After making a successful mark with 40 Sufi Comics at San Diego Comic Con International this year, Vakil Brothers , founder of Sufi Studios launched their latest comic book ‘The Wise Fool of Baghdad’ at first ever Comic Con Express Bengaluru.
Published by Sufi Studios based in Bengaluru and aimed at teenage and adults having a liking for spirituality, ‘The Wise Fool of Baghdad’, a 142 pages book, orbits around the story of Bahlool, who lived in the 8th Century of Baghdad and it was during this time that the voices of dissent against the ruling class were not tolerated. Based on the advice of his spiritual master he took on the demeanor of a mad person. Through the guise of a lunatic he would speak up against the ruling class thereby defending the rights of the people and in the process teach deep spiritual lessons to those around him. Bahlool’s genius lay in his ability, to calibrate his response in a way that he would say all that was needed yet protect himself from the ruling class and this trait of Bahlool has made his stories fascinating to hear.
Speaking on the idea of developing ‘The Wise Fool of Baghdad’, Vakil Brothers, Mohammed Arif Vakil and Mohammed Ali Vakil, shared, and “For the first time these stories have been made available in the form of Sequential Art- Comics and have been taken from books of history & oral traditions Every generation remembers Bahlool’s stories with a lot of interest, but they’re often narrated in Arabic, Farsi or Urdu. For the first time we’ve made Bahlool’s stories available in the medium of comics. We’ve been hearing the wonderful stories of Bahlool from a very young age. These stories of his wisdom & wit were narrated to us as children in our Madrasah (Islamic School) and later in Majalis (Islamic gatherings), where Scholars would explain the spiritual teachings in Islam for the young and old. Since we started Sufi Comics, creating a book like this was always on our minds. Our first book ’40 Sufi Comics’ contains two stories from Bahlool’s life. He was such an inspiring figure in history that we wanted to dedicate an entire book with just his stories.
It has taken 6 months for Sufi Studios to complete this entire book with the art of the book being inspired from Turkish & Persian miniature paintings, to create the space in which these tales take place. The book is compiled and edited by Vakil Brothers, illustrated by Artist Rahil Mohsin and to expound the spiritual message of these stories, after each story, the sacred verses of the Qur’an and sayings of the Prophet Muhammad (s) have been hand-inscribed in Islamic Calligraphy, which is done by Master Calligrapher Muqtar Ahmed, one of the finest Islamic calligraphers in India and colors are taken care by Abdul Gafur Madinal. Also, the design of the book is composed with Islamic geometric patterns, floral designs & Arabic calligraphy as part of the art.
Priced at INR 195, ‘The Wise Fool of Baghdad’ will be available for purchase in a few days on the official website of Sufi Studios, http://www.sufistudios.com/
So far, Sufi Studios has participated in Comic Con Delhi and Mumbai with Comic Con San Diego and Vakil Brothers are extremely delighted to share with us their thoughts on the first ever Comic Con at Bengaluru, “The response at Comic Con Bengaluru has been amazing. It’s the best Comic Con we’ve experienced so far and we feel so happy to share that around 400 copies of ‘The Wise Fool of Baghdad’ were sold at this comic con.”
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