Read OR Write?

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Most laymen (including its not so nice word for the feminine gender) think that professionals in the academic and literary world read and write (likha pora).

Nothing can be farther from truth. 99% of them either read OR write. It is a question of time and inclination.

RKN didn't even like to read his prescribed text: "Amundsen's Expeditions" and failed in his BA exam. Later he went on, in his simplistic way, so far as to suggest that there should be a sort of Welfare Organization for Writers whose representatives can take care of his day-to-day family affairs so he can keep just writing fit.

I guess neither Dickens nor Dostoevsky nor even Shakespeare had any time to read.

SDM told me several times that all his reading of Physics and Math was over by the time he did his M Sc. Thereafter he hardly read anything. I saw him closely for 5 years. He was either thinking, or talking (nonsense), or writing. He did occasionally visit the Central Library, but only the Current Periodicals Section just to browse the Abstracts. He never got any Journal issued.

He ran the risk of getting out of date. He didn't care. He had enough number of gripping 'problems in his bag' (as he termed them) that he had just no time to read. Of course he was out having fun with his prowess. After his GR and QM work, he was not doing any 'frontline' research for almost his last 3 decades (he worked after retirement too). Moreover, he scrupulously avoided reading anyone's work bordering on his, lest it should affect his 'original' approach.

This is also true with those who indeed 'do' frontline research. If they start reading everything that is being written in current journals, they will have no time to breathe: such is the bulk of publication activity that goes on in frontline research. To get over this, they invented a wonderful short-cut: 'International Conference'. They just have to attend and listen to what interests them to keep abreast of their rivals and to get ideas.

Feynman is not known to have been a prolific reader. I beg to be corrected.

I shared Office (C-239) with DB for 20 years (1975-95). Almost once every hour some student or the other used to barge into our room without knocking...they were welcome! All would testify that while they would find DB smoking, thinking or writing (calculating), they would find me with my legs up on the table, reading. Each of us did what we enjoyed doing. And we were the obverse of one another every which way. We never published a single paper together although both of us did publish something every year.

There were about half a dozen voracious readers among the Faculty during my 40 years at KGP. One of them had the Constitution of India and the Indian Penal Code by heart, apart from everything else under the sun. Another had a home library that was the envy of everyone. He was a walking encyclopedia. He practically ruined his eyesight reading. All famous and tough crosswords were to him just child's play.

And a few more like that. They were all highly respected by students and colleagues. They were all the time picked up as quiz masters or judges by students for their functions. They were all eminent teachers loved by their students.

But they refused to write anything at all. They were promoted to the next post mostly when the post they were holding got abolished or under some 'supernumerary scheme' (they 'carried' the higher post with them and when they retired or left, only the lower post fell vacant!)

Some were never promoted at all and never even applied!

During my first 5 years at KGP (1965-70) I hardly wrote anything. But I read everything under the sun. I was a bachelor living in the Faculty Hostel and so had ample time on my hands. These 5 years took care of my teaching requirements for the whole of my stay there. For the next 5 years (1970-75) I could hardly read anything at all. I was busy doing Ph D under SDM. After that I reverted to my reading habit and wrote papers one every year on all sorts of topics mostly in educational journals, not writing 'serious' research papers. I declined to take any Ph D student. I was prepared to forgo all promotions. But I was just lucky...

For 2 years after retirement, in Hyderabad, I was neither reading nor writing nor even thinking coherently. Then on I was reading Deccan Chronicle and Hindu/Times of India. Then there was a 2-month stretch in which I could hardly read even DC: I was composing political limericks at the rate of 3 a day. They were just flowing from nowhere. Then I started blogging now and then but reading DC. For the last 3 months I have been blogging one piece daily. I just don't have time to even open DC. 8 hours go thinking up a topic lolling in bed; 2 more hours 'gathering' material in bed. And 2 hours of composing and keyboarding.

For me reading and writing happen to be mutually exclusive.

There was a curious person in Bengal last century. He neither read much, nor wrote much, and talked a bit later in life. But moved mountains through his disciples mostly after his death who practically rescued the decaying and dying Hinduism. His name happens to be Ramakrishna Paramahamsa.

There was another even more curious one in Tamilnadu. He never read anything much, nor wrote anything much, nor talked anything much, nor belonged to any math, nor established an order of disciples after his death, but stuck to a single-point agenda that is at the heart of all Vedanta.

He is little known outside. He is known as Ramana Maharshi.

The one exception is Adi Shankara. He lived only for 32 years. He had to read the Prasthana Traya (Gita, Upanishads & Vedanta Sutras) in order to win debates all over India and establish his Advaita. He wrote exquisite commentaries on the three. And also wonderful poetic works like Bhaja Govindam, Mahishasura Mardani, and also a popular Advaita text called Viveka Chudamani apart from many other beautiful things.

He toured the length and breadth of India and established Peethas that for today are living and thriving.

But that is rare indeed!
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