Sometimes reading a book compels us to read another one. It starts a chain-reaction. After completing "Sei Somoy" by Sunil Ganguly, I almost set forth to collect everything about 19th Century Kolkata. Thankfuly Sunil attached a list of references and these are still available. I owe my gratitude to those book-shop owners in Kolkata who work somewhat like a co-operative society. I still remember the day when I visited College Street first time way back in '93. I had to just mention the title/author's name and they started the search in earnest. I never felt the same sense of urgency anywhere else. May be its because of the severe competition there.
We like to read books, however I sometimes ponder over the fact that we unknowingly tend to confine our world in a particular set of subjects. Don't we read a particular genre of books? I tried but could not generate interest in varied topics. May be books are comfort food for mind…and there are newspapers and enclycopedias for rest of the spectrum.
We read snippets from different great books in school, but not complete ones. However though the selection was varied, some from Great Authors, most chapters never hinted at the original compilation. That age was best suited for those books!! And then I got hold of a "rapid reader" in Bengali that actually & solely was devoted to do this !! One day I wish to own all those books that Mr Borgohain listed in "Boi Porar Ananda" (The joy of reading books)………...
Posted By: Somabho Bhattacharjya
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4 comments:
Great sentiments, good article, only the language could be improved a little. And if you could be a little more elaborate on the subject, it would do us a world of good.
Best Wishes,
SRD
I agree that as a reader I was left hankering for more.Good piece, mate. Keep the posts coming
Well I think you have a point there, about wanting to read the same kind of books over and over again. I was reading Jim Corbett Omnibus,part I, bengali translation by Mahasweta Debi and was so excited that went on to buy the part II as well. Maybe they create a comfort zone, you know and we do not want to come out of it. One way to counter this is once you have finished a reading a book from a particuler genre, force yourself to read a book from another. It would be difficult at first, then you get hooked to this genre as well. Human mind is amazingly flexible.
Good one, please keep posting.
I can undestand that feeling..once you get into a groove and then want to be in it a little longer. But then I never found myself stuck to a particular genre ever except in passing phases. For eg, I read my first Inspector Banks Detective stories few months back and got hooked on. Got half a dozen more and whooshed past them. But then towards the end it got a little less interesting and i moved on to different pleasures. But last month I got my hands on another Inspector Banks book and enjoyed it all over again.
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