"Upendrakishore Raychaudhuri (upendrakishor raaYachaudhurI) was born on 10 May, 1863 in a little village called Moshua in Mymensingh district in Eastern Bengal, which is now a part of Bangladesh. The lush green fields and forests, the streams and ponds of his childhood home, wove a magic spell that stayed with him forever, even in the heart of Calcutta, where he spent all his adult life. Upendrakishore was a remarkably gifted man - a prolific writer, a fine artist, a musician, a man of science, and at the same time a deeply religious man. The hymns he composed for the Brahmo Samaj (braahma samaaj) are sung even today. In the field of book publishing, he is still remembered in India and abroad for the new methods he developed for printing both black and white and color photographs with great accuracy of detail. When he died on 20 December 1915 he was only fifty-two years old. His many talents did not die with him, however; but took on new lustre in the works of Sukumar Ray, his son and Satyajit Ray, his grandson. A grand tradition that is still going strong." (excerpted from Majantali & Co.)

Upendrakishore was the founder-editor of Sandesh, the ever popular Bengali children's magazine still going strong after more than 85 years. His Tuntunir Boi is a classic, still loved and relished in most Bengali homes. He did the illustrations for most of his books himself. Buddhadeva Bose, the famous Bengali literateur, commented on the excellence of Upendrakishore's version of Ramayana (Cheleder RaamaaYaNa) written for the children. His fantasy story Goopy Gayen Bagha Bayen is now known the world over due to Satyajit Ray's movie bearing the same name.

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