Teacher interviews!

Hello! This is where we'll be hosting our series of interviews with teachers about their favourite books, and reading habits!
[Brought to you by the NJC Library Team]

• Bookly Scoop with Mr Koh
• Spilling the Tea with Mr Beer
• Coming soon!

Readers are Leaders Club
A team of General Paper Subject Representatives (and a Reading Ambassadors!). We've revived NJ’s Bookstagram, organised a book display, interviewed teachers about books and reading (which you can see here in this site!) and organised a short story competition for JH3 boarding.

Narayanan Rakunathan (Mr)

What is a book you are currently reading/have read recently?
I am a bit of a foreign language geek, and speak a few foreign languages fluently. In late 2020, I
read a Mexican novel titled ‘Como agua para chocolate’ (Spanish-to-English translation: ‘Like
Water for Chocolate’) by Laura Esquivel.
Would you recommend this book? Which target audience would you recommend it to?
I would recommend this book to people who enjoy magical realism, a literary genre that blurs the
lines between fantasy and reality. Readers will also learn much about Mexican history and
culture. In particular, and interestingly, each chapter begins with a Mexican recipe, and I have
been wanting to put my culinary skills to a test!
P/S: The translated text appears to be just as good as the original version.

What is a life changing book to you?
I would not say that this book is necessarily ‘life-changing’, but it did have a considerable impact
on me when I was younger. As a teenager, I was really intrigued by ‘Disgrace’, and it remains
one of my favourite books. I remember several of my friends were reading it, too, as it was an A-
Level set text. I have fond memories of the intense discussions surrounding this text.
Set in post-Apartheid South Africa, the novel carefully examines discrimination among different
segments of the population in urban and rural areas. Reading through the perspective of the
protagonist, David Lurie, one might wonder how traumatic experiences could be for individuals
subject to torment by others who have little tolerance for racial, as well as sexual and gender
diversity.

Have you always been a reader? What is your earliest memory of reading?
For as long as I can remember, I have always been a reader. According to my mother, books and
I have been inseparable since I was the age of three! I am not sure how true that is, though;
coming from a Mandarin-speaking background, I am quite certain that I started out with Chinese
storybooks.

J. M. Coetzee accentuates to the reader—through Lurie’s startling shift from perpetrator
to victim of violence—the importance of keeping an open mind and reaching out to those who
need our support in our own lives. As Lurie struggles to understand his daughter’s identity and
her response to an unspeakable violence, this novel shows us how difficult yet necessary it is to
endeavour to understand others—even if their identity and values might be in direct conflict with
our prejudices and deep-seated beliefs.
Everyone has their own story and should be respected, and that is the spirit I hope NJCians can
grow and exhibit.

If you had to pick only one book to read for the rest of your life, what would it be?
I cannot really answer this question because it is always contextual. As an economist, I would (of
course) say that one’s tastes and preferences are never static. For example, I really enjoyed the
‘Harry Potter’ series when I was a child, but as I get older, I have explored other genres like
science fiction, historical fiction and dystopian literature. Moreover, I tend to gravitate towards
different books, depending on my emotions. For instance, when I was feeling home-sick whilst
studying in Europe, I found myself reading a few novels that surround the theme of homecoming,
especially from somewhere very faraway. My point is that our penchants and aversions change
over time. In ten years, I would not be surprised if I ventured into hitherto unexplored fields.