all the inspiration, all the books?
Since we all were little children, we have been associated with books. Some we liked and some we hated! To start with there were some which we had to read, as obedient little students! These were chosen by our parents, teachers, siblings and other well wishing elders. Knowing very well, that books were one of the major things which would let us grow into dynamic and responsible adults, people in our surroundings always suggested one to us. But back then, reading looked like a passive and patient trial when compared with the roar of playing in the sun, inventing pranks, running errands with our friends for nothing and other such outdoor activities. I remember that friends I had in my childhood, were almost always like my family, with the innocence and trust I manifested in my relationships, I gave a high significance to my peer group. And then I remember how one day my dearest friend gifted me a book on my birthday! I read it, only because she had gifted it and because it spoke about a little boy, much like the two of us, who hated school and all that he always wanted to do was PLAY! It was Mark Twain’s Adventures of Tom Sawyer. She is still the dearest friend I have!
I kept growing, meeting new books, each one carrying a world of imagination, knowledge and quest inside it. I read them; I imagined them, assimilated them and loved them. Today when I look back at my life gone by, I can’t imagine what it would have been like without all those books I read, and all those worlds they gave me to live in with my own reality. When we read a book, we read a world, we open it and from the very first pages one can smell the newness and the wonder of a friendly new world one is being welcomed into.
I believe that reading made me a much better person, than I otherwise would have had chances to become. Not only did my books let me see the reality I lived in in a comprehensive manner, they also enabled me to develop an eye for many more perspectives that existed beyond mine. Very often these were fictional, but the extension of fiction in my world made me stretch my possibilities…at least in my mind…it has been a romantic and everlasting affair!
My love for books placed me as a student of English literature and then of the social sciences, in all these years when I have read, I have always felt a need for more…more perspectives, more people to read with and more books (even in the little budget I could afford as a student!). If reading a book all alone could open up one’s mind, imagine what would, reading with a community do to our development. Not only will it double the benefits in knowledge, it will enhance the entertainment value that we initially drew out of it.
What has been particularly significant is the way books connect people, silently and yet so strongly. I was suggested by a friend to read ‘the catcher in the rye’; I read it, loved it and suggested it to my brother, my colleagues, my friends and also my relatives. Some of my friends were left behind in time as I changed jobs and as they moved on, but we still share the ‘catcher in the rye bond’, we still connect through that book that we once read together (almost) and discussed how we loved and hated Holden Caulfield (the protagonist). I got married and moved out of my house, I was trying to fit into a new environment, and books as always helped me. As I shared my likes and dislikes and exchanged some suggestions with my new brothers and sisters in law, we came closer on a level, which was already democratic, equal and mutually respecting.
In college me and my best friend used to sneak into the library during our tutorial hours and read ‘The Inscrutable Americans’, it not only made us come a lot closer as friends, it also gave us both the company of each other to laugh with, wonder about, and share the excitement that the book (and especially reading it) promised.
It was keeping all these wonderful memories and experiences related with books in mind that the InspireDwarka Book Club was conceived. I call upon all the book lovers in Dwarka to join this community and share their experiences, remarks, thoughts, perspectives and memories about books, authors, friends, parents, teachers and everyone they are related with through books.
Here’s to a new and dynamic books’ people community…may our bond last forever through these books!
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