For The Love Of Books; My Mother's Story Of Reading

The following are my mother’s reminiscences about how she developed her love for books. She wrote in Kannada and my son and I translated it.

When I was six or seven years old and I could read the Kannada script, my father gifted me around twelve slim books. My father, who had been a school teacher for two or three years, wanted me to experience the joy of reading. So he got me these story books containing tales from different countries. I remember that each of these books contained about twelve pages. This must have been around 1948 or 49. We lived in Puttur, a small town on the South Western coast of India.
In those days villages and small towns in India had no supply of electricity. I read in the light of an oil lamp at night. I also remember reading by the light of the moon. Such was my passion for books. I used to borrow books from everybody I knew.
Our family was not well off. My father did not have a steady job and did whatever work was available. Including me my parents raised ten children. At the time of these occurrences we were only two. My sister and I had to assist our mother around the house. My mother used to ask me look after whatever she was cooking while she attended to other chores. Even as the pots boiled on the stove, I used to have a book in my hand. My mother too read a lot but due to household work such as looking after us and my grandmother, cooking , milking the cows and so on, she could not pursue her passion.
I attended the primary school near home and later the high school. I would borrow books even from my friends. Sometimes when the story was too exciting ,I could not resist reading in class hours too. I remember that my teacher almost caught me once.
I got married in 1959 at the age of eighteen and left for Kharagpur in West Bengal. My husband was working in the Indian Railways and was posted there. I travelled by train for the first time. My father was apprehensive about this new experience. So he sent my younger brother and sister with us. They were with us for a month. My father came to Kharagpur to escort them back home. At this time he brought me several books in Kannada. He knew that I would be missing Kannada books.
In the following few years my two children were born, and reading took a backseat. I had finished all my Kannada books, and my husband told me to learn other languages. We lived in Hyderabad from 1968 to 1971. I learnt Telugu and would read books in that language too. From Hyderabad we moved to Delhi in 1971. There I learnt Hindi and enjoyed Hindi books and magazines. My husband used to get them from his office library.
In one of the Railway Colonies we had friends from Kerala. Mrs Hamid used to read a lot of books in English. One day I said to her her, “Look, I think I will find it difficult to read books in English as I have studied in a Kannada medium school.” She said that she had studied only in her native language, Malyalam. Nevertheless, she had learnt to read books in English. She lent me four Barbara Cartlands. I found the first couple of books very difficult to read. But once I got used to the language I could not stop reading.
This was in the early seventies, and I have never stopped reading. We have always been members of one library or another wherever we lived. My children too grew up reading books. Now I am seventy five and my children supply me with an endless stream of books. These days I find that I cannot read as fast as I used to earlier. Back in the old days I could finish a book in a day or a night. I remember that once my children and I were reading late into the night with rapt attention. Suddenly my father-in-law walked into the room and scolded us : “ Are you still reading ! Why don’t you all go to bed?” That incident amuses me to this day.
I spent the whole of last month with my granddaughter and her three year old son. We were all at my daughter’s. I was overjoyed to see my great-grandson insist every night, at bedtime, that his mother read him stories.

 

Thank you Uma, I too love reading from books I get them from our library. But I also use the Kindle to read some old books which can be downloaded freely. Regards, Lakshmi

 

Thank you Shobhamma, It was good to read about your mother. I love reading and writing but that is for my blog. I too get books from the library and I download some old books. With regards, Lakshmi