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.
