It is the Olympic Year and with just under three months left for the start of the Olympic Games in Paris, a bouquet of memories will spring forth across diverse media. Even in the age when information finds a way into our mobile phones via text, photographs, audios and videos, a book still has its own charm.
Vijayan Bala is the fastest to get off the blocks with his coffee-table book, Olympics: Modern Summer Games: Its Stars and their Great Moments. But this is far from a quickie. His passion for sport, nurtured from the time he grew up in Calcutta and through his years as a school teacher and principal to this day post his retirement, finds expression in the lovingly produced book.
The brevity with which Vijayan Bala tells so many stories reflects his understanding of the reducing attention span of contemporary citizen. In an age in which readers are served the bullet points as the gateway to longer reading and Instagram reels and YouTube shorts dominate timelines, he has ensured that the reader will stick with each story he narrates from the start to the finish.
Besides inspirational tales of 77 stars from across the world, the book offers a glimpse into each edition of the Olympic Games. The standout feature of the book is that the reader does not have to read from cover to cover. Instead, the reader can choose to read any chapter, soak the magic of the featured stars and the selection of photographs.
The creative use of the ‘Did you know’ series is another striking aspect in the book, directing the reader’s attention on nuggets of information. That the author and publisher have not sought to cut corners is evident from the layout of the pages. The space between lines of text is such that the reader’s eyes are not put under strain.
Vijayan Bala’s labour of love is a treasure worth acquiring. For, it surveys the entire gamut of the Olympic Games from the prism of a fan of global sport and leaves the reader feeling inspired and motivated by the stories of athletes across a wide range of disciplines.
Olympics: Modern Summer Games: Its Stars and their Great Moments; Vijayan Bala, Wonder House (Prakash Books), 2024, pp 228, Rs 990.
