What's with Reading...?

What's with Reading...? 

Just yesterday I shared a post:

“Interesting... I share a video and 800+ view and several likes (20) in a few hours.I share an article ( takes a few hours to write) and it gets 50 views at best, similar likes. What is this saying about us? Are we on a fast lane? Are we consumers for ‘2-3 liners’?”

And ….in less than 24 hours, many likes, and comments, than say articles I have posted here.

The world is surely changing: Analogous to the cricket from a 5 day test match, to a one day, to the new T20 format, games evolve. And I guess so has books, giving way to articles, to short summaries, to 2-3 liners.

I guess, I am old school. I recall the thick Thomas Hardy ‘Far from the Madding Crowd’ and the Character of Gabriel Oak, the eternal patient lover on the side line, the fascinating books of Ayn Rand and over the years the 1000 plus books I have read. Back then, I recall now with immense nostalgia my own HG Wells ‘time travel machine’ that could take me forward or back ward in time – said simply, Books.

The modern bookstore is giving way to e-copies ‘quick airport reads’ – slim editions. Most content today are PDF files of Summaries of Books or Articles. We are saying less in each short burst, but saying ever so much in the multiple bursts of articles. I often wonder, what is this trend all about? Do you have an insight?

Again, back then, in my teens, leisure time was spent with basic toys, board games and TV watching (when it finally arrived) was a group activity. The radio was primarily for news or music from Ceylon. Interactions were fewer and travel ever more sparse.  The newspaper was our primary connects with the world outside.

Books were my favourite companion then, and a lifelong companion now. Curled with a book, I am transported to new worlds, events, time, and characters, culture. In the 1:1 silent connect, the book and I, my imaginative mind, simulated by books conjured up sounds, pictures, living people, introduced me to new lands. But most of all, I discovered the power of ‘ideas’. New thoughts, bold thoughts, strange thoughts.

Reading connected me to the living: I could see a little deeper, connect more, experience more, and understand more. Books symbolised the magic of ‘rubbing the Aladdin’s lamp’ and make wishes come true.These days, I have started to write as well, to express and relate with the world around me.

To each age, its new propellant for personal growth. Times must change, old order giving way to new, as Tennyson says, lest one idea corrupts the world.

For me, give me a great book, some time for self, and that’s my Nirvana.