In the late eighties, there was a serious drive to encourage school teachers in catching the reading fever, especially English materials, preferably novels.
It was then – and I think it still is – a policy of the state’s Education Department to equip teachers with an all-round knowledge and that reading would help a lot to attain this objective. Our school which was barely accessible by road then, was not to be left behind and placed order of some easy-read English novels, magazines, even comics.
I found it amusing when a female teacher at our rural secondary school proudly told her colleagues that she had read a book or two by Enid Blyton – while attending a teacher’s college. A local lady in her 30s, she was teaching Form One classes English Language. Can’t blame her – she was a product of the new curriculum whereby the English language took to the back seat.
In fact I commended her in front of the others but injected a mild sarcasm in my advice by telling them to start reading English materials of any kind, including comics.
While in primary school in the early 60s, we already had enough dose of Enid Blyton books of ‘Five’ series such as ‘Five on a Treasure Island’, ‘Five Go Off to Camp’, ‘Five Go to Smugglers’ Top’ and a few others. Having read many of her books is nothing to shout about. The only difference was, I read those books while in Primary school.
By the time I was in Form Two and Three, I had finished reading most if not all of William Shakespeare’s simplified versions of his plays such as ‘Much Ado Without Nothing’, ‘Romeo and Juliet’, ‘Hamlet’, ‘Othello’, ‘Julius Caesar’, ‘Macbeth’, ‘The Tempest’ and many more. We used ‘Julius Caesar’ as our textbook for English Literature in Form Four and later ‘Midsummer Night Dream’ in Lower Six. Thanks to early exposure, I scored distinction in my English Literature for our Senior Cambridge Exams (also known as School Certificate).
Within five years I had read most of the English novels that SMK Saratok Library had to offer. As the school made boarders go home every two weeks – later on I found this arrangement was to save school ration which I emulated when becoming the school head there 13 years after leaving it – I would borrow one or two books (novels) for the weekend leave. My favourite reading venue was on a well-built platform atop a tree near our farmhouse in the upper reaches of the Melupa river, a tributary of the Krian river in Saratok. During my rendezvous at the reading platform my white male cat Embin would wait at the foot of the tree and sometimes served as my alarm clock, complaining with his meows after waiting up to three hours.
I would continue unfinished business at night reading by the oil lamp that inevitably necessitated me to use glasses in the first month of my 17th year.
Our Form Five English Literature text book was ‘To Kill a Mocking Bird’ by Harper Lee – I was privileged to see the movie years later, casting Gregory Peck as Atticus Pinch, the main character in the book.
Before going to study Lower Six at Methodist Secondary School Sibu in 1973, I had read a lot of books (mostly in their simplified versions). Apart from Shakespeare’s, my favourites included books by Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, George Orwell, George Bernard Shaw, Alexander Dumas, Sir Walter Scott, Mark Twain among others.
Reading can be addictive once you get going or start the ball rolling which may not be that easy to do. At one phase of my career I turned to books on various subjects such as Sociology, Psychology and
Philosophy and Morality especially those related to Education, from Aristotle to Dewey to Freire, from Freud to Maslow and the likes. Later in the nineties Edward De Bono and his ‘Thinking’ series dominated the imaginations of reading enthusiasts as was John Naisbitt and his ‘Megatrends’ – I only read two, Megatrend 2000 and Megatrend Asia. Most of De Bono’s are gathering dust on my humble shelves. Erich Von Daniken and his ‘Chariots of the Gods’ also added new lights to extraterrestrial perspectives and had a hit with many. To me it was purely for general knowledge.
Since my Brunei days, I had renewed interest in novels especially by bestselling authors such as Jackie Collins. In fact I have in my collection most of the late actress/author’s books ranging from her first book ‘The World is Full of Married Men (1968) to her ‘Hollywood’ series to ‘Santangelos’, from ‘Chances’ to ‘Poor Little Bitch Girl’. I have close to 20 of her novels but yearning to include in my humble collection of her ‘Deadly Embrace’, ‘Lethal Seduction’ and ‘Thrill’. I was lucky while in Bandar Seri Begawan as there was a well stocked bookstore and an outlet lending and selling second hand books/novels quite cheaply of both which I was a regular customer.
In recent years I have added to my list of novels that include those by bestselling authors such as Sir Jeffery Archer, Karin Slaughter, Frederick Forsyth, Michael Connelly, Stieg Larsson, Jo Nesbo, Stuart Pawson and yes of course 70s icon Sidney Sheldon. I read his ‘The Other Side of Midnight’ no less thrice – within the last twenty years and never get fed up, on top of watching the movie of the same title starring Susan Sarandon and John Beck more than 30 years ago.
Others in my latest repertoire are books by lesser known but really talented authors such as Mark Keating, Alison Bond, Mandasue Heller, Douglas Rushkoff, Lucie Whitehouse, Harlan Coben and a few others. Among books not read and collecting dust on my shelves is ‘Shit’ a controversial political satire written by my former University of Science Malaysia (USM) lecturer the late national laureate Prof. Emeritus Dato’ Shahnon Ahmad who was also a Member of Parliament. Shahnon taught us Introduction to Literature.
Hardcover one of the ‘Books of the Times’ Monica’s Story (about ‘the Monica Lewinsky’ of Bill Clinton’s White House era) by Andrew Morton that cost me a bomb in BSB, Brunei is another book that collects dust. In the near future I’ll do justice to its B$153 price tag.
Perennially interesting are books on Sarawak’s Brooke Era which help to broaden my historical perspectives. I found very well written and informative the book ‘Queen of the Headhunters’ written by Sylvia Leonora Lady Brooke, Ranee of Sarawak, wife of the last Rajah Sir Charles Vyner Brooke.
Reading keeps the mind active. It can be therapeutic too. There is nothing to lose but instead, everything to gain. It broadens your weltanschauung (a German word for ‘world view’ – I learned Achtuung !, minen etc from comics ). On my part reading keeps me going, as if it is the food of life. If it does too for our loyal readers out there, keep on reading!
Here I share one interesting excerpt from ‘Hunt for White Gold’ by Mark Keating: “He laughed off bullets, broke cutlasses for toothpicks and took gunpowder with his eggs” to describe a character, a pirate, in the book.
