I was neither a bibliophile nor was I into casual reading. However, as school life came to an end and the first semester of engineering beckoned, I learned that many of my classmates always had a book on them, even if most of the time it was just for show off. Also, our communication skills’ Read more…
I clearly remember I was in grade ten when I got my first novel. It was Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels. It probably wasn’t the best choice for a first-time reader as the book failed to interest me at first. However, the more I read, the more interesting it felt. I was now officially a reader.
Growing up in the middle of lots of books, I was always curious about what could be so special about those big, voluminous bundles of paper. I still remember the day my father brought me Anondomela, a Bengali children’s magazine. This was my first introduction to a hitherto unknown treasure. To put things into perspective, Read more…
My friends and I were once on a Goa trip. During our train journey from Vasco da Gama, I noticed that my friend was carrying Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist. Now, I had heard tales about parasmani (a stone that is said to have the ability to convert everything into gold), and I immediately felt like giving the book Read more…
I have been a grandfather’s boy all my life. Daddy, as I fondly call him, has been my biggest inspiration to become a well-read person. Thanks to him, I have learned to see books as the drivers of individual growth. For Daddy, reading has always been a solace. Back in the day, I would make Read more…
I am Riya Negi, and I work as a software engineer at a multinational giant. Years ago, this was something unimaginable for me. Until grade twelve, I was just an average commerce student who hardly thought or planned for her future. I just went with the flow of life, living every moment to the fullest. Read more…
“Now that you folks are in class V, you’ll be taken to the seniors’ library from this year,” announced our teacher as she made us all queue height-wise. Being the little person that I was (and that, FYI, I still am), I stood at the front of the line. I was both eager and excited. Read more…
First experiences are always special and remain close to the heart. Ever wondered what it would be like to have many such first experiences all happening at the same time? Well, they simply get etched in your memory forever. I would have been seven or eight years old when I experienced one such set of Read more…
As a kid, I loved reading children’s stories and fables, and that was largely due to those exquisitely illustrated books. My mother would get me all these storybooks – from the stories of Akbar and Birbal to the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes to Aesop’s Fables and whatnot. However, I could not stand the books that Read more…
This is a story from many decades back. I grew up in a village (a real one, not a weekend getaway), around the time India got its independence. For a kid growing up in circumstances like mine, books were almost things of luxury. Anything other than textbooks was hard to come by. In fact, the Read more…
