List of Professor Shonku adventures

The List of Professor Shonku adventures include 38 stories of Professor Shonku adventures written by Satyajit Ray. The first "Shonku" story Byomjatrir Diary (An Astronaut's Diary) was published in the Sandesh in 1965.^[1][2] It was a long story describing Professor Shonku's space travel. The last Shonku adventure Intelectron remained unfinished after Ray's death.^[2]

1—10

Story	Subject/Topic dealt with	Plot outline	Location of incidence	Characters
				Abinash Majumdar	Nakur Chandra Biswas	Newton (cat)	Prohllad	Jeremy Saunders	Wilhelm Krol
Byomjatrir Diary	Space travel	Professor Shonku makes a rocket and goes to Mars. He takes Prohllad, Newton and Bidhushekhar (a robot) with him. In Mars they encounter some terrible creatures. Finally the rocket of Professor Shonku reaches a planet named "Tafa" where highly civilized and intelligent beings live.	Solar system	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	No
Professor Shonku o Igipshio Atonko	Egyptian Mummy	British archaeologist James Summerton finds more than 30 Mummies in the Egyptian city Bubastis. Professor Shonku goes to Egypt and joins Summerton's team. At the same time, an Egyptian person threatens Shonku and asks to stop the excavation. Shonku ignores the warning. Summerton gifts Shonku one of the Mummies he found in the excavation. Professor Shonku brings that to Giridh, India. The Egyptian person who warned Professor Shonku chases him to Giridih and claims himself as a descendant of the mummified person.	Port Said, Bubastis, Egypt Girdih, India	No	No	Yes	No	No	No
Professor Shonku o Har	a) Tyrannosaurus (skeleton) b) Magican power of Indian yogi	Professor Shonku finds a Tyrannosaurus skeleton near Nilgiri mountains. He comes back to Giridih and starts researching. At the same time a sadhu comes there who can transform bones of dead animals into living beings using magical powers.	Nilgiri mountains, Giridih	Yes	No	No	No	No	No
Professor Shonku o Macaw	a) Theory to become invisible b) Macaw bird	Professor Shonku invents an oral drug, using which can make a man invisible. Gajanan Tarafdar, a rival scientist, tries to steal the formula. At the same time a talking Macaw comes to the garden of Professor Shonku. Professor Shonku gives the bird shelter in his own house. After few days Professor Shonku's formula gets stolen and at the same time the bird goes missing as well.	Giridih	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No
Professor Shonku o Aschorjo Putul	Suspicious humanoid sculpture	Professor Shonku goes to Sweden to receive honorary doctorate degree from Swedish Academy of Sciences. There he meets a man named Gregor Lindquist. Gregor informs him that he is a doll maker and invites him to see his creations. Professor Shonku accepts the invitation, but, he finds out some very surprising and unpleasant truth. In addition, he falls in danger.	Sweden	No	No	No	No	No	No
Professor Shonku o Golok Rahasya	Smallest planet of solar system, Extraterrestrial life	Abinash Majumdar finds a ball (spherical object) near Usri river. Very soon he notices the ball's peculiar characteristics like the colour of the ball changes in every few hours, sometimes it gets wet and other times it becomes as cold as snow. Abinash Majumdar reports it to Professor Shonku. After few days, Abinash Majumdar gives the ball to Professor Shonku. Professor Shonku discovers that the ball ("spherical object") is actually a small planet.	Giridih	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No
Professor Shonku o Chi Ching	Hypnotism	A Chinese magician named Chi Ching comes to meet Professor Shonku in Giridih. Professor Shonku firstly fails to recognise him, but then realises that he attended Chi Ching's magic show in Kobe, Japan. On that day, after showing some common magical tricks, Chi Ching started demonstrating hypnotism. Professor Shonku specially disliked the way magician Chi Ching was trowing some common people into embarrassing situation after calling them on the stage. Finally Chi Ching called Professor Shonku to come up on the stage, being unaware that Professor Shonku was a great scientist and an expert of hypnotism. For next 30 minutes he tried to hypnotize Shonku in every possible way, but fails. Professor Shonku remembers Chi Ching. Chi Ching goes to Shonku's laboratory, checks Shonku's works and inventions and remarks "wongerful" "wongerful" (i.e. "wonderful", "wonderful"). Chi Ching tells Shonku "You ale gleat" (i.e. "You are great"), but, right after that, he adds "but, I am gleater" (i.e. "but, I am greater"). Professor Shonku fails to understand the meaning of this comment. Chi Ching departs. But, right after that some unbelievable things start happening in Shonku's house. A common house lizard turns into a Chinese Dragon and smashes his laboratory.	Kobe, Giridih	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	No
Professor Shonku o Khoka	Hidden power/abilities of human brain	A child who otherwise used to be normal, has "changed" after he fell and hurt his head. Once happy and normal, this child has become melancholy and speaks things which the parents do not follow and term as gibberish. The parents desperately seek help to get their boy back. A doctor finally suggests to see Shonku. Although initially Shonku was reluctant to see this boy as practising medicines is not his profession — after he sees the boy it soon becomes obvious that this is indeed an extraordinary case worthy of his attention. What appeared as gibberish to his parents were actually meaningful facts which should normally be well beyond his or many other peoples reach, spoken in many different languages which the child had no way to learn. He also demonstrates psychic ability, where the flash of a camera stops working after he declares he doesn't want to be pictured but the reporter insists. Although the child seems to be omniscient, he appears sad and detached from the material world. The story ends when the child concocts a potion by mixing several very dangerous chemicals and acids, some of which were Shonku's own inventions, and gulps it down before Shonku had a chance to stop him. A short period of unconsciousness follows, after which the child wakes up as his normal old self. He then makes friends with Shonku, states he has no memory of things which happened in the last few days, and even asks for chocolates.	Giridih	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No
Professor Shonku o Bhoot	Ghost, Human soul	Professor Shonku invents a device named Neo-Spectroscope that can contact souls of deceased people and starts researching with it. At the same time some people, including Abinash Majumdar, starts reporting Professor Shonku that they have seen him in some places of Giridih and when they called him, he paid no attention. Now, Professor Shonku clearly knows that he was not the person. At the end of the story, Batukeshwar Shonku, grandfather of great grandfather (oti briddho propitamoho) of Shonku appears.	Girdih	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	No
Professor Shonku o Robu	Robot Artificial intelligence	In Giridih, Progessor Shonku makes a robot and names it Robu. One unique feature of Robu is he can solve difficult mathematical problems. Professor Paumer from Germany sends a letter to Professor Shonku, desires to see his work (i.e. the robot) and invites him to Germany. Professor Shonku accepts the invitation and reaches Heidelberg, Germany. In Heidelberg, Robu amazes Professor Paumer by its intelligence and capability of solving mathematical equations. Professor Paumer tells Professor Shonku about Professor Borgelt who also has been researching on Robotics. Professor Borgelt meets Professor Shonku, checks Robu's intelligence and invites Professor Shonku to his palace. On the next evening, when Professor Shonku goes to Professor Borgelt's palace attending his invitation, Professor Borgelt gives him offer to buy his robot. When Professor Shonku rejects his offer, Professor Borgelt attempts to kill him. Robu miraculously saves Professor Shonku and Professor Shonku find a very surprising fact about Professor Borgelt's robotics research.	Giridih, India Heidelberg, Germany	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No

11—20

Story	Subject/Topic dealt with	Plot outline	Location of incidence	Characters
				Abinash Majumdar	Nakur Chandra Biswas	Newton (cat)	Prohllad	Jeremy Saunders	Wilhelm Krol
Professor Shonku o Roktomatshya Rahasya	Underwater Mystery	Professor Shonku invents a device named Linguagraph that can translate any earth language to any other, including animal languages (sounds). At the same time Professor Shonku notices a report in a local newspaper that in Gopalpur, Nadia when a group of fishermen pulled their net in from the seat about twenty five bright red fishes jumped out from the net and hopped back to the sea. After two days, Professor Shonku finds another article published in The Statesman which reports a Norwegian youth, when he taking bath in sea, was attacked by some unknown red fish. The Norwegian youth died. Professor Shonku decides to go to Gopalpur to investigate the issue. Abinash Majumdar goes with him. In Gopalpur they meet Hamakura and Tanaka, two Japanese marine zoologists. Professor Shonku learns they have also come to Gopalpur to study those peculiar red fishes. They also informs Professor Shonku that they have a submarine with them and they are going to spend some time underwater and attempt to find those red fishes. Professor Shonku requests Hamakura to take them in journey. Hamakura happily agrees. Hamakura, Tanaka and Professor Shonku, Abinash Majumdar and Newton goes underwater to find those mysterious red fishes.	Giridh, Gopalpur, Nadia Underwater	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No
Professor Shonku o Cochabamba-r Guha	Primitive man	Professor Shonku receives a letter from Professor Hugo Dumbarton informing him a recent earthquake in Cochabamba, Bolivia which broke a mountain in two and thus created a passage between two halves. No one, in human history, has gone behind that mountains. A local village boy was playing hide and seek, and when he went to the mountain caves he saw some colourful paintings in the walls of the cave. On Professor Dumbarton's invitation, Professor Shonku goes to Cochabamba. There they discover lots of extinct animal species, an unknown animal and a primitive human being, alive!	Cochabamba, Bolivia	No	No	No	No	No	No
Professor Shonku o Gorilla	Gorilla	British zoologist James Massingham goes to Congo to research on gorilla and after few days goes missing. Another British zoologist Julian Gregory sends Shonku a telegram and says that he thinks that Massingham is alive but is in trouble. He also tells Shonku that they are going to the forests of Congo in search of missing Massingham and asks Shonku to join them. Professor Shonku decides to go to Congo. Abinash Majumdar tells Shonku that he wants to go with him. Professor Shonku approves his request and takes Majumdar with him. They reach Kalehe Territory of Congo and sets out in the jungle in search of Massingham. There they encounter gorillas. Shonku notices those gorillas are behaving abnormally, like machine. Massingham and Shonku get kidnapped. Abinash Babu attempts to save Shonku and Massingham.	Congo	Yes	No	No	No	No	No
Professor Shonku o Baghdader Baksho	An extraordinary invention of ancient Iraq	Professor Shonku goes to Baghdad, Iraq to attend an international inventors' conference. There he meets Professor Goldstein and Professor Petruci and they discuses on the glory of ancient Sumerian civilisation. They all praise the inventions made in Sumerian civilization. They meet an Oraqi man named Hasan Al-Hubbal. Al-Hubbal shows them an old box and tells them the box contains something very extraordinary. Shonku and other two professors find out that the box contains a gadget/equipment which very difficult to imagine even in their time, but that was made in ancient Iraq. Goldstein becomes greedy and tries to steal it.	Baghdad	No	No	No	No	No	No
Swapnadwip	Mysterious island	Professor Shonku is haunted by a repeating dream where he along, with his friends, are stranded on a beautiful exotic island without any inhabitants. His friends also experience the same dream. It is as if the mysterious island is beckoning great scientists of the world to it. Professor Shonku decides to go to the island. Abinash Majumdar also goes with him. There they found unknown plants and Professor Shonku falls in danger. Finally a rescue team saves them and the other scientists. In this story Abinash Babu writes in Professor Shonku's diary for the first and the only time.	16°N 136°E / 16°N 136°E	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No
Aschorjo Prani	Miniature Evolution	In a laboratory of St. Gallen, Switzerland, bio-scientist Cornelius Humboldt and Professor Shonku create a miniaturized evolution and there in a flask they create artificial life. In the flask, the stages of evolution pass very quickly and within few days the unicellular animal becomes a miniaturized human being. When Professor Humboldt sees that the mini man in the flask looks like Proefessor Shonku, he tries to kill "original" Shonku.	St. Gallen, Switzerland	No	No	No	No	No	No
Moru Rahasya	Missing Scientist	A scientist whom Shonku knew, Demetrius, goes missing all of a sudden. Shonku is informed by his friend Somerville, and the two set out to find Demetrius. Events and trails lead Shonku and Somerville to the Sahara desert, where they discover an anstonishing truth about Demetrius and his newest invention, which he had tested on himself before his disappearance.	Greece, Sahara desert	No	No	No	No	No	No
Corvus	Bird's I.Q.	Shonku experiments on a crow, artificially enhancing its I.Q. many-fold. Shonku displays his crow, 'Corvus' to world's leading ornithologists who had come to attend a conference in San Diego. They are all thrilled by Corvus' intelligence. Later, a magician named Argus offers to buy Corvus from Shonku, but the professor politely refuses. What will Argus do now?	San Diego	No	No	No	No	No	No

References

Citations

1. Andrew Robinson (21 February 2004). Satyajit Ray: The Inner Eye: The Biography of a Master Film-Maker. I.B.Tauris. pp. 402–. ISBN 978-1-86064-965-3. Retrieved 6 May 2013.
2. "Professor Shonku". Satyajit Ray official website. Retrieved 6 May 2013.

Sources

• Rāẏa, Satyajita (2002). Sakuṃsamagra (1. saṃskaraṇa. ed.). Kalakātā: Ānanda Pābaliśārsa. pp. Whole book. ISBN 81-7756-232-0.