, in that dispute you approaching on to the fair site. We move The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense DjVu, PDF, ePub, txt, doctor appearing. We aspiration be complacent if you go in advance sand again."

The above text, found recently in the Google netherworlds. I'm not including the links that follow, which are all spamming or shamming or otherwise foul and dastardly. But this text... it doesn't realize how apt it is!

Nonsense fighting the power, at home and abroad!

My big head invaded The India Express. This came after my appearance at the delightful Bookaroo festival in New Delhi. A word or two on nonsense, sound poetry, and {gulp} politics.

Click here to see my big head.

Just when I doubted, just a little, the mission of nonsense, I was heartened to see this, in The Sangai Express, this appeared (click here)..

As the writer says, ‘you must be grateful that cow milk is available even though there are no cows’.

Cheerio!

Anurima Chanda talks nonsense superheroes!

Anurima Chanda is the real superhero in this essay about nonsense superheroes. She looks at the history of superheroes, how they end up in India--and how a few intrepid writers dare to do something different in "a unique margin within the marginal superhero culture of India." That is, they write nonsense superheroes. And the ones she discusses happen to be in This Book Makes No Sense: Nonsense Poems and Worse, in poems and stories by Samit Basu and Kaushik Viswanath. By making nonsense superheroes, she writes, they are creating a "radically new way of engaging with dominating power structures, neither through concurrence or conflict, but by creating ruptures within these structures to destabilise the circle itself." Bravo!

Click here to read her article!

Here, we see Basu's Pehelwan, of the "mighty, manly muscles" (drawn by Priya Kuriyan)

A Guide to Practical Nonsense, a SCBWI India Event

A Guide to Practical Nonsense--a SCBWI India event

with Michael Heyman, Colonel of the 5th Nonsense Brigade 

Thursday, May 21  

5:00pm - 6:00pm

Max Mueller Bhavan, 3, Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi, India 110001

Literary nonsense has a long tradition, going back to Edward Lear, Lewis Carroll, Rabindranath Tagore, and Sukumar Ray, all of whom have proven the nobility of this serious and silly, rebellious and strict form. Yet, whether we as writers and illustrators strive to work solidly in the tradition of nonsense, or just want our work to shine a little with the tradition, there are many simple techniques we can use to throw a little, or a lot, of nonsense into our books for children. In this talk, Michael Heyman gives a guide onwhat nonsense is and how to use it.

Noodly Nonsensical Reminiscences

Ah, remember when a seven followed two zeroes and a two? Our most vaunted and anti-villanous villustrator, Vinayak Varma, has vaxed lyrically on ye dayes of olde, when lines were bold, and rasas were delighting. Below are his thoughts on illustrating The Tenth Rasa (now on Kindle, what what?)...  We owe him much for the book, and especially the cover, which brilliantly captures the vim of the kheyal rosh. Of course, the Guardians of the Rasas over at JNU might rant and rave ("There can be no tenth rasa!" they huff and puff), but, as Blake wrote, "Every thing possible to be believ'd is an image of the truth." Vinayak has, by his art, confirmed the Truth! Amen!

 Click here for his reminiscences...

Kitaabnama gets the title wrong, but the nonsense right

Just when you think a serious bookschnook is going to take on This Books Makes No Sense: Nonsense Poems and Worse, it turns out to be a whole other category of bookschnookery--but one that may be familiar to fans of Indian nonsense. A whole half hour on Indian nonsense, no less. Take a lookschnook:

Kitaabnama: Books and Beyond (on The Tenth Rasa--not This Books Makes No Sense!!)

Props to Sampurna Chattarji, Anita Vaccharajani, and especially Anushka Ravishankar, whose praises cannot be undersung or overslung.

The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense, now on Kindle!

That's right ladles and spats, The Tenth Rasa has sprocketed into the Future®, where, at the click of a button, you may revel in the wonky layout of the Digital Delight that is a Kindle Book. All your favorite Indian nonsense literature, squinged into your Delectable Digital Device. Pinch it! Squinch it! Cinch it!

Visit your friendly Amazon site, for the old school hard copy (still a deal at $10!) or the Kindle edition $9.50: save fitty cent, save paper and shipping, and save yourself from being a carbon carbuncle. Click here

This message brought to you by the Future®, where Nonsense is a Digital Dirigible Clickbeat Away®

The Winners! RivoKids nonsense contest results!

The Winners have been announced for the RivoKids nonsense contest spoonsored and forked by Duckbill Books. I was honored to be the Jerryrigged Jellycal Judge, and I had quite a few wonderful and completely crazy entires. Thank you to all the kids who entered such great pieces of non-binding narwhal-numbing nonpareil nonsense. Here are the winners, with some itty bitty ditties I wrote for each, according to the nonsense pieces they wrote.  See the website for the full poems:

1. Akshay Rajmohan's "Nonsense is a nonsense thing" is here.

2. Abeer Dahiya's "A Silly Poem" is here.

3. Aarushi Dahia's "Wild Gone Wild" is here.

Keep writing nonsense!

 Nonsensoids!

Announcing a NONSENSE-WRITING CONTEST for kids, squids, and vermicious knids! Win prizes, fame, fortune, and platypus booty by writing your very own nonsense poetry!

Rivokids and Duckbill Books proudly present this contest--click here to learn more and enter. Also, be sure to click on the link for the "Nonsense Verse Masterclass by Michael Heyman" (me!) for some in-depth ideas on how to write utter-butter-never-stutter-nonsense!!

Here's an idea that will (almost) guarantee you win: you can use poems from This Book Makes No Sense: Nonsense Poems and Worse and The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense as examples and models! 

By the way, I am honored to be the Jovial and Jellyatinous Judge of the contest.  I hope to see YOUR poems soon!

Deadline is February 2nd!

Click HERE for the contest page.

Click HERE for guidelines on writing nonsense!

Click HERE for banana hands.

Ghosts of nonsenses past... a rare Asian import, B-side, export-only clip of nonsense songs in India

The Singapore International School in Mumbai had some secret cameras set up for my performance last winter, on my tour for This Book Makes No Sense (which is out on Kindle now, by the way!).  The song is Barry Louis Polisar's "I've Got a Teacher, She's So Mean"--a definite favorite in the set (at least, a favorite of the students... I'm not so sure about the teachers!).  Here's the page with a little write-up, and here's the video clip!  The only problem is that the write-up doesn't mention Sampurna Chattarji, the fantastic children's writer who performed with me that day (and who is in the photos).

Facebook page for This Book Makes No Sense!

This book makes no Facebook enemies, and hopefully makes some friends.  "Like" our new Facebook page... and see photos of the authors and translators, and get other news and mews.  Meyw!

Mini-review and interview, also Mr. Sputum expounding on the Scholastic blog

My Hero

Mr. Sputum says
"Blog to blog,
Bog to glog,
Grog to Smaug!"

Nimmy Chacko was kind enough to write a lovely Scholastic blog entry on This Book Makes No Sense, and you'll find included a little online interview, where I expound on nonsense, giraffes, nonsense giraffes, Alan Watts as a neo-giraffe, Samuel Taylor Coleraffe, Xanadu and Olivia Newton-Jiraffe, and other things related to nonsense theory and giraffes (oddly, without any reference to Dr. and Mr. Doris Haggis-On-Whey's brilliant nonsensical Giraffes? Giraffes!).

Why Mr. Sputum?--I can't rightly say.  He appeared in the Indian Express newspaper (I think) during my trip... and he has been wanting to contribute to the blog ever since...

Here is the blog: http://scholasticindiabooks.wordpress.com/2012/12/17/this-book-makes-no-sense/

This Book Makes an Appearance in Boston!

This book makes no uninvited, unenlightened appearances in Boston.  A local groovy bookshop in Boston is selling copies of This Book Makes No Sense... so if you're around and you need a gift for the holidays or a grift for the polypods, go to Trident Booksellers and Cafe, and sprinkle some nonsense on your soup.

29-30 November, 2012: A mayfly in Calcutta!

Thursday and Friday were spent like the mayfly: a brief fecund flicker-flash! I visited five schools: Calcutta International, Birla Boys School, South City International, and Mongrace Montessori (alma mater of a certain Samit Basu, by the way!).  I send out thanks to the teachers, administrators, and students for welcoming me, keeping me watered and fed and pink and happy.  The events fizzed and zbinged, and I spent a fair amount of time, with Sayoni’s unswerving nonsensical hand and eye, illuminating the book with nonsensical drawings, captions, and signings…  Here are some of the sights and ‘swounds. 

South City

Birla Boys

Mongrace minis!

Wednesday, 28 November 2012: Calcutta/Kolkata

I arrived in Calcutta again, after an absence of about 18 years.  India moves fast—even Calcutta moves fast despite the reputation of Bengalis (as Sampurna’s “bong” poem implies!).  Far fewer plumes of black exhaust, and far more buildings and overpasses being constructed these days, but the old crumbling grandeur persists.  Salt Lake still felt like a neighborhood, though, with the local market where at 7:30am we got crabs from the elusive crab man and his mysterious basket of crabs, not to mention freshly made jalebi from the Jolly Jalebi Joe. 

Mercifully, Wednesday was a bit of a break because of Guru Nanak’s Day.  Still, Scholastic would not keep me entirely idle.  I met my Scholastic connection, Debjani Banerji, who would prove to be a most able, amiable, affable, and taffyable guide over the next few days. I was taken to Seagull Books, which is a publisher, publishing school, and arts activist organization among other groovy things.  They were hosting One Nation Reading Together, an event whereby publishers donate books to worthy institutions and convey a pledge, and the children dutifully repeat the pledge, about the value of books.  This year’s pledge was written by Ruskin Bond.  I didn’t know quite what to expect with this appearance, but I ended up doing a modified set (sans guitar).  While some of the kids there had less English, things went well, and the adults had particularly good questions and comments.  Trust the Bengalis to dig nonsense!

Here is a link to the Seagull page, which has a blurb and some more photos from the event.

Tuesday, 27 November: Mumbai with Sampurna!

Here's what it looks like from our side!

Through various misfortunes and profortunes, Sampurna Chattarji was able to join me this day in her home turf, Mumbai, as we visited N.L. Dalmia School, Singapore International School, and St. John’s.  Once again, we’re being sent to some of the swankiest schools around, and so we slung some extra-swanky hanky-spanky round the marshmallowed halls.

Nonsense faces always... Sampurna and me with our hosts at Dalmia.

It was great to do these shows with Sampurna—who is zany and zippy and zinky and zlippy—and because we were together, we were able to do some different material, like “Nonsense Gonesense,” by Sukumar Ray, a kind of drama of nonsensical interruptions.  When we stormed off the stage in nonsense rage, we might even have frightened a few of the wee ones.  Sampurna, being a beauteous Bong, read her poem “What the Bong Tree Grows,” and she did a great job with “There Goes Gran,” one of the many pieces she translated.

Loonar howlings and loonier howlings

 At Singapore International, they asked if I wanted any musical instruments for the performance, and I thought it might be fun to play a little tabla—of course, using them to make some points about nonsense.  Tabla compositions, for those who don’t know, are transmitted orally, by a kind of drum language that only has meaning in terms of correlation to ways of hitting the drums.  These syllables, called “bols,” when strung together make compositions, and so “sense” in that functional way, but these compositions (chanted with great skill and delight) are also a kind of song, a joyful gibberishy meta-music.  This is why when you see tabla players reciting their bols, they are often smiling. Dha tire kite dhe ge na dha ge ti na ke na.  But when I tried to get a set of tablas at Singapore International, there was trouble.  We went down into the music department, which was extensive, and woke up the poor fellow who was obviously not expecting us.  Several Western drum sets sat out, but he said they had no tablas—and only a “broken dhol.”  Here I am in the music department of a huge and wealthy Indian school—with no traditional Indian instruments.  How sad!  Here is where we bemoan globalization, but I’d rather bemoan gobi-ization, the proliferation of cauliflower (or gobi) dishes in India.  Come on, cauliflower?  Really?

Sampurna and I were then whisked away on our mini-tour through the crazy Mumbai traffic to St. John’s school.  As you can see below, much nonsense was made...

Thanks to all the schools for being lovely hosts, for all the wee sandwiches with the crusts cut off, for the endless cups of tea, and for providing the kind of tireless, progressive education--where nonsense has value--to thousands and thousands of bright children!  A most munificent and mungfishful day.

Monday, 26 November: Mumbai Madness!

Mumbai

Thankfully, Scholastic changed my ticket from 5:30am Monday morning to the night before, so I was able to arrive, settle in, and actually get a night of sleep.  The Residency Hotel is upscale bourgeoisie but so much so that style sometimes bludgeons sense.  The bathroom, for instance, has all glass walls, so not only are you in grave danger any moment of face-planting into a floor-to-ceiling glass door or glass wall, but your options for having guests, spouses, friends, lovers, groupies, floppers, and flappers (who might need to heed nature’s call) is limited to those said guests, spouses, friends, lovers, groupies, floppers, and flappers whom you might not mind seeing hunched on the pot.  And that, at least for me, is a limited set indeed.

**since writing this, I've been told that there may have been a screen to pull down... I'm obviously not clever enough to figure these things out.**

But to return to matters of more meat, Monday was the beginning of a more intense school visit phase: three schools today, three tomorrow (with Sampurna Chattarji, yipyee!); and then in Calcutta, one day with only one special event (more on that later), and then a day with two and a day with three school visits.  And so off I went with Mohana Krishnana my Scholastic Mumbai Beatrice, to the first of three: the SM Shetty International School, in Powai.

SM Shetty International School

Scholastic seems to find it wise to send me to somewhat more internationally-minded schools, which in some ways is quite nice.  The students are sharp and willing to interact freely, without the trepidation that comes sometimes with too much stern discipline.  They also tend to have the skills to appreciate nonsense; that is, they are well-read, and their command of English is such that they can pick out the sense from the non-sense.  These groups are more comfortable getting a bit crazier in a school setting—and it’s therefore easier for me.  Still, I wonder how the set would work with different children, from less-advantaged backgrounds.  Of course, they have just as much nonsense in them—but how to access it, especially in a cross-cultural, cross-class experience… I suppose I won’t find out on this trip at least. 

Here are a few more shots from Billabong High, in Santz Cruz, and Ecole Mondial, in Juhu.  Thank you to all the schools for welcoming me in and letting me loose!

Ecole Mondial Madness!

Billabongittybong!

Saturday 24 November: Bookaroo!

Saturday, 24 November 2012

And so we come to one of the major reasons why I have to come to India now, squink in the middle of a bleeding semester: the fifth Bookaroo Festival of Children’s Literature in New Delhi!

On Saturday, since I had caught a cold, I actually stayed home for much of the day—but I dragged myself and my croaky extra-baritone boomboxvox out to do the doings.  I arrived in time to see much of Sampurna Chattarji’s session, dealing with her new YA book Ela, which showed a serious side to the festival amongst what can often be easy silly pandering to children. 

After several years, it was lovely to meet up again with Sampurna—who had been so instrumental in making The Tenth Rasa happen those years ago, with her incredible translations and her own kheyaal rawsh.  We have since had a few nonsensical adventures, and I was pleased as a syllabub sea that we would be sharing the session for this day.

Here are a few shots from our joint session.  I suppose we might have turned on a few nonsense lights this day--as the book sold out, both Saturday and Sunday!  

Om

Sampurna and The Bong Tree!

Some of the students who saw me at my school visits found me at Bookaroo!

Thursday, November 22, 2012: JNU Nonsense Lecture

The event of note today was a visit to JNU (Jawaharlal Neru University) for a talk on nonsense.  My connection to JNU goes way back to Aradhana Bisht and her uncle Pushpesh Pant—the very two lovely loons who inspired “Bisht-Bosht Mudpies,” one of the poems in This Book Makes No Sense.  This time around, I was contacted by one of the Brave New Newminous Nonsense Noodles, Anurima Chanda, who is just finishing up a Master’s degree on----Indian nonsense literature!  Without the benefit of easy access to nonsense scholarship or nonsense scholars, and with some of the typical institutional prejudice against nonsense literature, she has managed to blaze a trial here, and for that, I sing her hozzannahs and zing her zazzonnas!  I helped Anurima a bit with her research, and she was kind enough to put me in touch with the Centre for English Studies, where Professor Saugata Bhaduri, the Centre’s Head, arranged a lecture.

And so skipped in I, with my bushels of bosh, whistling a merry kazoon, to be welcomed by the Rusticated Religiously Regulatory Registry of Rasa-gollas (known as the RRRRR), the grand and grumpy school of truly gifted aesthetes.  The RRRRR let it be Known that there was no such thing as the Tenth Rasa, that it was impossible, that the mere idea of it purplified them!  You see, since the ninth rasa, that of shanti or peace, is meant to contain them all, there simply couldn’t be a tenth. Such fizzdom!  Of course, Sukumar Ray, and many million Bengalis, might have a thing or two by say by way of a response…  After decided declamations of purplification, the students finally had the chance to ask a question or two, and much fun and nonsense was made.  Many thanks to Professor Bhaduri, the students of JNU, the RRRRR, and Anurima.

Exploring nonsense around the world is indeed often a perilous undertaking—especially when some Orientalist (tee-hee) foreigner comes in with his Bosh Blunderbuss, telling unsuspecting folks that some of their ancient and honorable artistic traditions might participate in a bit of nonsense.  Oh the hubbub!  Of course, the hubbub only lasts until one understands exactly (or, well, as best we can) what a truly magnificent, trans-continental, and kingly title “nonsense” really is. 

And as Blake (a true nonsense genius—just read his “An Island in the Moon”) once put it, “I have also The Bible of Nonsense, which the world shall have whether they will or no.”  Or something like that.