Monday, 24 September 2012

Melancholy of an ebook

I never noticed the pleasure of reading a book- a real book, words printed on paper and bound into a book until I started reading an ebook lately. It’s been weeks and I haven’t been able to finish reading it. I could barely make myself interested in picking it up or should I say opening the folder that contains this ebook on my Samsung Tablet.
 
It’s so unpleasant.
 
It doesn’t have a smell. It doesn’t have a feel to it. I don’t find myself building a bond with it or even the slightest of attachment. It’s possible that the book is really uninteresting but it has just 21 chapters. I could have wrapped up these 21 chapters like that! Only if I had a real book in hand.
 
I love reading books. But I want to hold the book I am reading in my hand, sleep with it, wake up with it, be able to fold the corner of the pages before I put it down and go to sleep.
 
An ebook doesn’t seem alive. It almost seems like it doesn’t exist at all, like it doesn’t have a life. Like it was never printed. Like a depressing ghost.
 
A BOOK, on the other hand, has a life of its own. Even if it’s uninteresting, boring or even pathetic. It has a life. It breathes. It smiles. It cries. It is happy. It is sad. It is mysterious. It changes its colour, its mood and tones. A real book seems so “natural” to me that it almost seems as if it bends towards the sunlight like the sun flower.

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