There was this flood of cheap russian books, translated into English and local languages that were available everywhere. They cost so less, anyone could afford to buy them even in our middle class neighbourhood in the backwaters of Delhi.
That was my first brush with the printed word(and some pictures). I still remember the glossy pages telling animal stories that were so uniquely russian. There was a mention of strange animals and snow covered landscape. The story of the lost glove where animals made their home must have been so well known as local folk tales !! But it was sheer thrill.
Then came my school library. Though poorly stocked, it was a haven for most of us. One it meant a relief from gruelling schedule of textbooks, and two it was a quiet place. It was replete with books printed at some government press, mostly folk tales from various regions of India. I liked that. They had their intended impact and raised our curiosity quotient to the Nth degree. They taught me more about distant regions of the world than any geography book ever could.
Chandamama was a different class altogether. Even its drawings had strange colours that I had never seen before. The stories had distinctly southern flavour about them, but the child in me was drawn into a different world of strange mountains and valleys where demons exercised their monstrous powers. I am still not able to understand what drew me every month to a completely ’’ Unreal World’’ ?
Then came the pocket money era. We were rich and could afford to buy our own books. For a paltry 50p, you could buy the Phantom comic series, which became our favourite. The characters were so alien and outlandish that made our young minds think of the exotic places that the jungles of africa would be.
There were also the ’’5 penny books on the exploits of RAF and USAF in WW2 and even WW1. These illustrated comics carried stories of such legends as ’’ Baron von Richotofen’’ or the ’’ Red Baron’’. A famous WW1 fighter pilot who flew his Fokker Triplanes and had ’’virtual duels in the air’’. Printed on newsprint, these were available from local libraries on hire.
Enid Blyton came rather late in our lives. But they were addictive. Fired my imagination and I was kinda taken in by the lush English countryside than anything else. There was a book in which a mention is made of ’’ The Great Auk’’ an extinct bird. That fuelled my interest in Ornithology and I became an ardent bird watcher ( I do that even now, only watch a different flock altogether!!!)
Then when I was in senior school I and a friend found interest in Sci-Fi which in those days was limited to UFOs, the mysteries of the universe and specially our planet. I remember reading about a very strange book about the lost continent of Atlantis and that was something. Years later I was informed that the book was actually a hoax!!
Now comes the real McCoy. My brother was a born painter and won an award at one of the painting competitions. The award were two books. While the first one wasn’ much to write home about, the second one caught our fancy. That’s perhaps the best thing that could have happened to our childhood reading passion.
It was the ’’ Calculus Affair’’ a series book of the ’’ Adventures of Tintin’’. It took some time, but once we knew what Tintin was about, we were hooked and before the the month came to close, we had acquired the entire Tintin series. They say that the world is divided between Tintin and Asterix fans, I say they are both a class apart.
Tintin has a very subtle, but a very intelligent humour. It’s characters are so real, they could be found at any time, at any place. In fact when I grew up, I found that I had traces of the idiosyncracies of Captain Haddock!! Little did we know that we shared this passion with none other than Charles de Gaulle himself !!
I am not ashamed to admit that I read Tintin even today. The day I stop reading these books, the child in me will die.