The written word

Do you remember one of the favourite topics for our essays in school? At some stage or the other we would be asked to elaborate/justify this statement: The pen is mightier than the sword.

Naturally, at that stage of our lives, when all that mattered to us were the marks we would get for the essay and the remarks we would earn from our teacher, we had a whole list of clichés down pat. We coughed them onto the page without much effort and definitely without any conviction — and in due course, depending on our grades, went up or down a notch or two in our eyes and those of our peers.

Thereafter, we forgot both the topic and the arguments and went about our lives: enjoying the written word, finding it thought-provoking, riveting, stimulating, sometimes compelling us to look deeper into ourselves and at the world around us... but basically, taking it pretty much for granted.

From time to time, however, the effect of the written word comes to the fore — and then we recall the might of the pen. It could be when writers win awards for their work and write of how they got to that pinnacle. It could be when writers return awards in protest — as was happening in India some months ago.

It could also be driven home to us when we globetrot: perhaps when we stand in awe before the homes of our favourite authors or maybe where their mortal remains lie, or the places they wrote about ... We could also be reminded, as we were recently when we make a trip to Denmark that young or old, from far and near, continue to bond over the beloved tales of Hans Christian Andersen — while the fearsome Viking warriors we expected to be immortalised everywhere with their axes and swords were not.

Taking copious notes

When we travel, we also find that many of our companions believe that “a picture is worth a thousand words”, preserving memories by busy clicking photographs on all cameras, tablets and phones while we would rather not rely only on pictorial evidence of our jaunt and take copious notes as guides and tour managers speak about everything around us.

Thus, there’s always a little notebook on hand as we move in our coach or proceed on a walking tour — and somehow, I try to get in that little bit extra like ‘narrow white house with brown roof beside same with red roof’ to help me identify photographs later and remind me that it was there that some of my favourite fairy tales were written...

No, my nose is not inside that notebook all the time — and I don’t stumble into the wrong lane and trip over the kerb or miss out on the sights and sites of note. It is when we stop for those few seconds or slow our pace that the pen gets busy. It doesn’t matter if my handwriting is squiggly and goes diagonally or vertically in my hurry to get details down. It is still decipherable: and thus, when we get back at the end of an eight-hour jaunt to at least a dozen different castles and gardens and museums, when that smorgasbord for the eyes has made the entire trip a haze in our minds, it is so easy to recall our steps.

We pore over photographs but there’s beauty everywhere and we cannot distinguish one park or palace from the other — and that notebook becomes the deciding factor. No one questions my conviction as I say, “Kronborg castle was practically unadorned, but it had the great distinction of being immortalised as Hamlet’s Elsinore. The gilded and decorated Rosenborg palace was the repository of the crown jewels...”

For me, it is the written word all the way.

Cheryl Rao is a journalist based in India.