I enjoyed reading the Mahabharat and Ramayan texts as a part of the school curriculum. For me, it was a revision of sorts. Remember I had mentioned how I was initiated into reading poetry, Ramayan, Mahabharat and comics from Amar Chitra Katha by my father? But this revision was way more detailed than what I had read earlier. I was gaining a lot more history than what I had read earlier. So I was jubilant.
Then I added commando comics to my reading content. And then there were others – comics from Diamond Comics, Archie’s, Tinkle, Nandan, Commando Comics, Asterix & Obelix, Tintin etc. So you see I was experimenting with reading.
As school progressed, reading non text content reduced. During senior & high school the only non-text reading I did was from newspapers. Competition, homework and sports were taking away my reading time, and in that order.
Thereafter, it took me a dozen years to get back to reading. I was posted in Kolkata then. This is 2002. There was no OTT, well the internet was just kind of gaining ground. No smartphones, thank god for that. My innate interest in history and military made me pick up Is Paris Burning, by Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre. Is Paris Burning – a question that Hitler asked Gen. Dietrich von Choltitz, commander of German forces in Paris during WWII, to ensure that his order of burning down Paris is executed. Of course, von Choltitz disobeyed the order. Loving the history Larry & Dominique brought for their readers, I also read two of their other works – O Jerusalem & Freedom and Midnight. Absolutely brilliant. And I was happy that my reading habit found its feet once again.