Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Ahhh... Why They Wrote


Turn just five pages into Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children and the reader is bound to get excited:

"For Zafar Rushdie
who, contrary to all expectations,
was born in the afternoon."

We get a glimpse of the things and people treasured, without the guise of a story. A mere three lines and we begin to taste Rushdie's wit, humour and language mastery.

Scanning the opening pages to a piece, it's so nice to know why and for whom a writer wrote. The homage is cherished, I'm sure, by the persons who are actually mentioned, but for readers it gets us all revved up for an exciting ride or signals us to start building sentiment. At the end of reading a book, it's even more delightful to look back at the words on that page before the piece begins and savour the journey you had going through the pages.
Whatever the book you're now enjoying, at the end of the journey, be sure to read that page just before the start again.

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