The dying art of reading

Trinidad is a hard place to be an English major. It is, for the most part, a non-reading island. Even at the university, that institution I had long regarded, perhaps a tad naively, as one of the bastions of learning, reading was far from commonplace. Significant pockets of non-readers thrived in every course. There were the religious purchasers of Cliff Notes; many relied on the Internet for their synopses. Frighteningly enough, the majority of those whom I know couldn’t be bothered to read what they were studying, were students who aspired to one day attain the rank of teacher. I shudder to imagine attending a Parent/Teacher meeting and having my child introduce me to one of these former classmates. I think I may then and there decide on home schooling.

Everyday one is assaulted by breaches of the laws of the language. Sometimes I wish I could walk around with a bucket of paint and a brush, permanent marker in back pocket, like some sort of renegade literary avenger, coming to the rescue of beleaguered syntax and subject/verb agreement everywhere. Perhaps nowhere is this more visible — or the crimes more horrendous — than in the dubious and unfortunately ineluctable art of automobile typography. The main offender is the ever-present phrase “Too bless to be stressed.” There are variations on this theme; sometimes it also appears as “too bless to be stress.” Still to be topped though was the “to bless to be stress” painted on the back glass of a car I had the misfortune to drive behind. 

The use of verb as adjective, in a phrase that has become annoyingly clich?d, is too much, especially when it is scribbled across the windscreen of a B14, the driver of which is sprawled insouciantly behind the steering wheel and blasting music that was not designed to bring one closer to God, or, for that matter, to reinforce the feeling that one is indeed singled out for divine blessing and protection. Government buildings are far from exempt from unpardonable lexical sins either. Incorrect spelling of the noun “advice”, the use of “principle” instead of “principal”; all these are inexcusable, especially considering the fact that fresh in my mind is the memory of the foot long wooden ruler that was continuously itching to dance across the back of my legs and hands for failing to remember these homonyms. Sad to say, the Ministry of Education is one of the chief reprobates.

I remember a ministerial press campaign that was riddled with errors. Embarrassment on its behalf led me to call and point out the mistakes. After being hung up on the third time I gave up. Striving for excellence indeed. And no, I do not feel the need to make a parting shot about “breakfastes”. The thing is, the Trinidadian concept of reading is founded almost exclusively on the concept of learning, formal learning that is. The idea of reading chiefly for pleasure and the informal, by-the-way knowledge that comes with that approach is unpopular. Trinidadians don’t buy books.  I remember buying a book as a birthday gift for one of my sister’s friends several years ago. “A book!?” she had exclaimed incredulously after she had removed the gift paper.

She had looked around, peering at the faces of those gathered to celebrate her birth, then, unceremoniously, she had dumped it on the table, returning with gusto to the more favourable presents of clothing and jewellery. As a people we only buy books at the end of the school year when presented with a book list. Book buying for us is essentially the purchasing of school books. And judging from the number of school children seen loitering about with empty school bags, even that habit has woefully gone to seed. As a child growing up I would hear parents fed up of the failure of idle threats to rectify bad behaviour hand down the sentence, “Go and pick up a book!” Pick up a book, meant, of course, go and read. It is still a favourite punishment – to this day I still hear parents threatening their children with reading if they don’t cease to misbehave.

I was incredulous then, I’m incredulous now. If one treats reading as a punishment to be meted out for the overzealous activities of salubrious children, one should not be surprised that they grow up perceiving it as such. My parents always treated reading as a pleasure and a privilege. My mother never would have put God out of her thoughts to reward my bad behaviour with reading time. I would have happily torn the house down! Sadly, as we continue to ride this tinselly tide of technology, as we aspire to the ownership of Play Stations, DVDs and the brain numbing, eye-goggling diversions of cable television, our attitude to books is only going to worsen. I shudder to think what it will worsen into.

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