Growing autobiography trend

Some days ago, I finished reading the autobiography of cricket Great Sachin Tendulkar: Playing It My Way (Read the review here). Spanning over about 450 pages, it revolves around his earlier life, his career and more. As an avid cricket fan, I thoroughly enjoyed it, and finished it quite soon. Before Sachin's, I have read about a dozen autobiographies by different people. Comedian Haribansha Acharya's 'China Haraeko Manchhe', Businessman Binod Chaudhary's, Late National Leader BP Koirala's 'Aatmabritanta', Writer Jhamak Kumar Ghimire's 'Jiwan Kada Ki Ful', Journalist Vinod Mehta's 'Lucknow Boy', Late Apple CEO Steve Jobs' are mentionable. The trend of published autobiography prevails all over the world. And it is gaining momentum in Nepal as well.

An autobiography generally deals about one's life, his/her struggles, success, failures and achievements. For instance, Haribansha used to teach in his early age to earn for his further study. Differently abled writer Jhamak's earlier tales are heart-wrenching. She used to try to learn to write in ground using her toe as a pen. It results in severe pain in her toe. In most cases, a successful person moves through pain and insufficiency.

Nepal also sees a lot of autobiographies publishing these days. Ex-Prime Ministers Krishna Prasad Bhattarai, Girija Prasad Koirala, Pushpa Kamal Dahal (biography in case of Koirala and Dahal), Ex-Generals Bibek Kumar Shah, Rukmangud Katwal, Senior Journalist Bijay Kumar Pande etc also published their autobiographies. Actor Bhuwan KC is also writing one. Some autobiographies generate a really good hype. Readers get to know many different novel things and incidents through the autobiography of 'Who's Who' of our society! But some things in them are simply not true. For instance, Katwal mentioned that he never saluted the then PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal. It must not be true as a Chief of Army Staff salutes the PM.

On the other hand, Journalist Pande reveals a lot of hidden truths about his life. He used to drink a lot earlier, but he did not drink a single drop of alcohol for the past 10 years. A famed person like Pande gave a lot of inputs on life, and its meaning. Ex-PMs BP's and Kisunji's biographies tell a large number of interesting historical events. They did not shied away from exposing their failures as well, which is inspiring for us. BP has praised his younger brother Girija for his outstanding negotiation skills despite his then-loss of wife in a fire accident.

It is a good sign to see a lot of new autobiographies in market. Nevertheless, writers can trick us with their silly and false accounts. A careful selection of an autobiography will surely help a reader to know a lot about one's life. And, an autobiography always act as a good change after reading some poetry, novel or story book!