Fiction / Non-Fiction - are we reading enough?

What’s with reading….

Tell you what, reading fiction and non-fiction is on the decline amongst the youth.

And there’s no organized social research around this, just anecdotal references around what I observe. Fact is, a few sample of people I have met, just cannot recall books they have read, and even if they have read a few, cannot really remember most of it.

The world is changing: Analogous to the cricket example from a 5 day test match, to a one day, to the new T20 format, games evolve. And I guess so has books. From the thick Thomas Hardy of ‘Far from the Madding Crowd’ and the Character of Gabriel Oak, the eternal patient lover on the sideline, book have given way to ‘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. Akin to Machine gun firing versus a sniper shot.

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. 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.

Books were my favorite companion then, and a lifelong companion now. Curled with a book, I was 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, etc. 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 more around me, connect more, experience more, and understand more. Books symbolized the magic of ‘rubbing the Aladdin’s lamp’ and make wishes come true.

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. J