Long copy woes!

Long copy gives me jitters. I wonder how someone can write at such a length, making sense and keeping the enthusiasm intact. On top of it, who has the time to read it? People are always in hurry. They have little or no time to go through a tedious piece of numerous words. They hop and skip and go down the end, or simply read the heading. Words, they think just fill the space and have no memory value. Even as kids they loved stories with many illustrations. Though people say content is king, but they prefer a picture over thousand words. And oh the text! Its size and font gives them a headache. And those words that are strangers to them, stare hard making them weak and hollow inside. Dictionary can probably help them, but who refers to those bulky, monstrous, piles of paper bound together? So they simply ignore and lead a life of bliss in ignorance. Skipping past an array of alphabets and letters, they give it a blind eye, for they think it’s a forest of words that are put across to make a short story long. Rather lengthy enough, one that would put them to bed and take then to an estranged world of words, leading then to develop hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia.

Whew!

But do you know that you've read 223 words so far. So, in case you are one amongst those who hate long copy, you must think again about it, because it could just be a mental block. One that you just shattered right now! 

Visual Vision and the Comic Life

Remember how every storybook in early years of schooling and pre-schooling times had an appealing picture that fascinated us. I always loved books with more pictures and found it hard to adapt to literature books in the later classes, which were picture less, heavy text laden long stories.

Picture of course is worth a thousand words and even when reading any of the best sellers we begin to visualize and take over 50 pages to have the character images in our head. Imagination is always visual if you notice and is never textual. Even to write a copy most of the times, we first play a visual scene in our head to tell the tale in words. Memories too come in images- snapshots of our life in the past.

Images rev up thoughts and sometimes it’s the other way round. Irrespective of which comes first, the visuals definitely make the whole story telling simpler. And this is where Comics and graphics come into play. A friend (Anshul, thanks man!) recently introduced me to comics, (yes I have never read any in my childhood) and I loved reading a 75 pager Romeo and Juliet published by Campfire, cut short, crisp and visual. And another one in the list was a 68 pager Leonardo Da Vinci again published by Campfire and I was in love and awe with the great artist, completely drawn to his life and mind-bent.

Also recently there may Graphic Novels based on hindi flicks that are seeing a prospective rise in demand. Though there always existed a market for the English ones. If you still have doubts on what are graphic novels and how they differ from comics, it’s simply a descriptive novel with graphics.

The Graphic Drama Spreads, an article in today’s Delhi Times, once again triggered my interest in comics and it’s good to know that comics are catching up trend with readers in India once again. So what if I missed reading Champak and Chacha Choudhary in childhood, I can still do it and cover up for not reading comics now.

Isolation plea...

Just for a day, let me be...

Spare me of expectations, set me free.

Running around in life, I gasp for breath,

Not that I fear the strife, but I am fatigued.

Past is past, it was decades ago,

Picture me not, in a frame so old.

Yes, you nurtured and trusted me too,

Not that I don’t reciprocate, but even I am blue.

If you can then do excuse,

Enough of it now, I need refuge.

And once I am me, I shall return,

Romancing life, in a new verve!