Why I read fiction

Nowadays, the dearth of people reading good fiction seems to be growing. Maybe it is simply the circles I navigate in – mostly educated, MBA candidates, slogging in large corporations. Nevertheless, it is sad to find that barely one out of a hundred people one meets is interested in fiction reading.

I caught onto the habit of getting lost in fantasies of the world as a child. Of course, Calcutta and Bengalis do provide a strong impetus for any child to be groomed in literary works, and there is little escaping the tyrannies of any culture as a child. The fairy tales, the folk tales, the mystery tales, the romantic tales, the tales of war and peaceful times were an education of their own. I remember that my best friends, hailing from a business community trying to point out the utilitarianism of reading – “your language will improve” (hinting that better language will result in better marks at school).

But my language was already at a comfortable peak, not in hurry to scale great heights unless forced. And that is something fiction will never do. The mere act of losing time in crafted stories is an act of volition, and can rarely be successfully enforced.

I grew up and mingled among people who were least bothered with the world of letters. The practical world had enough difficulties to keep them occupied and solace was cheerier among friends than the pages of printed ink. The written word for them, was only to be understood to confront legalities of one’s existence, who were hung over from the colonial times, and processed only written documents. But for all other aspects of life, speech and fragile memories were sufficient.

This world definitely did capture my attention, as I realized that the company of books indeed paled in the company of conversation. Books are really an urban indulgence, and can simply be dispensed off in other contexts, where people were familiar with each other and comfortable with themselves.

Alas, the paths of our lives do tend to stray back into the pastures we started off with, and soon enough, I was back at my urban context, with acquaintances more than friends, and more time than companionship. Fiction books returned to my world, as a long lost friend. Of course, the lesser counterparts of non-fiction decided to tag along as well, but deep bonds take time to establish and I was far too happy engrossed in my fictional friends.

The sad reality of most of adult life is that there are many responsibilities to encroach upon your time, offering scant satisfaction in return. They nose their way into the evenings, and the weekends and holidays, leaving less time for all the things which matter the most. The easiest thing, I’ve realized is to be busy and delude oneself that one is being functional or operational. In reality it is the most dysfunctional state to be in.

Even though I realized this, I did succumb to the inanity of being busy for a while. It crept in without really me noticing it, as there were always justifications of importance and emergencies tagged. By the time I realized that it was simply a perpetual state of being, I was neatly entangled in its vicious web. But I digress. Time or no time, there had to be time to do what one needs to survive, and I needed books. So fiction was my companion in busy times as well as the rested months.

Do all who read fiction do so because they find their current worlds unfulfilling and inadequate? I’ve heard this argument from my skeptic friends, and despite my instinctive urge to oppose it, there is a grain of truth embedded. We’ve always loved stories because they are similar to our world, and yet different. Inexplicably, I think it hints that otherness is possible too, the otherness which fascinates and forebodes. Books are too inert to really be catalysts, but stories keep in company in good times and bad, and do remind us that ‘there is so much more’.

Each genre has its own attractions. Mysteries give us the power to unearth the unknown, while fantasy gives a chance to be the unknown. Romance reminds us of all our heartbreaks and fluttering heartbeats, while comedy simply points out the absurdities of life around. There are also more complicated works which attempt at capturing the complexities of being human – of families and individuals as they traverse life. The abstractions of magic realism simply suggest that nothing is what it seems.

Books transcend time and space, infact all art does. The changing contexts of literature from different continents and histories gentle insinuate our mortality, that we are mere specters gliding in a certain lifetime. Books change meaning over time, because our minds change over time and understand them differently. And yet, books involve the reader. A passive recepient merely looking at being entertained could perhaps switch on the idiot box, but books demand time, and effort, and thought. It is a companion only if you are too. I guess that’s why I read fiction. To be myself, and know of all that I can be, could have been – and to gaze at this fleeting ever-changing shadow of life.