TIMES have changed, whether for the better or the worse. Everything now revolves aroud technology -- newspapers, commercial calculators, letters. Nothing is the way it used to be.

Could this change of time, brought by advancement in technology, ever replace the joy in holding the paperback of your favourite book in your hands? The smell of an old book, the feel of its hardback cover in your hands, and the thrill of reading it for the sake of pleasure — these are the things an eBook reader could never compensate for.

Yet we see people slowly drifting away from the simple habit of reading. Children would rather watch a movie with fancy CGI than let their minds wander freely in imagination.

The love of reading ought to be promoted through libraries, as there are hardly any public libraries in Rawalpindi. eBook readers, in a way, have taken away the deeper connection people used to feel with books. Books have become another part of technology, and that has ended the long-term intimacy that people have shared books. Reading allows one to think. Something needs to be done to revive the traditional book reading.

Hajra Waheed

Rawalpindi

Published in Dawn, March 17th, 2018