JOY KINDLED

I am in love with my latest acquisition-a Kindle. It’s a gift from my daughter; a beauty to behold; a joy to hold; a loyal, undemanding, uncomplaining companion.

I had never imagined that I would enjoy reading a ‘digital book’ as much as a ‘proper book’. I can now say all war ends and I am completely at peace with myself the moment I sit in my rocking chair  holding this little thing in the palm of my hand and delving into Tolstoy’s early 19^th century Russia. Perhaps Blake had this futuristic vision in mind when he wrote “Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand and Eternity in an hour”. Time stops. I suddenly have wings.

Yes, I agree that the pleasure you get from turning the dog-eared pages of an old, yellowed favourite, retrieved from the last row of the topmost rack of a dusty, bookshelf, from which a delicate, poppy petal or a papery fern leaf falls out, is not to be found here. The dry, brownish pages cannot be felt here; the queer, moth eaten smell will not reach the nostrils; the oft read or the most turned pages will not keep falling out; the tear marks will never be visible to anyone nor will the old stains stir up any memories.

I also do not deny that it cannot infuse you with the same sensory or tactile feelings as you experience when you unwrap a brand new book or turn for the first time its freshly printed pages which still stick to each other and give out a smell that says ‘I am oven fresh’.

 However, as you gently touch this digital wonder with your forefinger and one page unfolds after another, you will soon realize that once again certain emotions are being kindled. The joy of reading is not growing less; instead, the sense of suspense is still growing; the feelings of boredom and loneliness are slowly abating; the characters are slowly coming to life; as the plot thickens the heart is once again racing; the pulse is missing a beat; the doors to another world are slowly opening up and miracle of miracles, you are once again enjoying!

To an old bookworm, who has practically survived the ordeal of life with the help of books, initially the digital world never held much attraction. Gradually, as time passed, I too succumbed to her charms. Presently on a self imposed house arrest, the world of internet, the online bookstores and the online libraries have been a boon. Though persistently and diligently I had been avoiding the Kindle, when it finally came from a loved one all wrapped up, I just had nothing to say. And now I have only one confession to make –I am in love with it.

While on the subject of books, I recall that it was the most common gift that we received as kids. Anybody visiting, or wishing you on your birthday or any other occasion for that matter, would do so with a book. A visit to a relative or family friend would very often earn you one. In fact, choices being limited, it was the most popular gift. Visits to the annual Book Fairs had become almost ritualistic. Train journeys also called for a last minute dash to the A.H. Wheeler stalls or saw uncles and cousins rushing to the platforms to see off the family armed with a packet of books. Prizes for good results also meant books. Pocket money too found its way to books. That is how we built our collection of fiction and non-fiction, how we survived the pangs of adolescence, unburdened our loneliness, lived through our moments of crisis or as Terry Jacks and Westlife have put it ‘Learned of love and ABCs / Skinned our hearts and skinned our knees’.

Books, undoubtedly, are the most trusted friends you can hope to have. You are free to criticize them, judge them, appreciate or condemn them; they will always be there for you. You just have to reach out for them. They also kind of grow with you. The same book you never could appreciate in your teens or twenties appear in an absolutely new reincarnation when you pick it up again in your fifties. For me they have been the best companions. Incidentally, I spent the most on them when I was a student and all the youthful resolutions with friends to buy the entire book shop the moment we start earning never actually saw the light of day. In fact, most people, I have seen, with the richest collection of books have not been the richest of people themselves.

Not that our love for books were always appreciated. A few illustrations of comments heard from the world of our elderly well wishers:

‘Instead of burying your nose in romantic novels and useless fiction, why don’t you concentrate on studies.’

‘What good will reading centuries old classics do- better to read textbooks.’

‘Amar Chitra Katha? You cannot learn English from reading such crap. Read Classics.’

Or an even better sample:

‘Enid Blyton’s books won’t help you get marks. Don’t waste time reading them.’

Interestingly, most of the Quiz questions on mythology I can still answer by racking my memory and filtering out names and incidents from those same Amar Chitra Katha illustrated series and I am sure many of my readers will agree that we first heard of butter scones and ginger ale, tuck boxes and midnight feasts in the fascinating world created by Ms Blyton.

No matter what they said, the love affair with books continued. Many idle afternoons have been spent in their company and so have passed many lonesome nights. How can we forget those interminably long train journeys which turned bearable only because of a few good books? Or when the whole family went off to a wedding feast and left us to study for the board exams? Even while waiting those insufferable nights outside hospital ICUs, in the company of equally anxious strangers, it was again books which saw us through. With books for company how many heartaches have we shrugged off like Scarlett O’ Hara saying “ I will think of it all tomorrow…… After all, tomorrow is another day”  or suddenly emboldened by dear old Rhett Butler we had the courage to turn back saying “ My dear, I don’t give a damn”. Perhaps, much of the joys of growing up lie in hiding a book inside a blanket on a winter night and reading those unforgettable and unmentionable lines only when the rest of the household have gone to sleep .

Continuing this tradition with our children can be equally enriching.Reading some of the same books again with your own kids is like a beautiful walk down a boulevard called life. You are able to re-live those years left behind and at the same time explore and discover many new ones on the way. How can we forget that it is the present generation that introduced us to the very magical yet so very human world of Harry Potter!

Though the number of book readers is going down, the love for books can never die out. Each one us might have our favourite genres-classics, romance, humour, biography, mystery, crime, history, sci-fi- but a true book lover usually reads extensively. After all it is a kind of addiction-you have to try out all kinds. Though whenever I try talking to youngsters these days most of them have many preoccupations or interests but books are certainly not among them. They state quite frankly that they are not into reading anything apart from those related to their subjects of study. In spite of whatever is apparent, that ‘breed’ called booklovers has not died out. Suddenly you come across a young boy of twelve or thirteen who says he loves reading all kinds of books though Greek mythology is his favourite. Another eighteen year old girl, I met once, told me that though she intends studying statistics, her hobby is reading books on history. Once I saw a young collegian, in a tightly packed ladies compartment of a Mumbai local, holding an apple in her right hand and George Orwell’s ‘Nineteen Eighty Four’ in her left, getting crushed all 360 degrees, but managing to maintain her balance well while continuing to read for all forty five minutes of the journey.

DS