Reading Books       

 I have been a very voracious reader (उत्साही वाचक) up until a decade or so. I would read whatever that I could lay my hands upon, be it in Marathi or in English.  In fact, in the beginning  I began by reading novels in Marathi. It was Baburao Aralkar's (बाबुराव अर्नाळकर -अर्नाळकरांच्या धनंजय - छोटू , काळापहाड आणि झुंझार कथा )  Marathi crime and thriller novels.

 I was a member of Ding Dong Library (now closed), and mt to and fro journey of 3 hours or so, enabled me to finished reading novel in a day or two. Mostly it was light stuff, James Hadley,  Agatha Christie, Perry Mason or some other  detective stiff. I was a privileged customer, I was allowed two books at a time. One book I would exchange in a day or two ( meant to be read during my train travel) while the other book was retained for longer period meant to be read at home leisurely and which was read by my sister and me, Heavy I have been a very voracious reader उत्साही वाचक up until some decade or so. I would read that I could lay my hands on, be it in Marathi or in English.  I was a member of Ding Dong Library (now closed), and mt to and fro journey of 3 hours or so, enabled me to finished reading novel in a day or two. Mostly it was light stuff, James Hadley,  Agatha Christie, Perry Mason or some other  detective stiff. I was a privileged customer, I was allowed two books at a time. One book I would exchange in a day or two ( meant to be read during my train travel) while the other book was retained for longer period and which was read by my sister and me, Heavy Reading category with likes of Lloyd C Douglas ( I was so obsessed by his Magnificent Obsession that read it many times during my  teenage), Thomas Hardy (his  Far from the Madding Crowd left a deep impression on me), William Somerset Maugham ( I have read and reread his Of Himan Bondage umpteen times) and many other English writers and also read Marathi literature, especially P L Deshpande and Achaya P K Atre. I have slowed down, may be my age and other things. Now a days I don't read much (books) and reading is restricted to net. 

  Currently, I am reading a book titled ' The Ultimate Cheatsheet On Goal Setting '.I has been quite sometime sessed since I had a book in my hand, with all my eye problem. Doctor is yet to give me number post surgery and I have to go for the check as well. I read using my old specs with magnifying glass. I find it extremely hard and I could but a few pages till now. The book is interesting, but I am rather apprehensive about such kind of self help books and this would certainly fall under that category. In our our days, we never had such kind of books, so never read these books. Reading books written by Bill Gates,would certainly not make you Bill Gates!  Have you ever read Self Helo books? 

 I asked this very question to my daughter in law  and and also to a friend of mine, Rashida and told her that shortly I am going to write on the subject.

 Rashida:replied, "No. I don't like reading such books either.

 Unfortunately I haven't read any book in a very very long time." 

My daughtrt in law hasn'i ever read such books.

 

Coming back to the subject of Self Helf Books, Iam reminded of this

 guy, Rajamamidanna. He is fantastic and his satire on the subject  is

 very funny and worth listening to. I will try to reproduce the same in

verbatim (शब्दशः) as far as possible. Rajamamidanna is on the stage 

and addressing young crowd.

"...but it doesn't matter. So I got admission inone college called 

 ...You ISB....No I didn't do it in ISB but did it in BSB, it is the 

parody version of ISB, which in Bangalore. I went there. There was t

this  Placement Officer who said ,' You will get there. Relax.' 

For me to get there I have to be alive also. With so much got one 

company  called Nandi Pipes. I am not kidding - Nandi Pipe. They

 had  eight rounds of interview, man. After that they didn't call.

 I had to do the follow up. I called up . 

Where is my job? I asked. 

' It is in the pipene , bro!'

When you go through all this you get depressed. And of the worst

you do... Ah, don't read those Self Help books. Anybody read

 these  Self Help books?"

Suddenly looking sharply in the direction of a

 young lady, he continues, "so maam, you read,

 don't be ashamed. You are here.which means it  worked.

   

These Self Help Books are... from thr author's point of view. For

 them they are helpful. It messes up with your mind.

One fried suggested a book called . Secrete'

 Millions copies sold insecrete, my friends read and got marks in

 secrete, I did' know their marks. But I was reading 'You can Win'

 and they got placent in secrete. 

And the motivational books mess up with your mind., you start

 believing  as if you sre greatest person alive, which you know and

I know, I am not you are not. .

There is another book called 'Monk who so his Ferrari, Robin

 Sharma wrote this book. If you are a monk where did the Ferrari 

come from?Who are you? Osho? The same fellow..the  fellow wrote 

another book called 'Who will cry when you die', that's the tittle of

the book, and  I cried after reading that book. My sister told me 'No

one will cry when you die'. I asked 'Why?' 'If you keep reading books

how will you make friends?' So I purchase another book , How to 

make friends.'

But the worst book I read was 'You can Win'. It had a tag line

 Winners don't do different things they do things differently. Replace

the word Winner with anyone, say, Cab driver, and it will fit the bill.

Cab drivers don't do different things they do things differently.. Why

 are confusing in this manner? There is another guy called Henry

 Ford, who also confuses people in this way. If you think you can,

 you are right. If you think you can not, you are right. Just because 

we are listening....You will tell whatever you want to.

I also wrote a quotation, Hope is like a soap, use it daily.

These days the book tittles they come up with ... I went to the book

 store and there was this book -  am okay, you are okay', I didn't buy

 it because I was okay.!

Everybody must have read this book.Ah, ah (हां,हां .. orange colored f

cover ... ah , yes, yes..what setellite F#CK ( THE SUBTLE ART OF

 NOT GIVING A F*CK by Mark Manson). I don't know what is

 F*CK and this came up with another, a sequel  it seems, Every

 thing is F*CKED. Yoy are the one who told not to give F and now

 you say that every thing is F. I hate thsese sequels. In movies it is

 okay but why in Self Help books? There is guy,  

he wrote, Seven Habits of Highly Effective People'.

It took me seven to eight years to cultivate those seven habits. After

 that he came out with 'The Eighth Habit' 

This guy is absolutely funny and entertaining. I have tried my level

 best to quote him and the entire show in verbatim.  But you must

  watch him (there is video on YouTube) to get the picture. The

 way he narrates the anecdote with the Placement officer, with his

 hand gestures, voice modulation, you can visualize the entire scene. 

The dialogue between them- the officer assuring him (he pats his

 own back, making you believe as if it's the officer) telling him ,"You

 will get the job man, relax?"  Later on, his  asking " Where is my

 job?" and getting the reply, " It's in the pipe line." The name of the

 company as ‘Nandi Pipes’, is done with  a purpose, and which

 synchronizes pretty well with ‘job is in the pipe line', and you

 simply  can’t stop from laughing.

 In fact the entire presentation leaves the audience in splits. 

The climax comes in the  the ‘F’ word book anecdote.  The way he

 tries to extract the name from the audience, encouraging them to

 come out with it with his intermittent interjections of " Ah, ah," and

 then  (spelling each alphabet as  F,*, C & K and then

 with  expression of innocence  on his face, asays, “I don't know

 what is that."  And then adds, "He was the guy who told us not to

 give F and now he says Everything is F  "

 

He has liberally used those interjection sounds  to good effect to

 express  his emotions. We are familiar with 'hmm', 'oops': woohoo:,'

 shh', etc.so  In English it is difficult to put it in writing the exact

 pronunciation of such sounds, but not so with our phonetical Indian

 languages. Therefore, I hace used  हां , हां . in brackets to denote

 thsese interjection sounds made.

 

 The last enecdote,, about  Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

 and The eighth Habit, he says '" In the second book, the first twenty

pages covered the acknowledgements why not remove them and

 put the Eighth habit in the first book itself? He then ends the

 presentation with this punch line...” in all these eight habits

 (ironically) Reading is not a ( good) habit." 

 

         I have always been apprehensive about these Self Help Books 

though I am currently reading the book which may well be

 categorised in the same class. Of course, at my age, I don't need to

 set any goals and no need for any self help books either.

Vinay Trilokekar