{"id":117,"date":"2026-09-08T07:43:07","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T07:43:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/?p=117"},"modified":"2026-09-08T09:14:31","modified_gmt":"2026-09-08T09:14:31","slug":"an-avid-reader-to-a-successful-playwright","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/an-avid-reader-to-a-successful-playwright\/","title":{"rendered":"An Avid Reader To A Successful Playwright"},"content":{"rendered":"

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”118″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center” css=””][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text css=”” el_class=”bjustify”]Tintin and Snowy, Mandrake and Lothar, The Phantom and Devil, Richie Rich, Frank Hardy, Joe Hardy and Chet Morton,\u00a0 Archie and his gang, Supandi, Bahadur, Swamy and Friends, Batman, Spiderman, Sherlock Holmes, Perry Mason and the list just goes on. For me, these were never just characters in books and comics. They were friends, companions and gateways to worlds far beyond my own. I travelled with them, solved mysteries with them, fought villains with them and most importantly, imagined with them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Looking back at more than 25 years of my journey as a theatre actor, playwright, director and performing arts educationalist, I realise something quite profound – <\/span>my journey to the stage began long before I ever stepped onto one. It began with turning pages.<\/b><\/p>\n

Reading was an integral part of my growing up. There is a saying that a person who reads lives a thousand lives in one. I believe I lived many of those lives through the books I read.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I never merely read a story. I entered it.<\/span><\/p>\n

When an author described a place, I built it in my mind. When a character spoke, I heard a voice. When something dramatic happened, I could see it unfold before me. The words on the page became images, people, places and emotions.<\/span><\/p>\n

I was fascinated by that magic. How could writers create entire worlds with nothing but words? How could a few carefully chosen sentences make us laugh, wonder, fear or dream? I was in awe of authors who could make the invisible visible.<\/span><\/p>\n

K. Narayan, Frederick Forsyth, Jeffrey Archer, Franklin W. Dixon, Erle Stanley Gardner, Arthur Conan Doyle, Rabindranath Tagore, Ian Fleming, Sidney Sheldon, Agatha Christie and the Brothers Grimm were among the many writers who shaped my reading journey. Each had a distinctive voice and a different way of telling a story. And each, in their own way, taught me that <\/span>there is no limit to what words can create.<\/b><\/p>\n

As a child, I did not realise that reading was developing a skill, I simply loved reading. But somewhere between the pages, something was happening. My imagination was expanding. My curiosity was growing. I was learning to observe people, understand situations and look at the world through different eyes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Years later, when I entered theatre, I understood the immense value of that experience.<\/span><\/p>\n

A playwright begins with a blank page and has to create an entire world. A director has to see that world before an audience can see it. An actor has to step into a character’s life and make it believable. <\/span>Theatre requires imagination at every step.<\/b><\/p>\n

And reading had given me that imagination.<\/span><\/p>\n

It has also given me something more. An understanding that every person has a story. Stories introduced me to different cultures, relationships, emotions, conflicts, dreams and struggles. They made me curious about people. They made me observe. They made me empathise.<\/span><\/p>\n

These qualities have been as important to my journey as any formal training I have received.<\/span><\/p>\n

Reading did not simply make me a better reader or writer. <\/span>It made me a more imaginative person, a more curious observer and ultimately, a better storyteller.<\/b><\/p>\n

Today, when I look at children growing up surrounded by screens, I often wonder what they might be missing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Technology is an integral part of our lives and I certainly do not believe children need to be kept away from it. But when a child spends hours consuming stories on a screen, most of the visual world has already been created for them.<\/span><\/p>\n

A book is different.<\/b><\/p>\n

When a child reads, the screen is inside their head. The child decides what the character looks like, creates the house, the forest, the city or the planet. The child hears the voices. The child decides how the story looks and feels.<\/span><\/p>\n

The child becomes the director.<\/b><\/p>\n

That is the extraordinary power of reading.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is why I believe parents must actively nurture the habit of reading, not as another academic task, but as a source of joy.<\/b><\/p>\n

It doesn’t have to begin with great literature. It can begin with a comic. A Tintin adventure, a mystery, a fantasy, a funny story, a book about dinosaurs, space, sport or anything else that excites a child.<\/span><\/p>\n

Let children choose. Let them explore. Let them read for pleasure.<\/b><\/p>\n

Because when a child reads, they are doing much more than improving vocabulary or language. They are building concentration, they are developing imagination, they are expanding their world, they are learning to understand people and perspectives different from their own, they are developing curiosity, creativity and empathy. Most importantly, they are learning to think beyond what is immediately in front of them.<\/span><\/p>\n

I often wonder where I would be today if I had not spent those countless hours with Tintin, Sherlock Holmes, the Hardy Boys, Swamy and friends, and all those wonderful characters and authors.<\/span><\/p>\n

Would I have become a playwright? Would I have found theatre? I cannot say.<\/span><\/p>\n

But I know that those books gave me something that became central to my life, <\/span>the ability to imagine a world that did not yet exist and then create it.<\/b><\/p>\n

The boy who once travelled through the pages of other people’s stories eventually began writing stories of his own.<\/span><\/p>\n

The reader became the storyteller <\/b>and the stories found their way to the stage.<\/span><\/p>\n

That is why, even today, I believe one of the greatest gifts we can give a child is not another gadget, another toy or another class.<\/span><\/p>\n

Give them a book.<\/b><\/p>\n

Give them the opportunity to get lost in a story. Give them the freedom to imagine. Give them the chance to create their own worlds.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Because every book a child reads is not just a story being consumed.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is a world being created inside a young mind.<\/b><\/p>\n

And who knows, perhaps the next great playwright, author, filmmaker, actor, artist or simply a wonderfully imaginative human being is somewhere turning the pages of a book right now.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Believe in yourself & the world will believe in YOU!<\/strong><\/p>\n

[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”49″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_border_circle”][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n

Vijay Viswanathan<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Theatre Practitioner | Educationalist | Playwright | Acting Coach
\nFounder & MD of Alchemy Academy of Performing Arts<\/h3>\n

[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”118″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center” css=””][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text css=”” el_class=”bjustify”]Tintin and Snowy, Mandrake and Lothar, The Phantom and Devil, Richie Rich, Frank Hardy, Joe Hardy and Chet Morton,\u00a0 Archie and his gang, Supandi, Bahadur, Swamy and Friends, Batman, Spiderman, Sherlock Holmes, Perry Mason and the list just goes on. For me, these were never just characters in books…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":118,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-career-guidance","category-1","description-off"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":130,"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117\/revisions\/130"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alchemycoe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}