Yes, more readers choose the book

THE EDITOR: Your editorial of March 27,  headlined, “More readers, please”, allow me to comment. Firstly let me say I am elated as to the new modern structure of, our new National Library Complex. It has changed the face of downtown Port-of-Spain. It is a very majestic building with modern features and facilities.

Now on to its use. A national library in a modern-day Trinidad and Tobago, who will it benefit, cater for? Your editorial was making a plea for more readers. As a society we are not truly a nation of readers. Yes, we may have a 45 percent literate population and 12 percent illiterate, but what are we doing as a nation to encourage more reading among its citizens? Secondly, as a nation we are moving away more and more from being a literate society to being a co-dependent society, depending on the computer and other modern-day devices for information. At the click of a button information can be accessed readily, information which would have normally taken a longer time if one had to gather the same information from a book, so that the joy of reading has been taken away.

Story-telling and folktales, the oral tradition which was practised by our grandparents and parents is no longer an effective way of communication. Our elders grew up on this form of expression, also reading was the part of a child’s learning resource or process. With the invention of the computer, information is readily available at a faster and easier rate, but is this helping us to be a literate society? Reading is a way of educating oneself. It is also a form of relaxation, a source of pleasure, but why is it our citizens choose other forms to obtain information. As a child, I was always encouraged to read, from as early as five years, and I developed a habit for reading, not only school material or books, but fiction and non-fiction material. As an adult I have continued the practice, but I now read more for information, I enjoy reading. This is a plea not only from the Newsday, but a general plea to our nation’s citizens to read.

KEN  SMITH
Woodbrook