The Book Dragon

My mother always bought me books I wanted to read. Mostly those were comic books and fairy tales when I was younger.

One time we were in a toy store and I was arguing with my mum and lowkey throwing a tantrum over a doll and a Karen nearby snapped at my mum saying if she kept indulging me, I’d never learn. I was getting really worked up but then my mum said, I never had a mother buy me things so I like to buy my kids what they like if I can. I have never thrown a tantrum over things I like for her to buy for me again. The comment was not even thrown at me but the memory is clear and unblemished even today.

Books were a different story altogether. My parents both have a holy respect for all books. Which was why before I had my own money, if I wanted a book, it is more accurate to say I demanded it of them rather than asked. I even had my dad stand in line with me in Lajpat Nagar for Harry Potter 4 when it came out. They didn’t care what we read as long as we read. Which was, again, how I was reading Mills & Boons romances aged eleven. That was not too bad because the stories were formulaic and I lost interest in a few years. What stuck was Dr Faustus that I read aged 10 or 11 and even today I feel like Mephistopheles is a real demonic name and I am very afraid of word contracts and how that can be bonding with the paranormal creatures. That book taught me not to sell my soul to the devil. Very creepy business. I facepalmed when I watched Jabez Stone do exactly that in Shortcut to Happiness, and even as I laughed at Brendan Fraser’s Elliot Richardson do the same in Bedazzled, I was thinking: ya, no, that’s dumb.

I digress. Books.

There have been few times when my mother was lowkey concerned over the material I was consuming. The first was J K Rowling’s Harry Potter series but when we discussed that, I said: I read about witches all the time, this isn’t any different. So she let it slide. The second was Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code. That was understandable. People were protesting the book. Some had even burnt it. I remember a girl in my Christian school boarding emphatically declare: Dan Brown is going to hell. Back home, when my mother brought it up, I told her about the amazing historical nuggets that were in the book divorced of the fiction. She let it slide again. The third was Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses. I said, this Satan is the Muslim one, not ours. She let it slide a third time.

We’ve not discussed banned books again post Satanic Verses. I don’t really know why. Maybe because by then, I was hardly home. And when I was home, I was not reading as many books as I used to. I’d discovered MTV, basically. Also, on the book front, we’d come to an understanding. I do an annual re-read of the Bible. As long as I do this, I think she has made her peace with my other consumption. As well, some of my books are in my kindle. And she doesn’t know their titles.

I don’t enjoy sharing my books with people because when it comes to books, I really am like a dragon hoarding her treasures. Not for nothing do I make thebookdragon my social media alias. There are books in my library (fondly named The Bookarium) in Leitan that I’ve haggled over, some I’ve fought strangers for, some I’ve broken my back hauling them all over Delhi for, and some I’ve straight out stolen. I jealously guard them. I don’t intend to share. There is even an author I refuse to share. I discovered this author quite by chance in a little forgotten nook in Defence Colony when U Rinpuii had asked Atu and I to return a book (it might have been a DVD) she had borrowed. Atu and I delight over it but this book series is between her, me and the books. Sometimes people ruin things when they find things out.

They really do.

Not As Much As Lord Voldemort

I made my dad stand in line for the sixth Harry Potter book. It was from a bookstore in Sarojini Nagar market in Delhi, before it was all swanky and shit. It was my first completely new Harry Potter book; all my first five copies had been bought second-hand. I don’t remember but I wouldn’t be surprised if dad had bought me the book as a reward for having gotten good grades; that had always been our way.

My parents have never understood my fascination for fiction. My dad lives in a world of responsibility, always taking it just a little bit too seriously. My mum has not a superstitious bone in her body, despite being deeply spiritual, which is a paradox (which she doesn’t find to be so). Neither of them takes time out of their hands to indulge in fiction and imagination and the fanciful world of paranormal fiction. Except for a couple of ghost stories, of course – my dad with his ‘I once gave a ride to an Old Lady Ghost’ and my mum’s ‘I once saw a chhawihfa when I was working in Durtlang hospital but it was probably methane’ stories.

Be that as it may, they’ve always said: If she is reading, it is better than not reading. There has never been a ban on any material. My mum did show signs of concern back when people said Harry Potter promoted witchcraft or some such bull. But even then, she never banned it. I read whatever fiction I could find. My first full-blown novel was The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas which might explain my fascination for gruff men who are far too brilliant for their own good. I might have been ten; I’d say that was a bit young for The Count but like I said, there were no rules. As long as I was reading, it was A-OK.

I read Enid Blyton after Sidney Sheldon, Doctor Faustus and Mills & Boon novels! That was not right. But it still worked. I liked the stories. Whatever I didn’t understand, I simply glossed over.

I never thought I’d be done with comics because I devoured any I could lay my hands on: Archies, Asterix, Biker Mice From Mars, Cartoon Network comics, Chacha Chaodhury, DC, Marvel, Phantom, Photoromances, Richie Rich, Tinkle, Tintin... any and everything. But lately, I can’t seem to bring myself to be engaged in them. Maybe I am getting old. This is new.

In 2011, my mum mused aloud that I read so many books yet never seemed to finish reading the Bible. That got me thinking. I said I’d give it a go. She bought me a small, pocket-friendly, leather-bound NIV Bible and I read it everywhere. It starts out nice with magical stories, gets a bit slow going after a point, but then with the songs and poems in the middle, it finds its ground again, ending with a bang. I’ve been re-reading it annually ever since. I am partial to some parts; not a big fan of some parts.

There are a few other books I continually re-read; January is for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series. I have re-read a lot of my old books; I consider it catching up with old, dear friends.

And every September, without fail, I return to Hogwarts, as we Potterheads say; via re-reading the books, basically. I remember my first time reading Philosopher’s Stone. It was in the girls’ hostel of SDA Inter-College Roorkee. My friend Meenu got sent the first two books by her grandfather (I think?) and she lent them to me. I was hooked from the line, “Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.” Yes, thank you very much.

I snuck out of the Lady Shri Ram Residence Hall for the seventh book with a few friends from college who I remain friends with to this day. There was that whole Midnight Release which because it was simultaneous across the globe, meant about 6:30AM for us in India. Actually, Harry Potter helped me make my first friends in college. We were a group of Freshers standing outside the LSR Auditorium and someone mentioned Harry Potter and a bunch of us just gravitated toward each other. These were the peeps I broke hostel rules with and standing in line with at that bookshop in GK-II that morning. Thanks, Potter.

Addiction is not always a good thing. But as Daniel Radcliffe said, it could be drugs. So I’m still doing OK, I guess. There’s just something so comforting about books, especially fiction.

I’m not the biggest fan of non-fiction but I’m trying out memoirs, biographies, travel and science books. They can be fun. I’d like to one day brag about some heavy literature I can quote offhand as a party trick. For now, I don’t really gravitate to literature that teaches you things. I’ve always preferred something ‘to enjoy’ rather than ‘to accumulate’, as in knowledge. Any wisdom I gain from my reading is ever only incidental.

Fiction works for me because in fiction, things make sense. Which is not always the case in real life. It is an escape, yes. But it can also be a way to learn many of life’s lessons without having to personally make many mistakes. Of course, some mistakes in life you make on your own because they are delicious. Wink wink.

I’ve always been interested in fiction. Some might even call it an obsession. I do not deny it. I’ve made my peace with it and I think it is okay. It is not as much as Lord Voldemort with Harry Potter anyway.