A place to stumble upon famous authors. , Photo Credit: Getty Images
A A few days ago, I went to the library in my city. I was sad to see only a few people inside. Deeply disturbed, I realized that libraries are in decline in readership, disappearing from modern life and people rarely visit them.
Nowadays, people especially the youth, addicted, addicted and enslaved to smartphones, internet and different types of modern gadgets, do not feel the need to go to libraries in their villages, towns and cities; Nor do they get time to be in libraries.
There was a golden time when young and old used to find time to visit libraries and invariably spent several hours in the morning and evening reading books of different categories, magazines and newspapers. During my school, college and university days, library was an essential part of my life and education. For people of my generation, the library was not just a building or a place for books, but a temple of learning and a holy temple of knowledge like our educational institutions. So whenever I got free time I used to go to my town library and pick up books of my choice, magazines and newspapers both regional and national and enjoy reading.
As a college student, I took membership of the library in my town and with the membership card, I would borrow books on poetry, novels, biographies, speeches and writings of Swami Vivekananda and read them at home and return them to the library. Gives before the due date. On Sundays and holidays, after breakfast at home, I would find myself in the library and spend a lot of time there, reading magazines and newspapers in the regional language and in English. I made extensive use of the libraries in my college and university to equip myself with solid knowledge in my chosen subjects in my degree and postgraduate courses.
I still remember very well how I was strolling along the different rakes of the library, looking through books of different categories and subjects, pulling books from the rakes and reading a few pages, finally I read Rabindranath Tagore, Chose books from your favorite authors like R.K. Narayan, Mulk Raj Anand, Ruskin Bond, Vikram Seth, S. Radhakrishnan and Vivekananda I have a twinkle in my eye and a bright smile shining on my lips. While searching for books in the library, I was often thrilled to stumble upon some poet or story-writer and novelist of great fame unknown and unfamiliar to me, and in a fit of excitement, I would borrow the book.
At home, diving deep into a new author’s book, I would get lost in a world of reading pleasure. My visits to libraries and the quality time I spent among books, magazines and newspapers helped me a lot to broaden my horizons and acquire skills in the English language.
It is true that visiting the library and reading books on various subjects was indeed a fruitful and rewarding, enjoyable experience known only to the enthusiastic, regular visitors of my generation, but different to the younger generation who are exposed to smartphones and modern technology. They search for the world of happiness in the world. Gadgets. So it is high time for the youth to put away their smartphones, think about the libraries in their villages, towns and cities and make it a habit to visit them at least on Sundays and spend a few hours reading and enjoying good books and magazines. Invest in receiving. In addition to improving their knowledge of reading.
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