Get Candid With Mrs Funnybones Aka Twinkle Khanna

Digital reading, writer’s block and WFH state of mind – Mrs Funnybones gets candid

Her digital venture Tweak turned one last month, she’s just launched an imprint (Tweak Books), and along with it, two new books (in association with Juggernaut, titled When I Grow Up I Want To Be... and What’s in your Dabba), and all this while she’s been operating remotely from Scotland for the past two months – is there anything Twinkle Khanna can’t do? We spoke to Mrs Funnybones on everything from navigating the digital world, technology, and start-up advice.

GRAZIA: How do you, as the founder of a new-age digital content company, capture the joy of being able to dive into the written word online?

TWINKLE KHANNA: Tweak was designed by and for people immersed in the world of words. There are certain things you have to keep in mind when writing for an online audience, like length and snackable content interspersed with longer reads, but the skill-set required to write a novel, a column, or for an online platform is the same.

G: How exactly does the technology we use to read change the way we read?

TK: I believe that our brain has evolved in a manner that it knows what to retain and discard. What we read online doesn’t seem to stick in our memories in the same way as reading a physical book. It could be because, subconsciously, we know that it can be retrieved through a search, or it could be that reading a physical copy, there are more senses involved, including the tactility of turning pages or, sometimes, underlining sentences. Like Douglas Adams said, ‘Books are sharks...there were sharks before there were dinosaurs, and the reason sharks are still in the ocean is that nothing is better at being a shark than a shark.’ I may run a digital platform, but I have to be honest and say very few things can beat the experience of reading a physical book.