The Sunday Haul

I cannot say the same about other areas of my life but when it comes to finding books I like to think that I am one lucky bloke. This Sunday luck struck me again but before writing about what I found I want to recollect a similar instance. One book I was fortunate to find at Abids a couple of years ago was a book on a topic that I am passionate about (and also not very good at) which is- writing. The book I found was ‘Borges on Writing.’ It was edited by three people one of whom Jorge Luis Borges’ translator. The book was a transcript of a prose seminar Borges gave at Columbia University in 1971.

I did not mind paying hundred rupees to possess ‘Borges on Writing’ because it was worth more than that. In the book Borges talks about his writing and discusses how he wrote certain stories and poems. I had only heard about Borges but hadn’t read anything that he had written. But after I read a story that he discusses in detail, actually line by line, I understood what a marvelous writer he was. All through the reading of the story titled ‘The End of the Duel’ I had my hand to my throat because the story is all about cutting throats. Two rivals have their throats slit by executioners at the end of the story. It is a famous story that fuelled a desire to read more of his works but alas, I could not find any books by him at Abids. Last Sunday however, I got lucky.

I hadn’t noticed the book the first time but on a second pass my eyes fell on the small, slim Penguin 70s edition of ‘The Mirror of Ink’ by Jorge Luis Borges. If finding the book was a lucky thing, then getting it for only ten rupees was the icing on the cake. The book has seven of Borges’ most famous short stories: The Mirror of Ink, The Lottery in Babylon, The Library of Babel, The Theme of the Traitor and the Hero, The Witness, Ragnarök, and Blue Tigers. Each story is just a few pages long and the longest story is ten pages in length in a book of only fifty six pages. I felt transported to another world when I read the title story- The Mirror of Ink. I plan to read one story at a time and s-l-o-w-l-y.

It was the only book I found last Sunday but it was a great find. Lucky me.