A friend came to me recently and sought my advice to become proficient in English. He said he did not have much spare time and wanted to achieve his goal soon. He wanted me to suggest some shortcuts.
He was in my good books as he had always pressed the ‘like ‘ button below my postings on social media. I had believed he had done so after reading the postings, but he confessed that day that he had no patience to read anything in English. Writing in that language was also unimaginable for him.
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What he asked for was like suggesting ways to learn to swim without entering the water. I told him there was no shortcut and that he had to read a lot if he wanted mastery in any language. His expression told me he was disappointed as he had come to me with positive expectation.
Benjamin Franklin once said that the person who deserved the most pity was a lonesome one on a rainy day who didn ‘t know how to read. His opinion concurs with that expressed by many that a book is the best friend of a lonely person, as it is hard to be lonely when one is immersed in a world of words. You discover by reading that your longings are universal and that you are not lonely and isolated from anyone.
It is well-known that reading books is like a conversation with people of different times. If you want to know about the world during Shakespeare ‘s time, you have only to read his works. That is the case with all famous writers of the past centuries. A book can take the reader to the period of that book.
Reading has undergone some welcome changes. Before the advent of paperbacks, the bound books were heavy, making it difficult for readers to read them while lying down. Now, the internet is there, making it easy to get information on anything or anyone instantly, instead of visiting libraries and getting information from encyclopaedias.
Reading has been revolutionized by e-books that are cheap as they do not need any paper to print on or spend money on binding. Hundreds of them can be downloaded into devices that are slightly larger than a mobile phone and weigh much less than most phones. One can carry them anywhere and read them. It has many other advantages, like changing the size of the fonts, adjusting the light, or finding the meaning of a word from the built-in dictionary.
Another advantage of e-books is that habitual borrowers of books cannot ask you to lend a downloaded book.
Fortunately, for those who do not like reading, television channels have come up with anchors who go on talking about current affairs. It is good that these channels need only hearing ability and not that of reading. Another advantage is that one can change channels from the comforts of one ‘s bed or sofa with the remote control. Most people have their favourite television channels that agree with their views. There are even newspapers and television channels owned by political parties, patronized by people who are ardent followers of those ideologies.
