KOCHI: Shashi Tharoor is famous for using high-sounding words on various communication platforms and his latest, which he used following a request from a 10th-standard student to add to his vocabulary list, is truly inspiring.
"I will give you a very simple, very old word: 'Read'. That's the only way I have acquired a vocabulary," said Tharoor.
"People think that I'm some sort of a nut case who studies dictionaries all day long. I've barely opened a dictionary in my life. But I've read extensively. And if you read widely, you read extensively, and if you come across the same word in three different contexts in three different books, you will understand the meaning and usage very quickly.
"The reason I was like that is of course, I had some advantages over all of you. I lived in an India without television, without computers, without Nintendo, without PlayStation, without mobile phones," said the author and politician.
"I was an asthmatic child and I was very often confined to bed, unable to breathe. All I had were books. Books for my escape, books for my education. And because I read above my age level and read anything that I could get my hands on, I developed the mind that God now has blessed me with and acquired the vocabulary that comes with it. My advice to all of you is Read, Read, Read. The more you read, the better your vocabulary will also become," added the Thiruvananthapuram MP, smiling and sipping tea in between.