#untouchable books?! - Shafeeq Rahman Vallappuzha

Every now and then, even the men of great insight and view advice and instruct us about the importance of selective reading and its advantages, and frequently they ban us from reading the book sans moral values. 

             Surprisingly enough, we are simply hurling away some valuable books riddled with morals and values in the name of this selective reading, and the people who are solely relying on selective reading are literally putting some restrictions over the reading. 

                                    Most probably, you would be asked or advised by your friends, only to read what is useful for you, but it is quit fair and favourable to read what you can make use of. So it is better to read whatever you go across and whatever come across you, as you have no foreseeing capacity to predict whether the book is useful or not. Therefore, never consider him, neither as your friend, nor as your enemy…..but, he is your frenemy, pretends to be yours, having the semblance of angel and heart of devil. 

         Nevertheless, my simple doubt is that, how can we measure the quality and value of the book by mere its structure? As it is quite impossible to judge the book by its cover. How can we get into the inner secrets of the book without encountering it? How we can get what the book hides in between its two covers without approaching it? How it is possible to have a selective reading without knowing the whereabouts of the book we are going to read? How magically we can get into the whereabouts of the book without having at least a  skimming or a scanning over the book , and how it is possible to skim and scan a book a book considering it as an ‘untouchable’…?! As long as these questions remain unheard or unanswered, I frankly oppose those who advice and instruct me of selective reading.

            Oh my promoters of selective reading ‘’do you have a magical eye to value the book by its cover?’’. Are you that much omniscient to predetermine the content of book without even having a look on it? How can you predict whether the book is readable or not without reading it? And then how dare you say that you are a selective reader and the promoter of the same?!. 

           Though, the whole universe is an open book to read and relish, why are you sitting idle, tagged yourself as the ‘selective reader’. Delve into the world of books regardless of the author, publisher, language, content and value, as you are not definite of where the actual readable content lies. Therefore, I would rather read all what is printed than keeping something aside, for the sake of ‘selective reading’. Doing so, you are just throwing some must-to-be-read books to the oblivion. So, do not shackle yourself as the `selective reader’ and don’t be a prey of it.

About The Author: Shafeeq Rahman Vallappuzha