Hooked On Books
By: Abinas Jagernauth
Tags: Books, Bookstores, Addiction, Reading, Libraries

It’s A Good Addiction

I became hooked on books from a very young age. My parents wanted us to do well in school and books were a huge part of that process. Primary school was free but high schools were largely private which meant that your parents had to pay the fees for you to attend, and for everything else, including books. The books were costly and we valued them.

It also helped that we were surrounded by books and other reading material at home. My father subscribed to one of the daily newspapers, and on Sundays we received the weekend edition of the three major dailies in British Guiana. My father thought that we should not get our news and opinion from just one source. There was also a new Reader’s Digest magazine delivered to our home every month.

My paternal grandparents lived with us. My grandfather was a Hindu priest, astrologer and healer. He ordered books and magazines from India. These were written in Hindi and Sanskrit, languages I couldn’t read. From time to time, Aja would gather us children around and ask one of us to pull a book he pointed out from the bookshelf. Because we had done this many times before, we knew what to expect. We had a lot of fun going through the book and finding money — one, two and five dollar bills.

Perhaps this was my grandfather’s way of getting us to love and to value books.

My maternal grandparents lived less than half a mile from us and I was over there a lot. My grandfather, Nana, loved to read. He read True Crime and Detective magazines, Western novels, other books and newspapers. I read a lot of Western novels; one of my favorite authors was Zane Grey, and I probably read all the books written by T. Lobsang Rampa up to that time.

One day my primary school teacher walked the entire class over to the Carnegie Free Public Library in Georgetown, British Guiana, half an hour away from our school, so that we could apply for and obtain our library cards. It was another introduction to books, lots and lots of books. Our class would go to the library every two weeks to return the books we had borrowed, and to borrow new ones.

This is how my addiction to books began and it has carried over into adulthood.

I began buying books for two reasons — to support the author, and because I couldn’t wait for the library to buy the book, put it in circulation, and then have my name on a waiting list to borrow it. My penchant for buying books has resulted in my owning a large selection, and if I am to be honest, I still have a lot of catching up to do with my reading.

I have read some of my books more than once, and with every reading I gain something new from them.

In order to reduce my collection to create space for new books, I have given away books I no longer want or need, and have sold some online. My most recent sale was five John le Carré’s hardcover novels to a purchaser in Québec City, Québec. I had bought these at a library sale, read them, and sold them on Facebook Marketplace.

I am very happy in bookstores and have to do my utmost to restrain myself from buying a book or two.

I am hooked on books and I’m enjoying the addiction.