Are we reading fewer books than we used to?

Is buying and reading paper books declining as a habit?  

It certainly appears to be the case in this digital age, where people are increasingly turning to e-books, audiobooks, and podcasts. E-books, in particular, are more accessible and convenient to buy, store and read.

As we do at every opportunity, my wife and I recently visited a book sale close to our home in suburban Mumbai. Under a large shamiana (or tent), there were hundreds of thousands of books—mostly paperbacks in near-mint condition—neatly lined in rows, their spines and titles facing up. As book exhibitions go, this one was quite impressive. The collection ranged from classic literature to contemporary bestsellers and everything in between.

Except for one thing.

The books seemed to be more on display than for sale. During our visit, most people appeared to be casual browsers, drifting in more out of curiosity than any real intent to buy. They would linger for a few minutes before moving on to other attractions—the colourful handlooms and handicrafts in the adjoining tents.

For over a decade now, the only people I regularly discuss books with are my family members and a few online friends who blog about the books they read. Almost no one in my immediate circle seems to be reading books. And if they are, I rarely hear about it.

Here are five reasons why people are probably no longer buying or reading books as they once did.

• Digital media—social media, smartphones and streaming services—offer constant entertainment and quick, short-term diversions, often displacing leisure reading.
• There appears to be a gradual decline in reading culture, particularly among younger generations, possibly due to reduced exposure to books within families and everyday life. My wife and I, like many of our generation, grew up surrounded by books, and they have stayed with us into adulthood.
• Many people say they simply do not have the time to read, citing busy schedules, constant multitasking, and long, tiring commutes.
• The attention economy—the digitally driven overload of information—may also be eroding sustained focus, making it harder for people to engage with long-form content such as books. In contrast, short-form content like posts, videos and stories is easier to consume and more engaging.
• Physical books are often perceived as less accessible and more expensive than e-books, especially in places where bookstores and libraries are limited. Bookshops and even secondhand bookstalls are also slowly disappearing, and not everyone can afford to buy books regularly.
  

While book sales may be declining, as people are either buying fewer books or reading less, they are still actively engaging with other forms of written content online—social media posts, articles, blogs and webzines.

This suggests that books are still very much present; it is our reading habits and preferences that have changed. It also means that my wife and I often have book fairs almost entirely to ourselves. And perhaps that is not such a bad thing after all.

The Ann Patchett excerpt that made me buy her books

Excerpts often influence whether I pick up books by authors I have never read before. That, along with a post on Twitter (now X), is how I discovered the award-winning American author Ann Patchett, who writes both fiction and nonfiction.

I was drawn to her writing when I read about her latest book Tom Lake, which is described as a “Beautiful and moving novel about family, love and growing up” or in the words of The Guardian, “A truth that feels like life rather than literature.”

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Those are the kind of books I have always enjoyed reading, and hope to write someday, now more so since my wife and I launched a website Pocketful of Happiness which stemmed from our desire to be as happy as possible and spread a little joy among our readers. Books like these have a feel-good quality about them. 

Ann Patchett's writing has been variously described as warm, poetic, illuminating, rich, poignant, funny, powerful, compelling and stirring. This was evident from the many excerpts I read including this affecting passage from This is the Story of a Happy Marriage (2013):

“People seem able to love their dogs with an unabashed acceptance that they rarely demonstrate with family or friends. The dogs do not disappoint them, or if they do, the owners manage to forget about it quickly. I want to learn to love people like this, the way I love my dog, with pride and enthusiasm and a complete amnesia for faults. In short, to love others the way my dog loves me.”

It prompted me to buy the book along with These Precious Days: Essays (2021). Both are personal  and literary collections of essays and memoir.

I look forward to reading one of these books as soon as I finish Agatha Christie’s The Murder on the Links.

Why I left a book fair empty-handed

About a month ago, I visited a Books by Weight exhibition in South Mumbai hosted by Butterfly Books and, in a rare display of self-restraint, left empty-handed. 

It wasn't because there were no good books to buy. I simply didn't feel the urge. Perhaps two years of working from home, followed by a hybrid routine, had something to do with it. Apart from evening walks, the occasional social visit and grocery runs in the neighbourhood, I had barely ventured out until that day.

I was also conscious that there was little point in adding to a collection of books that already contained many unread books. Only a few months earlier, my wife and I had given away more than a hundred paperbacks. I had no desire to replace them with another stack that might sit unread for months, if not years.

As I grow older, though not necessarily wiser, I find myself increasingly drawn to the idea of owning fewer things and making better use of what I already have. That applies to books as much as anything else: read them, enjoy them and then pass them on. 

One evening, my wife asked me, "What are you finally going to do with all your books? It's time to move on." 

She had a point. It's not as though I own a treasure trove of rare and valuable editions, aside from a few out-of-print western paperbacks and some books with particularly memorable covers. What she really meant, I think, was that I needed to outgrow the habit of buying books simply because I loved the idea of owning them. There was a time for that, and perhaps that time had passed.  

We still have many books, I more than she. I'm also holding on to my comic books, some of which I've owned for decades. What will become of them when I retire, I don't know. Paper, after all, has a shelf life.

These days, I do most of my reading on a Kindle and a tablet. Both are convenient, reader-friendly and, above all, kind to limited shelf space. Physical books possess a charm that ebooks can never quite replicate, but practicality has led me to draw a line between the two. My reading is now roughly 70 per cent digital and 30 per cent print.

I still buy the occasional paperback from secondhand bookshops and book exhibitions, but only after asking myself if it's really worth having the book and wouldn't an ebook serve my purpose just as well. 

The answer to those questions is increasingly shaping my book-buying habits. Having fewer books doesn't mean reading less.

Book Review: On the Run with Fotikchand by Satyajit Ray

“...And who is this young assistant you have got here?”

The question came so unexpectedly that Fotik’s heart nearly jumped into his mouth.

The two men were standing nearby. They had just emerged out of the dark. On Fotik’s right stood Shyamlal, his bow legs covered by long trousers. Out of the corner of his eye, Fotik saw the blade of a knife flash, go past his ear and stop somewhere between him and Harun.

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On the Run with Fotikchand by Satyajit Ray, the celebrated filmmaker, writer and cultural icon, is a charming adventure story about an 11-year-old boy who loses his family and his memory.

The story begins when Bablu, the son of a wealthy Calcutta barrister, is kidnapped by four criminals. Their plan takes a disastrously wrong when the stolen car carrying the boy crashes, killing two of the kidnappers. Bablu survives the accident but awakens with no memory of who he is or where he belongs.

Adopting the name Fotikchand, he drifts through the streets of Calcutta (now Kolkata) until he meets Harun, a poor but warm-hearted juggler who offers him food, shelter and work. As Fotik settles into his new life, helping at a tea stall by day and assisting Harun at local fairs by night, he becomes fascinated by the world of juggling and street performance.

His newfound happiness is short-lived, however. The two surviving kidnappers discover that the boy is alive and begin searching for him, still hoping to collect a ransom. As danger closes in, Fotik and Harun are forced to flee, setting the stage for an exciting climax in which the boy's lost memory begins to return. Meanwhile, back home, his influential father presses the police to intensify their search and places newspaper advertisements offering a reward of Rs.5,000 for information leading to his son's return.

On the Run with Fotikchand is not so much a tale of kidnapping as an endearing story of friendship between Fotik and Harun. The juggler’s hand-to-mouth existence does not come in the way of his kinship with, and generosity towards, the boy, the son of a rather selfish and calculated man. A not-so-subtle contrast between the arrogance of the privileged and the humility of those living on society's margins.

The 94-page novella is mildly suspenseful and moves at a brisk pace. The narrative is simple and engaging, thanks to Gopa Majumdar's translation from the original Bengali. Majumdar has translated several works by Satyajit Ray and other Bengali writers into English.

The book was adapted into the 1983 film Phatik Chand, which I have not seen. My Puffin Books edition (pictured above) also contains black-and-white illustrations by Ray himself. 

Which book would you read again this minute?

A student retrieves a book at San Diego City College.
Photo: Joe Crawford, California, USA,
via Wikimedia Commons

The 3Cs has been around for nearly seven years and during all that time it has rarely asked questions about books or films, let alone set up a poll or quiz, like some of my ardent (blog) friends do. Margot and Sergio run some mean quizzes and polls. The 3Cs is ill-informed to host any. Instead, it has a question, just one for now.

If you were forced, at knifepoint, to pick a book you’d already read before and asked to read it again, at gunpoint, which one would it be—and why?

No, that won’t do. You can’t read under the grip of fear. That’s no page-turner. Let me rephrase the question.

Which is the one book that you’d love to read again this minute—and why?

Your feedback will be like a recommendation of books for me, and I look forward to your eclectic choices.

My only request to you is not to “write down” your answers in comments below. Instead, send me an email at prashant@trikannad.com. I will collate the answers and put them up in a separate post, with your names and blog names.

The deadline is Saturday, April 30. In case you need more time, let me know, and we can extend the date. This is no homework.

Thank you for your time. Much appreciated.

2015: The year I didn’t read much

My reading went completely haywire in 2015. It was The year I didn't read much. I’m not putting a number to it because it hardly counts for anything. I probably read less than 25 novels and short stories and most of those in the first-half. I did read a lot, of course, just not books. In contrast, I read 41 novels and novellas and 31 short stories in 2014.

Ditto for reviews and sundry posts on my blog, down from 142 in 2014 to 76 in 2015. I wonder what I did with the extra time.

Something happened. I’m not sure what or why. I simply lost the desire to read, or write. Job transition and a new work routine played a role, I think.

I’m trying not to feel bad about it, because I enjoyed the books I read, and that is how reading should be. I certainly don’t want to be an apologist for tackling fewer books.

In November 2014, I announced a self-styled challenge to read and review at least 50 ‘First Novels’ by writers across genres. Tall order, for my final tally is just 10. I intend to continue with the challenge and see where I will be at this time next year.

My book of the year is British writer Sarah Ward’s debut novel In Bitter Chill, which made it to the ‘First Novels’ category. I reviewed the book and also interviewed Sarah, who was generous with her answers.

I’m looking forward to doing more author-interviews in 2016.

The 10 ‘First Novels,’ some of which I had read before, were:

01. In Bitter Chill by Sarah Ward, 2015
02. The Thirteenth Day by Aditya Iyengar, 2015
03. Noble Beginnings by L.T. Ryan, 2012
04. Run Girl by Eva Hudson, 2014
05. America, America by Elia Kazan, 1962
06. No Orchids for Miss Blandish by James Hadley Chase, 1939
07. The Case of the Velvet Claws by Erle Stanley Gardner, 1933
08. The Sheriff and His Partner by Frank Harris, 1891
09. War Against the Mafia by Don Pendleton, 1969
10. The Hardy Boys: The Tower Treasure, 1927

I also read some interesting short stories, including:

01. The Blood of the Fallen by James Reasoner, 2002
02. Harvest of War by Charles Gramlich, 2012
03. Blackskull’s Captive by Tom Doolan, 2012
04. First Offense by Evan Hunter, 1955
05. The Spider by Hanns Heinz Ewers, 1915
06. The Fog Horn by Ray Bradbury, 1951
07. Gladiator by Philip Wylie, 1930

You can read all the reviews under the ‘Rewind’ button on the right.

The other highlight of the year was my interview with prolific writer James Reasoner based on his fascinating story The Blood of the Fallen, an alternate history about Lincoln. I plan to read his westerns and historical fiction in future.

I will finish on a solemn note by remembering my dear blog friend Ron Scheer who passed away last April. He was very supportive of my blog and gave me a new perspective on westerns, or frontier fiction as he called it. I miss him.

Reading Habits #17: How many books do you read at a time?

Since I started blogging nearly six years ago, I have been reading a minimum of two to three books at a time. However, I don’t finish them all at the same time. Some spill over into next week or next month, and even next year. 

As of today, I think I have three or four half-read books going back to 2012 and 2013. Frankly, I'm not even sure how many. I could attribute it to a case of out of sight, out of mind, but I can’t because I see them almost every day, on my bookshelf or on my tab, the bookmarks still in place.

I have not learnt my reading lesson. I still read two to three books. I'm currently reading The Accused by Harold R. Daniels (hardboiled), Air Force One is Down by John Denis, Alistair MacLean John Edwards and Denis Frost in real life (thriller), and Me Tanner, You Jane by Lawrence Block (spy). So far I have read thirty-odd pages of all three novels. They are easy to read and comprehend. 

However, reading so many books at a time can be disorienting, especially when you are jumping from the plot and characters of one book to another within a span of half an hour. This morning, for instance, I read six pages of my paper edition of the Block novel and then immediately read six pages of the MacLean ebook. It didn't help. I had to go back a few pages to recall the story and the characters. As I read, characters from Daniels' noir novel popped into my head.

This is the reading equivalent of tailgating on the road. You know what that’s like and how annoying it can be for the driver in the front car. He’d be cursing, “Get off my back!” I guess that’s pretty much how the first book I'm reading must feel. "Maintain book discipline!" Too many books spoil the plot.

How many books do you read at a time?

Reading Habits #16: Reading out of peanut paper

A Reading Habits post is long overdue. The last one, The bitter taste of my tablet, appeared on October 28. I still read, of course; I just haven’t been writing about how I read, or in this case where and what I read.

It’d surprise non-Indian readers to know that, in India, you can actually read a story or an essay out of peanut paper. By that I don’t mean reading the literature on a packet of peanuts or something written on peanut paper; not that there is such a thing as peanut paper, although we do have something called butter paper (parchment paper) used in craft.

Here’s how it works. A fistful of roasted peanuts is one of the cheapest and healthiest street foods you get in Bombay (Mumbai) and elsewhere. In my city it costs Rs.3 to 5 ($0.05 to 0.08), the minimum price these days. Roadside hawkers use a small measure and serve it to you in a cylindrical cone made out of paper. The cone has a wide open mouth at the top and a closed pointed tip at the bottom. Imagine a miniature tornado.

This is the “peanut paper” I'm referring to. The paper could be anything, like a piece of newspaper or magazine, a page out of a school or college textbook or notebook, a cutout from an annual report or a red herring prospectus, or a leaf out of an old diary.

After eating your peanuts, you unroll the wrapper and read what’s on it. You’d be surprised the things you get to read, even if it’s incomplete. I have variously read a poem such as Milton’s Paradise Lost, an algebraic formula, a director’s report, an essay by G.B. Shaw, a company balance sheet, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and Moby Dick, to give you an idea. Sometimes the peanut paper is in other Indian languages like Hindi or Marathi.

Reading your “peanut paper” is a very old habit and I have yet to see one who throws it away without as much as a glance at it. Sometimes if you’re eating in a group then you compare your wrappers and find that you've all been eating out of the same book. And sometimes, you exclaim, “Hey, we studied this in school!” and then you crush the paper into a ball and toss it over your shoulder.

Unlike other street snacks, “peanut paper” remains clean after you polish off the peanuts. It’s mainly an after office hours snack though you can have it at any time of the day. They taste best in the rains. What it does is it educates and entertains you, however briefly, and kills your appetite till you reach home and have your dinner.

A slightly bigger paper cone is also used to serve sing (peanuts) and chana (chickpea) mixed with kurmura (puffed rice), small onion and tomato cubes, a shot of lime, a pinch of salt, and seasoned with a little powdered spice. It’s called chaat or bhel, a very popular snack that roughly means hotchpotch. Instead of eating with a spoon, you scoop up the concoction with a round puri (hard unleavened bread made from wheat flour) or a square piece of card paper, depending on how well-heeled the singwalla or bhelwalla is.

The sing-chana vendors are a common sight along the seafront, on beaches, and other tourist spots. They carry their stuff in a large circular wicker basket or metal container slung round their necks. Others sit along street corners, in narrow bylanes or outside railway stations, their sing-chana either heaped on a flat wood surface or stored in neat open compartments. They do brisk business.

The way I see it, you can eat and read out of your hand.

P.S.: I don’t have a picture of a sing-chana vendor but you can type “peanut seller” or “chanawala” in Google images and you’ll see what I'm talking about.

Reading Habits #15: The bitter taste of my tablet

I didn’t see any movies over the long Diwali weekend, and regrettably, will have to skip today’s Overlooked Films at Todd Mason’s blog Sweet Freedom. But I’ll be heading over there to read other contributions.

© Wikimedia Commons

Meanwhile, my mind is troubled by something else—the grim possibility that I may have to use my tablet sparingly or not use it at all for some time. It all depends on how my fingers and hands behave, on the pain and the stiffness caused by holding the tablet in my left hand and using my right forefinger to flip apps and pages.

The tablet is sleek and it weighs a bit, which I realised only after my fingers started aching. The pain and stiffness goes away if I don't use the tablet for a while. That seldom happens. The lure of the tablet is too strong.

Doctors have a term for pain induced by prolonged use of gadgets and electronic devices like tablets, smartphones, and laptops—RSI or repetitive strain injury. They label everything, don’t they? Like jam bottles. They warn me that if I don’t take preventive action now, then I'm heading for chronic pain—in my hands and fingers due to my tablet and in my neck and back due to my laptop and desktop computer.

Apparently, placing your tablet, iPad or laptop on your lap is no solution for you are still holding the gadgets by your hand, using your fingers, and stretching your neck and back like an ostrich.

The last thing I want to do is carp about my carpal and replace my Samsung tablet with my doctor’s tablet.

So here’s what I plan to do: I’ll go back to reading my yellowed and dog-eared secondhand books. The current ratio is one physical book for four ebooks, which explains my stiff neck and fingers. I’ll try and reverse the order. That way I can keep the orthopaedic away and put off arthritis by a few more years.

But do I hear the ophthalmologist already knocking?

Reading Habits #14: Does anyone talk books anymore?

In the week that saw closing showers and Thor’s wrath, conjunctivitis in the family, a midnight trip to the airport, problems over water supply, a dental appointment, car and medical insurance, and job deadlines and office sendoffs, this is what I have been thinking about.

In the seventies I discussed the Hardy Boys, the Secret Seven, and the Three Investigators with many of my school friends. In the eighties I talked about popular fiction with a few college mates. In the nineties I conferred about philosophical literature with two colleagues who shared my interest. In-between, there were intermittent exchanges about comic books.

In the first decade of this century I have not had a meaningful discussion about books with anyone.

But in just the past four years I have gone berserk “talking” about books, even showing off about books, with all my blog friends. Those four years have wiped out the book-talk deficit of the previous four decades.

Finally, a door to the mind’s library opened and I’m happily lost somewhere inside the giant labyrinth of books that we read and write about on our blogs every day. I'd like to think that blogging is god's 21st century gift to book lovers.

Of course, over the past two decades and more I have been discussing books with my wife, whose main interests lie in the Classics, Agatha Christie, and P.G. Wodehouse, among others, and later with my grown-up daughter who reads weighty books that include fantasy.

Both are wise and serious readers. They read one book at a time and finish it before picking up another. I read three books at a time and finish none. First I hoard books on my shelf and then I hoard them in my mind, dog-eared at the halfway mark of my intellect and no further.

My point is does anyone read and talk books outside the blog world anymore? Do you have to join public libraries, book clubs, and writing workshops to discuss books with others who read them as well? Is chucking anti-social smart phones really the solution to getting people to read books again and, hopefully, talking about them? Would it help if I collared a few people and forced books into their hands? Do I miss the old and informal way of talking about books?

Quite frankly, do I even need answers to these questions when I have you all, my fellow readers and bloggers, to discuss books with?

Reading Habits #13: Back of the book

My copy of the book

First question

Does the synopsis on the back cover help you decide whether to read a book or not?

In my case it does if I don’t know who the author is or if I'm familiar but not quite or if I'm reading his or her book for the first time. However, I’d make an immediate exception if the book is a western or espionage in which case I couldn’t care less if the back cover was ripped off.

It doesn’t if I'm really familiar with the author and I have read and liked his or her books. To give you an idea, I won’t turn the book over if it is a P.G. Wodehouse, Jack Higgins, A.J. Cronin, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Oliver Strange, John le Carré, Agatha Christie, John Irving, Louis L'Amour, Kurt Vonnegut or Erle Stanley Gardner because I have read and enjoyed many of their novels and know exactly how they will tickle me.

Second question

Do you have a favourite or a memorable blurb or summary, one that you remember?

I remember only one and it has stayed with me since I read the novel when I was sixteen. Not surprisingly, it is a western—The Marshal of Lawless by British writer Oliver Strange whose ten books take you through the adventures of his hero James Green alias Sudden, the Texas outlaw. He is not an outlaw and earns the nickname because he is fast with his twin guns. The ‘Sudden’ series is my favourite western.

This is what the back cover of The Marshal of Lawless says.

“Being Marshal of Lawless is plain suicide!” That's what they told the young fellow who applied for the job. They figured that anyone who had hocked his horse, his saddle and his guns to get money for liquor, was not the kind of man who could hold down one of the toughest towns in the West. But then the young stranger redeemed his guns and strapped them on. Lawless looked again. “Gentlemen, hush!” said one inhabitant. “A man has come to town!”

One of the reasons why I like James Green is because of his near flawless character. He is just, brave, honest, friendly, caring, intelligent, and a dogged fighter. His quest for two men who cheated the man who raised him makes him bitter but he doesn’t show it as he quietly goes about fulfilling a promise he made to the dying man. Nor does it stop him from going to the aid of people in the towns and ranches he visits, and making friends along the way. His deeds speak for the kind of person he is. Green is modest as he seldom reveals that he is United States Deputy Marshal. In short, he is a man who wears a badge on his pocket and honour on his sleeve.

How about you?

For previous Reading Habits, see under ‘Labels’.

Reading Habits #12: Sex in fiction

Are you still comfortable reading about sex in fiction? I say “still” because as I grow older and possibly more mature as a reader, I find that it doesn't make a difference any more. To the best of my knowledge, I haven't read a raunchy novel in over a decade. However, I have been reading books with a touch of romance or suggestive of sexual intimacy, but nothing explicit.

One reason for the absence of any kind of titillating stuff on my bookshelf or on my tablet is the change in my reading habits, hopefully, for the better. I read more classics and vintage books now while the crime and hardboiled fiction of the mid to late 20th century and modern novels that I occasionally delve into have little or no sex. Maybe, I'm not reading the right kind of books.

This does not mean that I haven’t read my share of adult literature in my younger days. While in school, I quickly graduated from Hardy Boys, Enid Blyton, and Just William to the popular and “sleazy” novels of Harold Robbins and Irving Wallace, to the dismay of an uncle who said I was too young to read the two worthies—“Wait till you are at least twenty.” That's four years away! Instead, he recommended A.J. Cronin and Frank G. Slaughter. I'm glad he did for I enjoy reading their books till today.

The mass appeal of Robbins lay in his stories, told in plain English, and in his next-door middle-class characters who lost their virginity no sooner they reached puberty. His A Stone for Danny Fisher where a tragic young man dreams big in a crooked world and 79, Park Avenue where a beautiful young girl is forced to become a prostitute when everyone begins to treat her like one, are among his better-known novels. Never Love A Stranger, The Lonely Lady, and Dreams Die First are also entertaining.

Wallace wrote some decent novels, too, but The Celestial Bed based on sex therapy and technique is not one of them. I’d recommend The Man in which a black man becomes President of the United States and The Second Lady, a Cold War political thriller where the KGB kidnaps the US First Lady and replaces her with a Soviet impostor. More on the latter.

Everything goes smoothly for the impostor till it’s time for the inevitable, making love with the President, who has absolutely no clue that the woman sharing his bed is not his real wife. I think initially she spurns his overtures. While the KGB has got everything sorted out, it clearly forgot to take care of that little intimate detail between POTUS and FLOTUS.

The clever “hero” on the KGB side is attracted to the captive First Lady and falls in love with her in what is a one-sided affair. But he is a ruthless professional—the state before self and all that. So to protect his girlfriend’s identity in the White House, he must find out how the President’s wife performs in bed and pass on the information to her. He does the obvious: he sleeps with her. Now the First Lady wasn't born yesterday. She loves her husband and realises that the only way to expose the fraud in her bedroom is to have sex with the KGB agent in a way she and the President never did. Throw off the enemy agent on one hand and arouse her husband’s suspicion on the other. Does it work?

If ever I've read a graphic account of sex in fiction in my teens, it’s in those four to five pages of The Second Lady which has a very ingenious, even if outlandish, plot, and an entirely unexpected ending.

Later, I read most of the titles under English writer René Lodge Brabazon Raymond’s famous pseudonym, James Hadley Chase, and discovered the deceptive covers of his crime paperbacks—semi-nudes on the cover, barely a kiss inside. What a letdown. But Chase told good stories. I liked the ones about cops the most.


For previous Reading Habits, see under ‘Labels’.

Reading Habits #11: Who did you read in school?

A few days ago, I visited ‘Landmark’ in my suburb. It's a leading chain of bookstores owned by one of India’s largest business houses. I was browsing through the books, with no intention of buying any, when I saw Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw in the Classics section. I’ve had an affinity for Shaw and his writing ever since I studied an abridged essay in high school. I don’t recall the title but I remember being highly impressed by his prose.

Many years later, Autobiography of Anthony Trollope by the English author had the same effect on me. This is how Trollope opens up on his life in the first chapter…

“In writing these pages, which, for the want of a better name, I shall be fain to call the autobiography of so insignificant a person as myself, it will not be so much my intention to speak of the little details of my private life, as of what I, and perhaps others round me, have done in literature; of my failures and successes such as they have been, and their causes; and of the opening which a literary career offers to men and women for the earning of their bread. And yet the garrulity of old age, and the aptitude of a man's mind to recur to the passages of his own life, will, I know, tempt me to say something of myself...”

The only way to enjoy reading the above passage, and the rest of the book, is to read it very slowly, pausing at just the right moment and then reading again, all along feeling and absorbing the rich texture of each word and sentence. Rapid reading simply won’t do with Trollope here.

The sighting of Pygmalion, which I also had in school, brought back memories of some of the finest essays, stories, and poems I’d the privilege of studying from my English textbooks. Until the late eighties, I think, English as a school subject was influenced by English literature based on a pattern of British curriculum. The textbooks have since been Indianised, in terms of both writer and content, and while they have retained some of the English and American literary heritage, they’re not the same anymore.

Who else did I read back in school? As far as I can recollect, besides Shaw, there was Chekhov, Kipling, Buck, Dickens, Maupassant, Shelley, Blackmore, Wilde, Sewell, Melville, Hugo, Bunyan, Swift, Doyle, Shakespeare, Twain, Verne, Carroll, and Dumas.

The best I can recall from my school days are the poems—Death Be Not Proud by John Donne, O Captain! My Captain! by Walt Whitman, Paradise Lost by John Milton, Daffodils (or ‘I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud’) by William Wordsworth, and The Lord of the Isles by Sir Walter Scott. I loved them but don’t ask me to recite from by heart.

A word about Charles Dickens and Mark Twain: for some inexplicable reason, I want to re-read Pickwick Papers and A Tale of Two Cities, and Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. I delight in the mere thought of being able to read these books again.

Are there books that do this to you? Who did you enjoy reading in school?

For previous Reading Habits, see under 'Labels'

Reading Habits #10: Controversial books

I’m currently reading a historical fiction about WWII by a writer who has been accused of never having written it. Do I continue to read it? I know I will because the book is so fascinating in a shocking and terrifying way that I can’t stop now.

The book is The Legion of the Damned, 1957, the first of several WWII novels written by Sven Hassel, a controversial Danish-born writer. His novels have been compared to pulp fiction.

The accuser is Erik Haaest, an equally controversial Danish journalist who apparently hated Sven Hassel and denounced all his books on several grounds.

Both Hassel and Haaest died in 2012.

The Legion of the Damned (‘Fordømtes Legion’ in Danish) is the first-person account of a deserter in the German Army narrated over years. It begins with his arrest by the dreaded SS and incarceration in a concentration camp and later transfer to a penal concentration camp where he is trained like an animal to fight on the Russian front. Anyone who is held captive in a penal camp is better off dead. Not half-dead, but dead. The deserter is a courageous German soldier who is put through weeks of brutal and inhuman training with little water, food or sleep. After the training, which is described in graphic detail, our “hero” is posted to a penal battalion that must fight a terrifying war through Europe and the Russian front. The deserter wears a uniform adorned with ordinary unit badges. He is not entitled to other ribbons even if he has earned them.

I’m still on page 59 of the 186-page novel. In just those pages I have asked myself a dozen times: how can any man treat another like this? Yet they did, in this war and in every other war, or genocide, before and after.

Sven Hassel tells us that the narrator of The Legion of the Damned is none other than Sven himself who came back from the war and recounted his experiences through fourteen translated books which sold very well in the sixties and seventies. He has been forgotten since then.

Hassel’s literary success was, however, marred by the controversy: Erik Haaest, whose father was involved with the Danish Resistance, believed that Hassel never went to war, that he stayed put in occupied Denmark, spoke to those who actually fought the war on the Russian front, had the first book ghostwritten, and got his wife to write the rest. Not only that, Haaest was also convinced that Sven was actually Børge Pedersen, a member of the auxiliary Danish police force created by the Gestapo. Apparently, Hassel did not deny he was Pedersen. 

Although the internet gives some credence to Haaest’s version, there is no evidence that Hassel, described as an anti-war writer, did not author the books and tell the world his frightening wartime stories.

For the reader there is a way out of the dilemma: if you even remotely believe Erik Haaest’s account, then read the book as war fiction. All of Sven Hassel's novels, translated into some twenty-five languages and sold in the millions, were immensely popular and at least some of them need to be read. I'm basing my opinion on 59 pages and just this one book.

But would you read a book whose authorship is questioned? I would in this case.


For previous Reading Habits, see under Labels.

Reading Habits #9: Do you surprise your readers?

© Prashant C. Trikannad

On my blog I seldom review books I write about before I read them, because they lose their novelty irrespective of what I may have to say about them later. There is no surprise element. A reader or visitor knows what to possibly expect, not that public memory is long. Still, I like reading books and short stories that most people might have forgotten about or might not have been aware of. Those are the ones I like reviewing too. My reviews of Public Murders, a crime fiction by Bill Granger, and short stories by Fanny Stevenson, wife of Robert Louis Stevenson, and John Philip Sousa, a renowned presidential musician, created a mild but welcome ripple.

Last week, I picked up three used paperbacks in good condition—Early Autumn by Robert B. Parker, who, according to The Boston Globe, has taken his place beside Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and Ross Macdonald; The House That Jack Built, a Matthew Hope mystery, by Ed McBain; and Cast a Long Shadow, a Bandolero western, by Wayne D. Overholser. The McBain novel is No.13 in my collection; I haven't read the other twelve yet. While I’m familiar with McBain and Overholser, having read their novels previously, I have not read anything by Parker, the noted American crime fiction writer who created Detective Spenser. I’m looking forward to it. I'll be reading these novels but I won't be reviewing them.

Hiking or trekking, we walk off the beaten track; I apply the same principle to reading and reviewing. How about you?

Reading Habits #8: 12 questions about blogs

1. What is your motivation for reading other blogs?
Me: I have two reasons: one, getting to know other likeminded bloggers (I have more blog friends than real friends), and two, a shared interest in books and films (I have learned a lot about both over the past few years). Although I haven't personally met any of my fellow-bloggers, I feel like I have known them for a long time. It has been a fruitful blog journey so far.

2. Do you visit other blogs out of a sense of obligation?
Me: Yes and no. I visit several blogs during the week, some more often than others depending on the content and time on my hand. First, I make it a point to visit those blogs whose owners visit mine, a sort of quid pro quo, as most things in life are. Then, I visit bloggers who don't usually hop over to mine; I like to read what they post though I may not leave a comment. Conversely, other bloggers whose blogs I don’t look up regularly visit mine, and I appreciate that. Finally, I visit random blogs that come up during “search” on the internet or in “comments” on other blogs. I visit these blogs on a one-off basis though I may “follow” them later.

3. Do you at times skip blogs that you frequent or follow?
Me: I do, sometimes because I genuinely forget and sometimes because of a serious lack of time. Besides, there are indefatigable bloggers who post faster than I can visit, read, comment, captcha, and exit the first time. I don't know how they do it and I say this with not a little envy. I find getting out of the bed in the morning easier than getting a post out of the way.

4. Do you read the entire post on other blogs or do you skim through and get the essence of it?
Me: I read the entire post from top to bottom even if my interest is waning, my coffee's getting cold, I'm missing a deadline or I'm running late for the 8.23 am train to work, and you know how important those last three things are.

5. Do you always leave a comment every time you visit another blog?
Me: Mostly I do and if I don't, it’s because I have nothing concrete to say. Sometimes I like a post very much but I genuinely don't know what to say. There have been times when I have left a comment and wondered later if I'd said too much or too little, too smart or too dumb, sounded too zealous or what.

6. Are you completely honest in your comments on other blogs?
Me: Almost always. But when I’m saying good things about a post, I’m not being polite, I actually mean it.

7. After reading a review of a book by a fellow-blogger, do you really mean it when you say that you're going to add it to your growing TBR pile?
Me: ‘I’m going to add it to my TBR pile’ is probably the most done-to-death line in blog comments. I mean it when I say it, but I never say when I’m going to read it. I make a mental note. Generally, on a scale of 1 to 10, my score is a poor two, maybe one and a half, which isn’t bad considering the sheer number of “new” authors and books I read about on other blogs every week. My intent is good.

8. Are you impressed or intimidated by what other bloggers post?
Me: I'm both impressed and intimidated. I'm impressed by the kind of books and films my fellow-bloggers review, not to mention the way they review them, and intimated by the superior knowledge and understanding they bring to those reviews.

9. What do you like reading most on other blogs?
Me: Let’s take books. I like reading about miscellaneous stuff, like a blogger’s or an author’s writing process or a visit to a vintage bookstore or new additions to the TBR pile or who is reading what, and then there are the reviews.

10. Do you speak the way you write on your blog?
Me: Not always, sometimes I blow up my writing. For instance, I may use certain words or terms that I'm never likely to use in a conversation. In my answer to Q3 I used the word "indefatigable;" in speech, I'd use the word "tireless," it's easier on the tongue. I take creative liberties.

11. Does your blog reflect the kind of person you are?
Me: Mostly, yes. For example, when I overreact or get carried away in my own posts or in my comments on other blogs, that’s me. I have a rather exaggerated disposition towards most things but as I have been saying all along, I mean it.

12. Are you proud of your blog and do you show off?
Me: I’m and I do. What do you think this post is all about!

All answers submitted by me in this post are true to the best of my knowledge and disbelief. What are your answers like?


For the previous seven Reading Habits, including an animated conversation between a paperback and a hardback, look under Labels.

Reading Habits #7: How do you treat your books?

© Prashant C. Trikannad

“My spine is hurting,” the paperback said from the bed. “I think I may have torn something.”

“A page or two, perhaps," said the hardback sandwiched between a Dostoyevsky and a George Eliot on the bookshelf. "What happened?"

“Slept badly, I guess.”

“Wide open and face up, or down?” the hardback inquired politely.

“Wide open and face down. That’s the third night in a row I've been mishandled. This morning I heard the birds singing outside the window and when I opened my eyes I couldn't see a thing. It was pitch black. I panicked. I thought I’d gone blind. And then, suddenly, there was a dazzling light. I saw that the housemaid had lifted the pillow.”

“So you spent the night under a pillow.”

“Yes, I did. To be honest with you, I actually liked it. It was cozy and warm. The pillow was white, clean, and smelled of lilies.

“Lilies?” the hardback raised his eyebrows. “Who did you say you were?”

“I never said who I was. Anyway, since you are asking now, the name’s Scruffy. And you are?

“The Mapmaker. I belong to Frank G. Slaughter,” the hardback said. “Why lilies?”

“Oh, I don't know, I like flowers.”

The hardback straightened up. “I know who you are. You are Paul Gallico’s, aren't you? The same fellow whose Poseidon Adventure short-changed you.”

“He did not short-change me!” the paperback said, indignantly. “I came way before Poseidon. Had it not been for the movie…”

“Are you feeling better?” The Mapmaker, who was also a peacemaker, quickly changed the topic.

“Why, what’s wrong with me?”

“You said your back was hurting.”

“Oh yes, I did, and it’s still hurting and that’s because I was lying open and spreadeagled all night. It’s easy for you stiff-backs. Look at Fyodor next to you, straight as a ramrod.”

The Mapmaker was about to say something nasty but let it pass. Instead, he said quietly, “Who’s reading you, Scruffy?”

“Some college kid who doesn't know how to read me or treat me. You’re fortunate his mother is reading you. She cares for you, doesn't she?”

“She certainly does, like she cares for her plants, her cats, her children, and her husband. So how does this kid treat you?”

“Well, last night and the night before and the night before that I was flopped over his sweaty and smelly face for like an hour, maybe more, and then he picked me up and shoved me under his pillow.”

“The same pillow that smells like lilies?”

“The same pillow. Thank god, the housemaid changes the cover every morning.”

“How much has he read of you?”

“Seventeen pages! Can you believe it? I’m only 288 and I’m very funny and he’s been at me for two weeks. Why doesn't the kid just give up on me?,” Scruffy wailed.

“Scruffy, 288 is a lot for a kid who hasn't read much. I mean, you're not the best or easiest of reads.”

“And I suppose you are, Mr. Mapmaker, with your navigational nose for latitudes and longitudes,” he snarled.

“Scruffy, I’m more than latitudes and…”

“That’s not all,” Scruffy cut in rudely. “Look at me, I’m torn, I’m dog-eared, I've been nibbled at, I’m shapeless, I've been scribbled all over, and I feel like I've been dipped in ketchup. This is NO WAY to treat a book or read a book,” he shouted hysterically. 'Tell me, Mr. Navigator, would you treat your maps like this?”

“I'm not just a navigator,” the Mapmaker hissed under his breath. He stared at Scruffy and muttered to himself, “Why am I talking to a monkey?” He folded up his jackets, rested his head against Eliot's shoulder, and closed his eyes.

© Prashant C. Trikannad, 2014

Note: For previous Reading Habits, see under Labels.

Reading Habits #6: Reading on the railway

8.20 am: I miss the 8.15 local by a few minutes. I am on platform No.2 at Andheri station waiting to board the 8.23 local to Churchgate in the south. I remove my earphones and my tablet from my bag—do I listen to music or do I read? As I make up my mind the loudspeaker crackles to life and I hear a familiar but depressing voice: “The slow train arriving on platform No.2 at 23 minutes past eight has been cancelled. Inconvenience caused to passengers is highly regretted.”

The lifeline of Mumbai.

© Prashant C. Trikannad

8.25 am: The next local is at 8.36 am. Will it be on time? Is it even scheduled today? My fingers are crossed. I put away the earphones and open the tablet and tap on the book reader, to page 42 of A Noose for the Desperado by Clifton Adams. I read about 19-year old rebel gunman Talbert ‘Tall’ Cameron's daring takeover of a band of outlaws in Ocotillo, a shady town in Arizona, and his plan to ambush a train smuggling silver across the Mexican border. The loudspeaker crackles again, this time with a repetitive public warning—“Overhead wires are charged at 25,000 volts. Travelling on rooftop is highly dangerous. Passengers are requested not to travel on rooftop.”

8.41 am: The 8.36 enters the platform. Even as it comes to a halt, commuters rush into the train and occupy all the seats. When the dust settles the arriving passengers get off the local and rush to the staircase. I enter the coach and stand in the aisle with my back to the stainless steel partition. As the train pulls out at 8.45, nine minutes late but early for once, I hear the loudspeaker intone, "The slow train arriving on platform No.2 at 57 minutes past eight has been cancelled. Inconvenience caused to passengers is highly regretted."

8.48: I look around the compartment. I spot a couple of known faces and we nod at each other. A few commuters are dozing off. Some are reading newspapers. Still others are fiddling with their mobile phones. Two people are reading books, one Dan Brown's Inferno and the other the Indian epic Ramayana. I put away my tab and listen to music; I plug into Elvis Presley. It will be some other singer on the return journey in the evening.

Inside the first-class coach of the 9 am Bandra-Churchgate local.
© Prashant C. Trikannad 

8.57 am: Three stations later, the train pulls into Bandra. I alight and walk across to the other side of the same platform and hop into the 9 am Bandra local. It is almost empty. I find a window seat. I open a book, AN.AL – The Origins, by Indian writer Athul Demarco and read the last chapter so I can review it. Some people get in and I look up and acknowledge their greetings. Only two men are reading anything at all; the rest are doing nothing, looking nowhere, in particular.

9.09 am: At Dadar, a major station, scores of transit commuters with haversacks and shoulder bags crash into the first-class coach and stand in the aisle so they can get off at the next two stations, the city's new business districts. After just two pages of Demarco’s novel, I lose interest, not in the book but in reading further. I reopen the tab and play a game of chess with alien software; I lose badly. 

The local leaves Marines Lines.

© Prashant C. Trikannad

9.35 am: Marine Lines, the last station before Churchgate. Before I alight I put away my book and my tab safely. I step on to the platform, walk out of the station, and proceed to my office a few blocks away, with Losing My Religion by REM playing in my ears.

And I wonder why I don’t read enough books every month.

Reading Habits #5: The Ten Commandments

And Apollo spoke all these words, saying, I am the god of knowledge and intellect who brought you out of ignorance, out of illiteracy, out of apathy.

The Ten Commandments of Moses
by Anton Losenko
© Wikimedia Commons

You shall have no other pursuits, neither movies or music nor chess, before books.

You shall not bow down to more than three books at a time; for we the authors of the three books would be annoyed if you leave them half-read.

You shall not take the name of the writer in vain; for the writer will not hold you guiltless for taking his name in vain but not reading his book.

Six days you shall read, and do all your writing. But the seventh day is the Sabbath: in it you shall not do any work, except read again.

Honour your books and your comics so that your days may be long upon the land of bookstores and libraries that Apollo is giving you.

You shall not tear, mutilate, fold, and dog-ear your books, nor write or scribble on them.

You shall not commit adultery and remain loyal to your books.

You shall not steal someone else’s books or buy more than you can read, nor hoard them. 

You shall not bear false witness against your fellow readers and bloggers.

You shall not covet your fellow-blogger’s bookshelf, or his books, or his blog, or his posts, or his style, or his hits and visits, or anything that is your fellow blogger’s.

Thank you, every one of you, for your very generous support through your visits and comments in 2013. The 3Cs wishes you and your families a very happy and satisfying new year; a year also filled with lots of books as well as the time and the pleasure of reading and reviewing them all through the year.


Note: For the previous four Reading Habits, look under Labels.

Reading Habits #4: Author, Writer, Novel, Book

Read what you can, when you can, wherever you can.

Are you reading a novel or a book and is it written by an author or a writer? As questions go, this is an unintelligent one, I admit. Do not answer if you think I’m insulting yours. Still, I’m curious. I spent my formative years thinking novels were written by authors and books were penned by writers. One was fiction, the other non-fiction. I read them that way. 

The line between novels and books and authors and writers—assuming there really was one—got blurred around the turn of the century when novels came to be increasingly referred to as books written by people who could be either authors or writers. Over the years the internet, and specifically blogs, has more or less obliterated the line that, I suspect, only I could see. Now I often refer to a work of fiction as a book. It sounds more cerebral. Inversely, non-fiction can never be a novel. It will always remain a book.

Looking back, I used to think that anything that told a fictitious story was a novel. All paperbacks, be it pulp or popular fiction, fell in that category. Everything else was a book, such as a book on history or economics, a book of stamps or coins, a record book or a book of account, the Bhagavad Gita or the Bible, a dictionary or an encyclopaedia, a rule book, a book of recipes, and so on and so forth.

Yet, there were grey areas, like Shakespeare, the Classics, and humour. The Twelve Works of the famous bard was a book, a volume actually. Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice is more a book than a novel. And P.G. Wodehouse wrote humourous stories and books. Although works of fiction, they are best referred to as books.

My thinking, thus, may have been the result of the disdain with which novels were looked upon, outside of the family. “Oh, you’re reading a novel. Which one?” And when you showed the cover, “You’re reading a Chase, I see. Have you read Nehru’s Discovery of India? You’ll learn much from this brilliantly written book.” You'd think I was reading erotica.

The dilemma hasn't resolved fully when I think of The Lord of the Rings by Tolkien and Harry Potter by Rowling. Novel or book, author or writer? I think I’ll just sit quietly and read.


Noted author James Reasoner has written an interesting post on his Favourite Reading Spots over at his blog Rough Edges.


For previous Reading Habits, look under ‘Labels’