Sunday, September 20, 2009
Gift from Son to Mother-Rendezvous With P.G.Wodehouse
Wear the old coat and buy the new book - Austin Phelps
Last Saturday one of my neighbors called up to help her procure a copy of the book “David Copperfield”. “Can you get it for me from one of the book stores on your way back from office”. By then I was already home. “ you are forgetting , today is Saturday and we have half day office. I am already home. I will get it for you on Monday” I replied. “Oh no” came the disappointed response from the other side. “ I want it today only and I have checked in the local book store. They do not have a copy in the local book store and it is not there in our library as well. Some one has already issued it”. I just could not understand the urgency on her part to get hold of the book . "But what is the hurry. What is the problem if we get it on Monday?” I asked baffled. “Problem is of 10 Marks” She answered. Then she told me the whole story. It seems in her daughter’s school they had asked the children of a specific class to read the said novel during their summer vacation . In case children did not obey, they were threatened with a question carrying 10 Marks in their literature paper from the novel. Since Monday was the D-day of literature test, my neighbor was frantically looking for the book. I was really impressed with the way the school was trying to force reading habits in children because the children and more than them the parents understood only the language of MARKS. But I could not help feeling bad for the children all the same. If they are not reading books outside their course books, they are missing out on one of the greatest pleasures of life. There can be simply no substitute to reading.
After I spoke to her I remembered one incidence which one of my colleagues had narrated few months back when we were coming from our office library after returning a book. It seems her niece and nephew had come to Calcutta during the summer vacation and my colleague had kept a few new books as gifts for the kids. But the kids did not seem to think much about books as gifts. As the vacation advanced , kids were getting restless. My colleague suggested them to read the books during their vacation in Calcutta. After reading a few pages each, both the kids came up to my colleague and started saying reluctantly “Aunty we have completed one chapter from the book. Can we do the rest tomorrow?” My colleague said she was flabbergasted. The way the children were reacting, as if they had been given a home work or some daunting task to be got over with instead of an entertaining and enjoyable experience. “What is happening to the kids of this generation ? Why is the reading habit fading away?” she asked the billion pound question.
While trying to give an answer to the issue she had raised, I could not help reminiscing about my kid-hood and adolescence days. I think we were more fortunate at least in one respect from the kids of today. We did not have so many distractions in the form of Satellite Television, Mobile Phones, PCs and Laptop Computers loaded with games, internet connection allowing connectivity with millions through social networking sites like orkut or facebook. There were no Gameboys , Xbox, Nintendo or PSPs during our time. Since I was brought up in a medium size town in Orissa, we had first exposure to television or Door Darshan only during the 1984 Olympics. Even Door Darshan apart from 'Krishi Darshan' and 'aapke khat' had very few things to offer. One Hindi movie per week, 2 Chitrahhars on Wednesday And Friday and one serial per day was all that was palatable in DD’s menu. So books were my best companion from childhood days. From Grandma’s stories to Amar Chitra Katha, from Aesop’s Fable to Panchatantra and Jataka Tales, from Enid Blyton to Agatha Christie, Sherlock Holmes to Classics I was graduating from one step to another in the company of my favourite books and authors. Once I stepped over to my adolescence days, choice of books and authors changed to George Orwell , Fredrick Forsyth, Alistair MacLean , Jeffrey Archer and so on…Then one day in hostel one of my friends lent me “Right ho Jeeves” by the comic genius P.G.Wodehouse and I got hooked to the Wodehousean style of Humour. Till date I just can not get enough of the foppish Bertie Wooster and his valet cum keeper , the inimitable jeeves carrying on with feudal spirits , of the eccentric Ermsworth constantly being given a trying time by his sister constance or of the tyranny of the formidable aunts Agatha and Dahlia. The oldest member recounting the golf course stories, stories of suave charming Psmith (P silent) , eternal day dreamer Ukridge , Mr. Mulliner’s nephews and the flamboyant Uncle Fred still take me to a different world. The list is endless and Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, who according to many was one of the greatest authors of first part of 20th Century has remained my most favorite author. Like the short stories of O’Henry, P.G.Wodehouse’s idyllic world is evergreen , ever fresh.
Coming back to present, after these two incidences, I decided to introduce literary works of great authors to my son ,so that he had wide literary exposure . Luckily he reads a lot and enjoys reading as much as watching TV or playing games if not more. So when we went for his birthday shopping, among others I bought two omnibus editions of Jeeves series and Blandings series by P.G.Wodehouse as birth day presents for my son and hubby. I was not sure whether my son at such a young age would be able to appreciate the Jeeves stories or not. But none the less I wanted to give it a try. And to my pleasant surprise, he started reading the book even before I could formally gift it to him and seems to be enjoying every bit of it. He has almost finished half of it (some times he even misses his favorite tv serial to read) and is waiting to read the other one after I gift it to his father. Today is his birthday; and he has given me again a gift on this special day by appreciating the work of one of the great authors of all times....
After I spoke to her I remembered one incidence which one of my colleagues had narrated few months back when we were coming from our office library after returning a book. It seems her niece and nephew had come to Calcutta during the summer vacation and my colleague had kept a few new books as gifts for the kids. But the kids did not seem to think much about books as gifts. As the vacation advanced , kids were getting restless. My colleague suggested them to read the books during their vacation in Calcutta. After reading a few pages each, both the kids came up to my colleague and started saying reluctantly “Aunty we have completed one chapter from the book. Can we do the rest tomorrow?” My colleague said she was flabbergasted. The way the children were reacting, as if they had been given a home work or some daunting task to be got over with instead of an entertaining and enjoyable experience. “What is happening to the kids of this generation ? Why is the reading habit fading away?” she asked the billion pound question.
While trying to give an answer to the issue she had raised, I could not help reminiscing about my kid-hood and adolescence days. I think we were more fortunate at least in one respect from the kids of today. We did not have so many distractions in the form of Satellite Television, Mobile Phones, PCs and Laptop Computers loaded with games, internet connection allowing connectivity with millions through social networking sites like orkut or facebook. There were no Gameboys , Xbox, Nintendo or PSPs during our time. Since I was brought up in a medium size town in Orissa, we had first exposure to television or Door Darshan only during the 1984 Olympics. Even Door Darshan apart from 'Krishi Darshan' and 'aapke khat' had very few things to offer. One Hindi movie per week, 2 Chitrahhars on Wednesday And Friday and one serial per day was all that was palatable in DD’s menu. So books were my best companion from childhood days. From Grandma’s stories to Amar Chitra Katha, from Aesop’s Fable to Panchatantra and Jataka Tales, from Enid Blyton to Agatha Christie, Sherlock Holmes to Classics I was graduating from one step to another in the company of my favourite books and authors. Once I stepped over to my adolescence days, choice of books and authors changed to George Orwell , Fredrick Forsyth, Alistair MacLean , Jeffrey Archer and so on…Then one day in hostel one of my friends lent me “Right ho Jeeves” by the comic genius P.G.Wodehouse and I got hooked to the Wodehousean style of Humour. Till date I just can not get enough of the foppish Bertie Wooster and his valet cum keeper , the inimitable jeeves carrying on with feudal spirits , of the eccentric Ermsworth constantly being given a trying time by his sister constance or of the tyranny of the formidable aunts Agatha and Dahlia. The oldest member recounting the golf course stories, stories of suave charming Psmith (P silent) , eternal day dreamer Ukridge , Mr. Mulliner’s nephews and the flamboyant Uncle Fred still take me to a different world. The list is endless and Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, who according to many was one of the greatest authors of first part of 20th Century has remained my most favorite author. Like the short stories of O’Henry, P.G.Wodehouse’s idyllic world is evergreen , ever fresh.
Coming back to present, after these two incidences, I decided to introduce literary works of great authors to my son ,so that he had wide literary exposure . Luckily he reads a lot and enjoys reading as much as watching TV or playing games if not more. So when we went for his birthday shopping, among others I bought two omnibus editions of Jeeves series and Blandings series by P.G.Wodehouse as birth day presents for my son and hubby. I was not sure whether my son at such a young age would be able to appreciate the Jeeves stories or not. But none the less I wanted to give it a try. And to my pleasant surprise, he started reading the book even before I could formally gift it to him and seems to be enjoying every bit of it. He has almost finished half of it (some times he even misses his favorite tv serial to read) and is waiting to read the other one after I gift it to his father. Today is his birthday; and he has given me again a gift on this special day by appreciating the work of one of the great authors of all times....
"In a hundred years' time `the kind of man who reads P.G. Wodehouse for pleasure' may become synonymous with an extravagantly fastidious taste. And that indeed is as it should be." Evelyn Waugh - 1939
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