The Hindu : Kerala / Kochi News : Connecting people through books

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 23, 2005

Kerala

Kerala - Kochi

Connecting people through books

For an emerging metropolitan city, it is surprising that Kochi does not have a place for bibliophiles to get together and talk about books. The concept of reading clubs and reading sessions is still foreign to this city, which is the birthplace of many writers.

"It is not surprising, as not many habits of Malayalis are in public domain. In fact, one of my Tamil friends was surprised by deserted roads here. They all have much more public life, whereas we are reclusive in nature," says Prema Jayakumar, writer and translator.

Senior members of the literary community recall their get-togethers and interactions. Says literary critic M. Thomas Mathew about the Navodhana Samiti where he, M.K. Sanu, writer TR and K.S. Radhakrishnan, currently Vice-Chancellor of Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskrit, Kalady, used to meet and discuss new books: "We also used to present our latest writings in these meetings."

Kochi once had the most number of village libraries. "With all sectors being overly politicised, the movement faded out. We used to have a publication titled `Vayanasala,' edited by TR, based on the activities at the Samiti, that introduced modern classics and carried literary articles," Dr. Radhakrishnan says.

These days, reading sessions are held at the Chavara Cultural Centre. "Only an elite group comes for these sessions, but this is a regular feature in our calendar," says Father Roby Kannanchira, director, Chavara Cultural Centre. He says new titles are introduced in these sessions as those who have read them talk about the works.

The trend of getting together and reading or discussing books is slowly catching up, it seems. DC Books marked the State-launch of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's new work `Memories of My Melancholy Whores' with a reading session and discussion.

A Reader's Forum was also inaugurated then, but it is yet to really take off. "We had planned to conduct reading sessions and discussions based on `Conversations in Bolzano' and `The Embers' by Hungarian author Sandor Marai," says Jaison P. Mathew, manager, of DC Books.

Another bookstore in the city, Just Fiction at Perumanoor, also organised a reading session. "We held a session on `Two Lives' by Vikram Seth. Though it was a small crowd, the interaction was good and hence we are now planning to hold a session on `Samskara' by U.R. Ananthamoorthy," says Paul George, owner of Just Fiction.

Both these reading clubs plan on being a regular affair. "We are also planning to bring in authors and arrange interactions with writers," P. Mathew adds.

Though it is a small beginning, the movement is showing signs of gathering momentum.

Anand Haridas

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