Remembering Mario de Miranda

Remembering Mario de Miranda For Mario, cartoons were much more than jokes. Read on : Mário de Miranda: The Genius Who Drew a World https://share.google/XpEbnz3hF44hMCCG9 Excerpts : "Born in Daman in 1926, where his father Constâncio served as taluka administrator, Mário grew up in the Miranda manor in Loutulim, south Goa, amid old-world gentility, family lore, and a landscape that would nourish his imagination forever. He delighted in books, music, and sports, but most of all in drawing. He doodled village characters, celebrities, and family pets on walls, once joking, “In those days, I saw myself as another Michelangelo ... but it didn’t work out that way.” He attended Mumbai’s JJ School for a day, but felt trapped rather than freed by formal art education, and so joined St. Xavier’s instead. In 1949, he graduated with a degree in English Literature and considered joining the civil service. It is amusing now to imagine Mário as a bureaucrat! ***. ***. *** Oscar De Noronha remembers : Even after my father passed away in June 2011, whenever we met Mário, he would remember that unfulfilled promise. We scarcely knew that by early December that same year, he too would be gone, passing peacefully in sleep. His ashes were scattered over the Zuari and India mourned the loss of one of its dearest artistic treasures. Endings seem inadequate when remembering Mário. His legacy persists not merely in museums or murals, but in the crowded bazaar seen as choreography, or in the village gossip, or the puppy perched in the corner of his frame—because love notices such things. Will younger generations, with altered sensibilities, read him differently? Perhaps. Some may question certain period stereotypes. But what endures is the largeness of his gaze—its compassion, irony, and delight. And in saudade: that deep, abiding longing touched with gratitude." Friends Occasionally, during an interaction, while reading a newspaper or a magazine or a book, or while watching a TV serial or a movie, our thoughts goes on a tangent and wanders in nostalgic thoughts. Reading about Mario, my mind scanned through memories about cartoons and cartoonists (Shankar, Abu, Aravindan...) and magazines like Illustrated Weekly of India, Shankar's Weekly and Mathrubhumi Weekly. My friend notes down everyday in a note book a few lines about whatever he read in the previous 24 hours. Some habits create treasures which are preserved by others. M G Warrier