Going back in time

Sometimes books can work as time machines, transporting us back to when we first read them

The other day, while rummaging through my book shelves, I came across a battered copy of the collected plays of William Congreve. I hadn’t read the restoration playwright since my days studying English literature in Loreto College Calcutta a million years ago. But I fixed myself a cup of coffee and settled down to re-read one of my favourite plays, The Way Of The World. 

And before I knew it, I had gone down the rabbit hole of time, and was once again that gawky little teenager sitting in a classroom, discovering worlds that I never knew existed. I could feel that same summer sun warming my back; I could hear the muttered sighs of my classmates who didn’t have a yen for plays; and I could hear the sonorous tones of my professor giving us the historical significance of the Restoration period in English history. 

That’s when it struck me. We don’t just re-read books because we enjoy the books themselves (though that, of course, is a big part of it). We go back to old favourites because they take us back to the times in our lives when we first discovered them. 

Some years ago, for instance, a close friend of mine gave me a copy of Black Beauty by Anna Sewell as a joke present for my birthday because she had heard me say it was my favourite book as a child. We both giggled over the gift and I placed it on my bookshelf without giving it much further thought. But then, a week later, in a fit of nostalgia, I picked it up on a slow afternoon and began reading. And in a matter of minutes I was once again that little child who was mesmerised by the world evoked in the book, laughing with childlike pleasure and then crying with the intensity that only young children are capable of. 

I feel the same nostalgia when I pick up some of my battered copies of Enid Blyton’s Mallory Towers series. No matter where in the world I am, I am immediately transported back to the shady verandah of my childhood home in Calcutta, sitting in a wicker chair, absentmindedly munching my way through a packet of biscuits even as my mother berates me from the kitchen, reminding me that lunch with be ready soon. 

Whenever I pick up a Georgette Heyer, I can see my sister’s disapproving face because she thought I was far too young to be reading her romance novels. When I leaf through a thriller by Alistair Maclean I remember my brother who introduced me to him when I was a teenager. When I delve into the plays of George Bernard Shaw, it is the face of my father — who was his absolute devotee — that swims in front of my eyes. And reading any historical novel brings back memories of my grandfather, whose favourite genre this was. 

Books may transport you into another world - as indeed they do. But they do something even more important. They transport you back into another part of your life — one that you have left far behind. And that can sometimes be the most precious gift of all.