Month: September 2021

What I read during my tween years doesn’t come easily to mind.  I know that I devoured the Hardy Boys series, eagerly finishing one book and starting with another soon thereafter.

I can’t recall when I stumbled onto the Western books by J.T. Edson, but I can clearly remember they were favourites of mine.  Two regular characters in these books come to mind, Dusty Fog and The Ysabel Kid.  Fond memories.

Somewhere in the mix, I also read the Roy of the Rovers comic books as well as the Archie and Jughead ones.  These books formed part of my everyday life during my days in Kensington.

My teenage and early twenties were spent reading mostly novels and fiction. Some titles that come to mind are The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  At one stage I kept a list of all the books I had read. Sadly, the list is no more and many of the books were donated to charity.

A friend triggered my memory about the photo-story books that were very popular in the 1970s and 1980s. There were titles in English and Afrikaans, such as Tessa, Kid Colt, Ruiter in Swart, Grensvegter, Melody, Kyk, See, Saboteur, and many others.  We owned a corner café in Elsies River, which is a cliché about Indians and corner shops. Therefore, I had regular access to photo-story books. When you love to read, you read anything!

Most of my reading was done at night.  In the daytime, we worked at our corner shop (not an enjoyable experience if you are young), so I had to wait until the shop closed at night to go back to reading. I would read from about 9 pm until 1 am. I was immersed in reading. I often read a book from cover to cover within one sitting. It should come as no surprise that I am a night owl.

My first recollection of reading goes back to when I was about seven years old. In 1972, my parents with my brothers and sisters had all gone to India (I think by ship). For some obscure reason (the way I see it), I did not accompany the family, with some explanation that I needed to start primary schooling (Standard One). I went to live with my mom’s family in Kensington and attended Windermere Primary School.

I ‘discovered’ the public library in Kensington in walking distance to where I lived. I recall going to the library, but the details are vague. I have memories of going to the library very frequently and reading book-upon-book.

It would be prudent at this stage to inform that no-one in my immediate family has a love for reading or books to the extent that I do. My dad is an avid cricket follower and I recall him having a collection of cricket magazines. I have vivid memories of paging through my dad’s Wisden cricket magazines and his collection of the Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack. I should thus attribute some of reading interest to my dad!

My sojourns to the public library in Kensington would soon be disrupted. I learned to my dismay that the Kensington Public Library was going to be converted to a reference library. At the age of seven years, I had no idea what a reference library was, but I did understand that children would no longer be able go that library. A new public library was built in Factreton. I eventually did end up going to the library in Factreton, but once again cannot recall who took me there.

The distance to walk to the library in Factreton was much longer. From home to the library was about 2kms and the roundtrip about 45 minutes. If my memory serves me correctly, I did this trip at least twice a week. Upon reflection, I am somewhat surprised that my family allowed me to do this walk all on my own!