A BIBLIOPHILE’S JOURNEY
 |
| LITERATI BOOKSHOP & CAFE: GOA |
If you read raise your glass, if you don’t raise your standard!!
Surely that was on the lighter side but in all earnestness. And its definitely time I wet the parchment and reveal an addiction of mine that’s been giving me the high since a long long time. I have been on voyages, crossed deserts, stood stoic atop mountains and wandered amongst the lonely clouds. I have eavesdrop on conversation of philosophers and great men and ridden through the country meadows on horseback. I have dived into the vast ocean of magic and witnessed moments of history. Most of all I have found myself.
Words!!!
If I remember correctly, I was in my 7th standard that my eyes fell on a strange titled book ; It read “MEIN KAMPF” meaning my struggle. My sincere efforts were no match for the language of the much acclaimed book yet I pronounced it as a souvenir after reading some fifty odd pages and let it adorn my upcoming library. The journey had started, the standard was set. I started saving up meagre sums I received which was so meagre that once or twice a year I could manage to lay hands on a childrens’ monthly. Just around the time I was hugely fascinated by Indian mythology and epics and struggled hard to buy one but as it turned out you can only save the tangibles you possess. Time passed on and I grew pretty stoked. Venturing into the attic of my house, creating a mess around to dig up old books- sometimes I got lucky , other times I had to climb down with my face all smeared with smoke and ash for all I could find was chisels, hoes & plough- you couldn’t probably chance upon a magical hidden library at a farmer’s, however hard you’d try. Nevertheless, the adventure continued.
I was in my highschool and it was the dawn of a new century. The world was unfolding at a pace never imagined before. The world was growing smaller. News had started travelling faster- sadam was executed, Bush was re-elected, youtube and facebook was launched and water was discovered on the moon. It was pretty exciting times to live in. I would read about it all while driving livestock around, under the shade of a tree, sitting besides the brook dipping my feet in the icy water and sometimes atop branches of trees, balancing my boyhood and the weight of words- something I would be forever bonded to. Thence came poets into my life – Frost, Keats,Yeats, Wordsworth, Kipling, Longfellow,Wilde and Neruda. They spoke of nature, of love and life. I would lie on the green pastures and read it all facing the blue sky till the sun called it a day and it was time to turn back.
Classics followed thereafter; someone truly described classics as books which everyone talks about but nobody actually reads, more so for I started off with “Wuthering Heights”. For pages the author says nothing at all and then drags it to few more and then publishes another volume. It took Fitzgerald, Bronte,Salinger , Joseph Heller, a couple more and countless sleepless nights to convince me. If you ask me today, classics are raw and crude books for you to bite off one piece at a a time and savour the bitter taste. It is much like a huge cup of strong black coffee; once you get the heck of it , you want it all the time for all ocassions. Afterwards, for a long time, it was all Tolstoy and Tolkein stacked upto and along with my pillows. It went by and I developed a habit of carrying books around wherever I went. I continue to do so today.
Like the turn of events in a classical story, I moved from the countryside to a city. My love for books remained the same and the only difference was books were more easily accessible in the city. I could grab a book on the go- the bus station, the mall or the metro . I would remain glued to the the huge collection, the hardbound copies, the colourful paperbacks. Inside the stores I felt like a gladiator in an arena- being watched, I could feel my heart racing. Anyway I would never grow to love these fancy city book stores and till the day I look out for small shops around the corner with books stacked randomly. I love searching through the stacks – it’s no less adventurous than a treasure hunt. I would read at quiet places in the heart of the city, in the gardens and while travelling. Reading had become my pilgrimage. It had got to the point that I stopped liking the company of humans and I never trusted someone who doesn’t read. I can say the same today.
Books have been many things to me. They are my refuge and guide, my adventure and escape. To hear voices of person already dead thousand years ago, to creep into the skin of characters, to see the world through someone else’s eyes – it is a voyage through time. To open a new paperback and smell through the pages, to stare into the wall in the middle of a read to fathom a line well written, creating distinct voices of characters in your head- I could go and on. You begin to travel in time and you are opened to the vastness of the never ending horizon. You walk out of the crowded narrow lanes and your mind is free to an understanding of things on scale not conceivable before. The awakening takes form and you’re never the same again.
Signing off with list of my fav authors / reads:
1. Ruskin Bond : for the love of nature
2. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: for creation of you know whom
3. J R R Tolkein : No fiction ever felt more real.
4. Paulo Coelho & Mitch Albom : the spiritual journeys
5. Michelle Obama & M K Gandhi : for defining “Autobiography”
6. Amish Tripathi & Amitav Ghosh : Diaspora & History, love & lost ; reads that will stick with you.
7. Jane Austen & Charles Dickens : Classics
8. Harper Lee & Emily Bronte : one book authors
