Hyperlinks

It was a very engrossing reading of Jhumpa Lahiri's 'The Namesake' (the book and not the movie!!) that prompted me to write this. Oh no, it doesn't refer to those blue coloured links you click on webpages to take you to some other pages. Long before Mr. Tim Berners Lee brought in the concept of hyperlinks on the WWW, they already existed in the real world. This I realised from the book I just read.

Perhaps this phenomenon is common to all avid readers. After a reading of a particularly enthralling book that incorporates another book in its plotline; you feel the itch to read that too. Its happened with me. After completing The Namesake, I immediately googled for "The short stories of Nikolai Gogol" and am still beset with the desire to browse through "The Overcoat". Same happened with Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner. I cant wait to get my hands on the Shahnamah and know more about Rostam and Sohrab!

Always all the works mentioned in novels don't turn out to be true. For example I searched for Fermeculi Formula for many fruitless hours disappointed to know that it existed only in Opal's universe. It was too much to expect that Harry Potter's "Quiddich through the ages" and "The Standard Book of Spells" would be found in a Muggle bookshop like ours. JKR fortunately catered partly to this whim by bringing out a copy of "Quiddich through the ages".

The hyperlink connection doesn't stretch only to books. Sherlock Holmes's 221-B Baker Street has been sought by many and again HP fans will find themselves wishing they could also roam through Diagon Alley or visit Hogwarts. Dan Brown's picturesque description of the Louvre in Angels & Demons led me to find more about it online.

On a more serious note this is present in research papers and journals as well where we jump to references to find more information. This, I'm referring to the paper version! And oh while we are at mentioning Dan Brown, his book hyperlinked me to ambigrams and their creations; something I never knew existed or was possible!!

Come to think of it, hyperlinks exist in people's conversations, in newspapers and in letters, greetings or postcards as well. You only have to notice them. Perhaps this is a case of reverse history and hyperlinks were invented as a WWW analogy to the situations I just mentioned. I guess my blog's given you a hyperlink - to find out hw they were invented - hope to pursue it and tell me if anyone does find the answer. Till then happy treasure hunt!!!