Nonsense arrives at DPS 45 School!

Nothing like meeting a fully fuliginous 4am to stimulate the stomata!  It’s a big day, but I had no idea how big it would be… {cue harp run}

A heaping plate of aloo-stuffed parathas went some way in alleviating jetlag, and soon I was whisked off by Himanjali Sankar, one of the This Book editors at Scholastic, to the DPS Sector 45 school in Gurgaon.

DPS Sector 45 School

As we approached, the massive structure (and this photo is just a tiny corner of the compound) I noted a dull roar, a writhing soundcloud of jeers and cheers, chatting and splatting: the  multitude of a massive public school.  Himanjali and I wandered about through courtyards and passageways packed with chatty chirpy uniformed kids until we were told to hang a right at the Gandhiji, to find our hosts.  After a quick tea, I was escorted into an enormous auditorium, every seat filled with a bright and squirming 9-year-old.  Each and every of the 600 or so seats.  As I stood with gob falling on shoe, holding my guitar and bag, I was announced.  I dropped my bags, walked to the podium, and spoke gravely into the mic:  “Nonsense!”  I may have said a few other words, after which I ran over to set up…

The show soon began, starting in a spiritual vein with Sarita Padki’s “The Bathing Hymn.” “Om” I intomed, and when I chanted “haveum bathum namaha” the crowd giggled.  The kids knew it was a joke, but the teachers panicked, fanning out into the crowd to suppress the laughter at such a deeply spiritual moment.  Even the teachers caught on, however, and the session began with a laugh.  I went through my brand new set list, with Samit Basu’s superhero poems, and They Might Be Giants’ song “Particle Man,” my “Bisht-Bosht Mudpies,” a little tutorial on nonsense and school subversion using the Appendix/Alice mash-up at the end of the book, followed by Barry Louis Polisar’s song “I’ve Got a Teacher, She’s So Mean.”

They mainly laughed where there were supposed to, and participated fully in chanting “Awk nok diddy wok, dicky picky poo!” (the phrase I still remember from my elementary days, though I think it was my brother and not I who saw Polisar do that song).  And so I learn: trust kids and nonsense.

We all filed out, and I had a quick tea before being escorted back into the auditorium to do it all over again for the next class… another 580 students. The second go-round I think was even more solid, and afterwards, as the children filed out, one asked me to sign his hand.  I did.  Then another asked me to sign his paper. I did.  And then another.  And then, within thirty seconds, it was a flurry of bits of paper and flailing appendages— I had to shimmy up the stage as the teachers shooed them away. The teachers apologized, saying the children were not supposed to do that, but I was just glad that they seemed to appreciate a little nonsense!

Sunday 18 November--First Day

While I will do my best to spare you the flotsam and jetsam of my trip, I take the liberty of chipping in a nonsense nugget now and then.  And so... my first full day in Gurgaon, a suburb outside of New Delhi, where massive modern steel and glass skyscrapers meet the mud.  How d’ye do? How d’ye do?  I present here a “Touching Moment,” and perhaps a little nonsensical.  For lunch, Sayoni and Paul (my most magnanimous, munificent, and mutton-bearing hosts) brought me to Delhi Heights, which is neither very high nor in Delhi, where we were seated near an impressive keyboard, behind which was an even more impressive dude with a massively impressive pony tail, and himpostrously impressive soul patch.  He appeared to be singing and playing to Men At Work’s “Down Under,” but then we realized that the keyboard was a sham—and that he was actually hired as a professional karaoke singer.  Here he is:

We spent lunch being serenaded by the greatest hits from the 80s, in full soul patchy, pony-taily, karaokey glory.  But I think my favorite part is the poor fellow at the table there, looking at turns grumpy, and confused, and grumpy. At our table, we were anything but...

It begins blearily in Amsterdam... New Delhi or Bust!

What better place to rest my flippers and conkimplate the crockery than here at a Mad Tea Party at Schiphol Airport.  I’ve not had a moment to spare in the last few days, and so finally I begin this latest leg (surely at least an octopod or dodecapod by now) of the Nonsense Way.

For those just tuning in, I’m beginning a little tour in India for my new book, This Book Makes No Sense: Nonsense Poems and Worse—just out now through Scholastic.  It’s long in coming, longer in humming, and extrapolatedly belated, considering that this kind of book is more or less what I had wanted to do way back when my teeth were less long, well nigh on eleven donkey’s ears ago, when dastardly Penguinish forces steered me away from a book primarily for children.  I can’t complain about The Tenth Rasa, but I never did get around to doing a children’s nonsense book.  So here I am, different publisher, different dhoti (thankfully), same pair of shoes—with a book filled with nonsense poems and stories by some of the top nonsense dogs of India, and some very good eggs (dogeggs?), like Sampurna Chattarji, Anushka Ravishankar, Samit Basu, Kaushik Viswanath (to name a few!), the ever-tubular translation talents of Anita Vaccharajani, plus a special guest appearance by none other than Jonaraja, aka JonArno Lawson, the Prince of Protopappadums.  And it's all topped off with Priya Kuriyan's amazing illustrations. It’s a Floyal Rush, if ever a whever a Wiz there was!  And this time around I managed to fling a few of my own nonsense falafels, including some poems and an Alice mash-up that teaches the younguns how to write nonsense and subvert authority with both hands and extra kapow.  The book is out in India now—but not available out of India, unfortunately.  I hope that may change at some point.

So the trip in a nutshell… I’m flying in to New Delhi, where I’ll be staying in the airy climes of Platypus Books (S. Basu, A. Ravishankar Proprietors) the newest hippest publisher of children’s books.  In Delhi, my primary target is the Bookaroo children’s book festival, where I’m doing a session with my nonsense partner of yore, Sampurna Chattarji.  Connected to Bookaroo and also separately through Scholastic, I’ll be visiting several schools, performing pieces from the new book, from The Tenth Rasa, from Jethro Tull, from They Might Be Giants, from Barry Louis Polisar, and anything else I can mustard up and catsup down.  I’m then off to Mumbai and Calcutta, to visit more schools.  My goal is to start what I’m calling the Indian Spring, a nonsense revolution.  Huzzah!

This Tour Makes No Sense: Stay Tuned!

My dear Nonsensettes,

Tune in to this station as I blog my latest Indian adventures... all in support of my new book, This Book Makes No Sense: Nonsense Poems and Worse, which features the delightful talents of many...  I'll begin Friday, November 16 and end around December 1st.  Here we go!

Yours nonsense nubbin,

MBH, Esq., DDS, SFPS

Scrabble of the Gods

This Book Makes No Sense! Out now, brown cow.

The book just called you a grouch!
It stuck its toe in your ear!
It just waved its pants at you!
It threw a protopappadum at you!

Yes, it's here!  Or, well, it's there! It all depends on whether you're standing here or there, I suppose, but as long as you're on your feet, chances are you're one or the other.  After so much time, so many promises of bountiful baskets of bosh, after teasings and queasings, I give you:

This Book Makes No Sense: Nonsense Poems and Worse, edited by Michael Heyman, with Illustrations by Priya Kuriyan.

---Out from Scholastic (India) right... now!

It features a tumble of oddball superheroes (and their superdog), mudpie masters, tree-climbing buffalos, a galloping Wollop, and pesky disobedient pants.  The Old Masters are here, like Sukumar Ray, Rabindranath Tagore, and Mangesh Padgavkar, but also the shiny new voices of contemporary nonsense writers: Anushka Ravishankar (whose Just Like a Bug has also just arrived), Sampurna Chattarji, Samit Basu (he of the recent Turbulence fame! Swoon, ye flighty and Despair!), and even a special guest appearance of JonArno Lawson, the Canadian poet of extraordinary vim and vichtenstein (whose new Old MacDonald Had Her Farm continues in lipogrammatical lunacy).  Kaushik Viswanath adds a hilarious short story about disobedient pants, and I also hucked a few pieces in there, in addition to a brief introduction that defines nonsense by way of juggling--and an Appendix that teaches all the little peepers how to write nonsense (and you too!)--through a mash-up Alice in Wonder(out)landish tale that includes nonsense heroes from around the world.  Wrap that up in masterful illustrations by Priya Kuriyan, and you're got a real hum-dinger, bum-swinger, numb-finger-flipping book!

If all goes to plan, I'll be at Bookaroo in New Delhi in November, and then a tour of schools in a few other cities.  Details to follow...

Here is the link to it on the Scholastic website.  You lucky Indian souls with soles and souls in India, you can order directly from Scholastic.  More sellers in India will join soon.  As for those outside of India, you're out of luck for the moment, but I'll let you know when it will be available.

Hold on to your hornswagglers---new book of nonsense commeth!

My dear, long-suffering sausages, I come to you with good tidings.  You have waited patiently since the 2007 release of The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense for the newest nonsense newt to make an appearance, and I have teased you with visions of world anthologies, anthologies for children, ant anthologies (now, with less itch!), Anthologies of a Certain Seemly Character, and anthologies of anthropological asymptomatic anthrax.  But it’s time to get serious.

Announcing, the newest kid on the block:

This Book Makes No Sense: Nonsense Poems and Worse

(edited, stuffed, and sauced by Michael Heyman (he (that is, I) of the famed Berklee College of Formica in Boston), forthcoming 2012 from Scholastic)

Brimming with illustrations by the Perfectly Pre- and Post-posterous Priya Kuriyan, this book will include nonsense by old favorites like Sukumar Ray, Rabindranath Tagore (who, despite doing pretty much everything at an astonishing level, really wanted to write nonsense as well as Sukumar Ray but admitted he couldn’t!), Mangesh Padgavkar, Sarita Padki, Edward Lear (no smarmy owls or cats though) and fresh new nonsense noodles by Anushka Ravishankar, Sampurna Chattarji, and Samit Basu (he of the superhero fame, among many other ferocious fernicious fames), JonArno Lawson (Canadian Master of Nonsaster), and even yours truly.  Plus, there will be an Appendix, in the form of an Alice in Wonderland mash-up, that will teach all the wee wonky wieners how to write nonsense.  This tuition will be at the hands of none other than a cast of the world’s most numinous nonsense notables, including Humpty Dumpty, Edward Lear himself, Graven Raven, Pumpkin-Grumpkin (both from Sukumar Ray), the Potato-Face Blind Man (from Carl Sandburg's Rootabaga Stories), and Korf (Christian Morganstern’s nutty musical inventor).  The book is aimed at all ages… and rumor has it that I will be going back to India later this year to squawk and hawk the book to any who would be so squawked upon.  I don't know the exact release date, but it should be some time in the later half of the year.  Stay tuned!

The Alleged Second Printing and other mews

It's 2011 and you're not sure where you left the can of whatsit. Don't worry, though, because Indian nonsense will always be there for you--and now with added whatsit!

It has certainly been a long slime since my last update, and while I won't bore you with pulling out every item stuck in my slime, I should inform you of two flings:

Fling One:

I am hoping to create a children's nonsense anthology that will include material from The Tenth Rasa but also (hopefully) a few new things (depending on whether the folks whom I've commissioned will actually write something--you know who you are!!), including a guide for children on how to write nonsense.  It will be fully illustrated and sanctified by the Nine Vestal Vultures.  I'm currently talking to the folks at Scholastic about this... and I shall certainly keep you informed on developments.

Fling Two:

I recently had to replenish my stock of The Tenth Rasa (aside from providing "pure reading pleasure,"™they also serve as analgesics, fodder, and bituminous bumf), and so yesterday I received a brimming boxfull.  When I inspected the included volumes, I immediately noticed a change on the back cover.  The ISBN patch is all tricked out now, and lo and behold, the price has gone up from Rs 295 to Rs 399! This in itself is not so extraordinary (for the volume is worth its weight in bumf), but what IS extraordinary is that it seems we are now into a second printing!

The new printing (left) and the old (right).  Also, for sake of scale, a ruler and a lollipop.

Upon closer inspection, I also discovered that the volume is now printed in Navi Mumbai, rather than Noida (where it was originally done)--also now noted on the page that notes such things in the beginning.  Of course, you are witnessing my clever deduction from the presented evidence.  I have heard no word from Penguin about such printerly activities.  Regardless, though, I'd say it's high time that all of you fans out there order an edition from the alleged second printing, because even though the content is exactly the same, there is that highly collectible new ISBN patch on the back.  Also, when do you ever get a chance to buy an "alleged reprinting"?  It's worth every paise of that extra 104 rupees!  Don't miss out!