The Apu Trilogy: Satyajit Ray and the Making of an Epic

by Andrew Robinson

Overview

"I can never forget the excitement in my mind after seeing 'Pather Panchali'", noted Akira Kurosawa. Satyajit Ray's three films about the boyhood, adolescence and manhood of Apu, 'Pather Panchali' (1955), 'Aparajito' (1956) and 'The World of Apu' (1959) - collectively known as The Apu Trilogy - are established classics of world cinema. The Trilogy was the chief reason for Satyajit Ray's receiving a Hollywood Oscar for lifetime achievement in 1992, just before his death. This book by Ray's biographer and world authority Andrew Robinson is the first full study of the Trilogy. Robinson - who came to know the director well during the last decade of his career - covers the literary and cultural background to the films, their production, their music composed by Ravi Shankar, their aesthetic value, and their complex critical reception in the East and the West, from 1955 up to the present day. Extensively and beautifully illustrated and a pleasure to read, 'The Apu Trilogy' will appeal to anyone captivated by the unique world created by Satyajit Ray.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781848855168
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	10/12/2010
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Andrew Robinson is the author of some twenty books, including 'Satyajit Ray: The Inner Eye' and 'Satyajit Ray: A Vision of Cinema' (both I.B.Tauris) and is the editor of three screenplays by Ray.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations vii

Acknowledgements xi

1 Self-taught Film-maker: Satyajit Ray's Formative Years 1

2 Apu in Fiction and Film: Adapting the Novels Pather Panchali and Aparajito 27

3 An Epic in Production: Making the Apu Trilogy 43

4 Working with Ravi Shankar: The Music of the Apu Trilogy 81

5 Pather Panchali: Critique 91

6 Aparajito: Critique 109

7 The World of Apu: Critique 127

8 From Calcutta to Cannes: The Reception of the Apu Trilogy 147

9 Apu in the East and West: The Trilogy and Ray Today 161

Epilogue: Ray Talks about the Apu Trilogy 177

Films Directed Satyajit Ray 185

References 189

Select Bibliography 203

Index 207

Editorial Reviews

"Satyajit Ray has worked with humility and complete dedication; he has gone down on his knees in the dust. And his picture has the quality of intimate, unforgettable experience." — Lindsay Anderson on Pather Panchali, 1956

"Though he’s very young still, he’s the Father of Indian Cinema." — Jean Renoir on Ray, 1967

"Not to have seen the cinema of Ray means existing in the world without seeing the sun or the moon." — Akira Kurosawa, 1975

"Ray’s magic, the simple poetry of his images and their emotional impact, will always stay with me.
— Martin Scorsese, 1991

"Robinson keeps faith with Ray’s own polymathic talents to show how history, art, literature and music all dance behind the haunting shadows on screen" — Boyd Tonkin, The Independent

 

"Robinson has written more extensively on Ray than any other English-language writer...[he]tells the tale with warmth, lucidity and a wealth of detail" — Philip Kemp, Sight and Sound

From the Publisher