Elizabeth Keyton aka Elikutty launches her debut Malayalam picture book for children

A web page from ‘Davina Finds Her Vowels’
| Photo Credit: Kohan Kolam

For years now, Elizabeth Keyton — popularly often called @eli.kutty on Instagram — has been utilizing social media to not simply study Malayalam, however educate the language through interactive, artistic studying instruments. One such software is her debut picture book, Davina Finds Her Vowels (AdiDev Press), that goals to introduce children to Malayalam vowels.

Elizabeth Keyton
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

The book, says Eliza (as she is fondly recognized), was truly created in 2018 when she was dwelling in Dubai. “My best friend, a Tamil, gave birth to her daughter, Davina. Her husband is Malayalee, but he grew up in Tamil Nadu. As a result, she had a lot of resources to learn Tamil, but I wanted to make something in Malayalam for Davina’s first birthday,” says the language knowledgeable who at the moment works with newcomer migrant college students in Chicago. Eliza handmade the book, “drawing my own simple illustrations so that she could explore Kerala through her own eyes”. “My friend loved it and pushed me to make it into a real book,” she shares. 

The picture book takes younger readers on Davina’s journey by means of Kerala’s fields lined with banana timber, native markets, and on buses, with every web page educating a set of vowels. “I enjoyed setting the scenes. The rhyme and narration was incredibly fun to expand on, and it felt wonderful alongside Kohan Kolam’s (the creative name of painter and illustrator Gurmeet Singh) illustrations,” she says. 

The book’s cowl
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

This is Gurmeet’s first Malayalam-centric book too, and he says combing by means of visuals of Kerala’s folks, native tradition, and watching Malayalam motion pictures was executed for the book’s analysis. “Words leave visual impressions, even where words do not describe it explicitly. The impression I had of Davina was of an impish, highly energetic, unself-aware little girl. I tried to convey this through things such as her always unruly hair, frolicking poses, and Elikutty’s mischievous expressions,” says Gurmeet, who provides that the method was creatively intense. “The marketplace design took two weeks just to colour!”

A web page from ‘Davina Finds Her Vowels’
| Photo Credit:
Kohan Kolam

Eliza provides that the primary model of the book took a month of writing, illustrating, and laminating the pages. “I’m a language teacher, and I’ve worked with children for many years, so I had the idea to make the introduction to the alphabet to be fun, engaging, and personalised. I started sending the draft to various publishers in 2020, and it took a lot of persistence and a few good friends to finally connect me with AdiDev. Davina just turned seven, so it’s wild to see how the journey to publication is not quite as straightforward as one may imagine,” provides the creator.

Why did Eliza select the picture book format for Davina Finds Her Vowels? “Picture books are wonderful tools to learn language because it opens up the context for children and sets a stage for them to see a relevance in what they are learning. Many parents want their kids to connect with their heritage language, but often fall into less engaging methods of memorisation, repetition, and frustrating corrections,” she says, “Children are naturally curious and want to explore new ideas, and using picture books guides their imagination and also makes it feel less forced as rote learning.” 

An illustration by Kohan Kolam
| Photo Credit:
Kohan Kolam

Hoping the book resonates with children, Eliza has written drafts for future books together with all of the Malayalam alphabet. “Each book has a theme related to Kerala, from the biodiversity of the forests of Thrissur, to the snacks and sweets at neighbourhood chaaya shops. In total, there would be about seven or eight books, each focussing on a certain cluster of sounds from the Malayalam language,” Eliza says, including that she has additionally accomplished the draft of a Malayalam coursebook for grownup newcomers. “I’ve structured it to be as engaging and approachable as international texts for learning English, Spanish, etc. I’m hoping that I can get this book to shelves as Malayalam has a lack of updated, engaging materials. I also have free online classes where I use the material I’ve developed for this coursebook.”

Priced at ₹499, Davina Finds Her Vowels is accessible on adidevpress.com