Issues | Torchlight

16Jun

By Beena ChoksiNo Comments

Axis, Issue 2 - June 2017, Issues

Preface

There are as many libraries as there are communities to imagine them; each library telling a different story of how it came into being. It may not be surprising for a community’s history and memories to be couched in “before the library“ and “after the library” terms. For, libraries, in celebrating curiosity, freedom of thought, and multiple modes of expression, hold the power to transform communities deeply, irrevocably. Built on the bedrock of books, libraries serve as intellectually stimulating spaces, safe havens—and in more recent times creative hubs—for children and adults alike. The ever-expanding vision of libraries encompasses book discussions, poetry readings, film screenings, drama workshops, and art and craft activities. Library-goers channel their experience of ne...

16Jun

By Neha YadavNo Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

Story Stacks

In 1993, Armenian-American artist Nina Katchadourian devised an unconventional way of extracting meaning from books. She began running her eyes over entire bookshelves, whether in private homes or specialized collections, and pulling out titles that seemed to suggest a story. She would then group these in a cluster that hinted at some self-enclosed tale. And the Sorted Books project was born. Nina K's project recognises the untapped potential of all book collections. Readers are invariably gluttons for stories: oral narratives, family anecdotes, tall tales, local gossip; we will accept all with gratitude and then go out looking for some more. Why, then, must the storytelling power of a book be thought finished with the last page? Sorted Books is also an exercise in biography. These cluste...

Reading across Countries, Time, and City Spaces

6Jun

By Elizabeth Sam LazaroNo Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

Reading across Countries, Time, and City Spaces

I don’t remember learning to read. But, I do remember reading; going down a few steps to a mezzanine floor, to three rooms lined with shelves, a large circular table, a few chairs, and books, everywhere, shelves, table, chairs, windowsills and floor. We were a Goan family in the French concession in Shanghai. As children growing up with multiple languages, Portuguese, French and Chinese, English was unknown. One day, the parents decided that English would be the language spoken at home. My father bought books, new and second-hand, singly and in lots to further this. I remember these masses of dusty books, English, French, and a few yellowy black bound Portuguese books. As an asthmatic, I was forbidden to go to the library, but I often crept in and breathed deeply of the atmosphere, old...

4Jun

By Gajendra Raut2 Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

A Two-way Street

Ever since I began working, libraries have been part of my work. I had an experience of working at the research and reference wing of Ramoji Film City, Hyderabad. In my previous organisation and current one, my work takes me to children’s libraries in schools. For a long time, I did not realise that communities and libraries are intertwined, and meant to be a part of each other. It seemed to me that libraries were meant for either children or adult readers. And reading for me was reading the text. Community members were seldom part of library activities because they did not access libraries for reading books.It was assumed that in order to engage one needs to be literate. I did not find this odd till I realised, in the course of my work, that reading is not limited to reading only the text...

4Jun

By Gautham Subramanyam1 Comment

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

All I Want is a Room…

There is an old abandoned house in Pamposh Enclave – once a small, innocuous neighbourhood, now become posh by the lottery of location. Its proximity to Nehru Place roots it in the very heart of South Delhi – and like all its proximate hoods, it too has changed. Older ‘Kothis’ with front lawns and terrace ‘Barsatis’ are collapsing. They are being demolished, rebuilt, and rebranded as ‘Builder Floors’. They have stilt parking for multiple cars; the terraces are given over to gigantic generators and water storage tanks. But C 13 stands alone, and it bucks the trend. We do not know why C 13 remains in this partially unkempt condition – in defiance of all around it. But as I discovered happily one April evening, it is to be celebrated. I went, having rece...

Reading a Second-Hand Book: A Journey of Serendipity

4Jun

By Gayatri Gulvady3 Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

Reading a Second-Hand Book: A Journey of Serendipity

Walking into a quaint second-hand bookstore and accidentally discovering a book that one has been searching for are two necessary ingredients of any bibliophile’s dream. In case you have already conjured up an image of this dream, you have me for company. Memories of stumbling upon childhood classics or rare out-of-print novels in ‘Bookworm’ or ‘Murthys’ Select Bookstore’ have come rushing back as I write this article. While some of you might opt for your books to be fresh and unused, I usually prefer second-hand copies, which have carefully preserved the experiences and memories of the previous readers within its delicate pages. By being held in the hands of several other individuals, second-hand books have an irreplaceable charm. Be it the inscriptions on the flyleaf, the do...

4Jun

By Radha GopalanNo Comments

Axis, Issue 2 - June 2017

Communities – the Libraries of Life

Libraries have been my sanctuary - the chairs, the alcoves, the stools in the corner, the smell of old and new books – unquestioningly absorbing the ebbs and flows of my life. In my mind therefore a library was shelves of books that revealed worlds, words and images where I could lose myself for fleeting moments or hours – in silence. More recently however, over the last 10 years or so, my libraries have expanded beyond the written word: they reside in people. They are built on life experiences where the words, images and experience are passed on by word of mouth, embedded in practice, from generation to generation. For a lot of us, the written word dominates the way we learn, accumulate knowledge and educate ourselves. The mainstream education system lays a lot of stress on w...

Open Sim-Sim: Digital Doors to Community Libraries

4Jun

By Menaka Raman1 Comment

Axis, Issue 2 - June 2017

Open Sim-Sim: Digital Doors to Community Libraries

Perhaps glum statistics aren’t the best way to begin. But sometimes, glum statistics are hard to ignore. “Mapping Children’s Literature in India”, published by Sir Ratan Tata Trust (SRTT) and Parag Trust, tells us that there are 1.5 lakh libraries in India, but no data available on the children’s literature on their shelves. Seventy-four percent of school children in India have negligible or no access to libraries. While in the United Kingdom one child enjoys access to six books, a less abundant picture emerges in India. In urban areas there is one book for six children, while in rural India there is one book for eleven children. When I read things like this, I realise how very lucky I have been. Growing up, libraries were a constant and reassuring presence in my life. There ...

3Jun

By Vibha Kamat13 Comments

Issue 2 - June 2017

Yours, Mine, and Ours

Ultimately it's the space, or the lack thereof. Then there's dust. And the abundance thereof. Unfair, especially when you crave one and want to banish the other. When one is finite and the other limitless. Now turn to the deep love for books, reading them and being in their company, being surrounded by them. Throw in a growing family, increasing the tribe of book lovers. Uncover varied interests, different subjects and mixed age-groups. Time to re-read that first paragraph - and you know one of the great motivating factors that led my friends and me to start a library. No, not concern for our fellow men and women, no. It was almost selfish. Because had we not started a concerted effort to look for a place to start a...

3Jun

By Deepika Sharma4 Comments

Axis, Issue 2 - June 2017

An Urdu Library in the Walled City

31May

By Salil ChaturvediNo Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

A Thousand Wrinkles (Why I Love To Read)

I don’t suppose you’ve met Nyima. But then, by a crazy accident, perhaps you have. Strange coincidences do happen in this world. Perhaps you took a holiday to Ladakh and bumped into her. In which case, you would have met Urghyen, her father, too. You must have seen the way his face shows a thousand wrinkles when he smiles. And you would have met her shaggy dog and seen how Urghyen immobilises him by putting his forepaws into his collar so he does not bother people. You would have seen Nyima milking the goats and picking up their droppings which her family uses for fuel to survive the biting winter. And perhaps Nyima took you to the Hanle monastery where she prays for the goats and yaks of her tribe, the Changpas. Nyima must definitely have shown you her father’s rebo (the trad...

30May

By Beena ChoksiNo Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

On The Same Page

Being able to criss-cross the globe on the strength of the Internet has made it possible to engage with creative ideas, conversations, and experiences which otherwise would be beyond our reach—and at times, even beyond our imagination. On The Same Page will bring to the reader of Torchlight, a combination of textual-audio-visual curated content, about and around libraries and bookish love. Las Misiones Pedagógicas Imagine borrowing a book from a library and finding card in it, which reads: When you finish your work wash your hands and take the book you have requested. Find a quiet spot and read. You’ll always remember these moments with pleasure. Then put the book away carefully until you can continue reading. Make sure that you when you return the book after reading it, it is as ...

29May

By Uma MahadevanNo Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

Shakespeare and Me

One Sunday morning when we were living in Calcutta, my father announced that we would be moving to Bangalore. His office had transferred him there for a project. What was a project, and where was Bangalore, demanded my sister, who was just six, and therefore had questions about everything. My mother murmured something about work and machines, and took out the atlas. I remained silent. I was in Class 4, I had seen the map of India many times and knew roughly where Bangalore was, but I didn’t want to move anywhere. I didn’t want to move away from my dozens of friends in the building, my school, and my city. We moved in the middle of the first term. I remained angry and resentful as we packed my new school uniforms: why were we taking them? I wouldn’t be using them a...

29May

By Alia Sinha1 Comment

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

Another readerly problem

28May

By Phuntsok Dorjee2 Comments

Issue 2 - June 2017

A First in a Refugee Settlement

I was born in the Mundgod Tibetan settlement in the late 1970s and personally was quite fond of reading. Mundgod Tibetan Settlement (source. www.tibetmuseum.org) I think my interest in reading was born out of my curious nature and my interest to acquire new information and knowledge. I vividly remember a monthly magazine called Wisdom which had articles on different subjects and I also had a collection of comics bought from a shop which sold used books in the nearby town. Our school library didn’t exist then and sadly, serves as just a physical presence even today. Being a refugee community, our parents were more concerned with providing for the family and our existence was at stake, so exploring ways of learning was not a priority. Reading as a pleasurable activity ...

28May

By Samina MishraNo Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 2 - June 2017

A Library is like….

19Feb

By Samina MishraNo Comments

Alt Shift Archives, Issue 1 - March 2017

A Library is like…

18Feb

By Sujata NoronhaNo Comments

Axis, Issue 1 - March 2017

Preface to Torchlight

"The light they give is insufficient and unceasing," writes Jorge Luis Borges in his short story, "The Library of Babel", when referring to bulbs in the Library. Torchlight, a Journal of Libraries and Bookish Love finds its context in a similar half-lit place and time of light and shadows. There is so much to know yet, and so much to share that even in our assuming that we know the library, we find we do not and so we are driven to go on searching. "When it was announced that the Library contained all books, the first reaction was unbounded joy" (ibid., 69)1 and this is akin to the feeling of birthing Torchlight. What began as an idea amongst a few of us spread joyfully to include others and we find ourselves sharing our first issue of Torchlight with all of you. Watch ‘Bookseller o...

24Jan

By Arvind Gupta1 Comment

Issue 1 - March 2017

A Million Books for a Billion People

The human species thrives because each generation passes on its lived experiences to the next one. These experiences were carved on rocks, scribbled on clay tablets, written on parchment for the benefit of all. Texts were copied by scribes and kept in depositories. Libraries and archives were known to many civilisations in Egypt, Asia Minor and Greece. These sundry libraries were, however, primarily concerned with the conservation of local traditions and heritage. The first known universal library, which gathered books from all over the world at one single location, was the great Library at Alexandria. Its genesis lay in the inquisitive Greek mind and in Alexander’s conquests. The book booty must have made the library richer. Likewise, the British Museum is often described in jes...

24Jan

By Jerry Pinto3 Comments

Issue 1 - March 2017

On Libraries

My first encounter with a library was not a pleasant one. I was in the third standard and around eight years old. My father’s idea of a birthday present was to take me to Prabhat Circulating Library and Book Shop near the Kohinoor Mills Circle at Dadar. I was terribly excited when we stepped in because I thought I was going to get a book. I remember being rather disappointed when I discovered that instead my gift was a membership in the circulating library. I knew what I wanted: I am afraid I was taken in by the vibrant colour and the promise of excitement in a Donald Duck comic and a collection of Dennis the Menace cartoons. Donald Duck was a familiar character from the rare cartoon films at Shree Cinema. I had no idea then that the comics were boring, as I would discover a few year...