The Sunday Haul (on 21/03/2021)

I had to take someone to a doctor on Sunday morning and the long wait meant I was late for my usual visit to Abids. From the doctor’s I rushed home and got ready to go to Abids. In that haste halfway to Abids I realised that I forgot to take along the cap I started to wear outdoors because the sun was growing fiercer by the day. Surprisingly somewhere near the King Koti hospital I spotted a small kiosk with some caps hanging on a stand. I stopped though I felt I wouldn’t get a nice cap but I was pleasantly surprised to find a nice, light blue cap without any garish logo on it. But there was a hitch. It was a flat cap, something I dislike. However I liked the colour and not wishing to go around Abids without a cap on my head I bought it for a hundred rupees.

The Sunday before I had seen a copy of ‘China: A History’ by John Keay that I did not buy right away. I found it at the same seller I had seen it the other Sunday. It was quite a tome with nearly 600 pages and before I bought it I had second thoughts wondering if I would ever find the time to read it. But I did not want to let it go also so I picked it up. I remember I had seen John Keay’s book on India that I decided right then to pick up whenever I see it next. I got this title for a hundred and thirty rupees.

 

A couple of years ago I had come across the name ‘Maryse Condé’ somewhere and I was so impressed by the recommendation that I noted it down in a notebook. I do not remember where I had read about Maryse Condé but last Sunday when I spotted a copy of ‘Segu’ by Maryse Condé with a beautiful cover I snapped it up. I got it for a hundred and fifty books. ‘Segu’ too was another huge tome running into nearly 500 pages and I wonder when I will get to read it.

 

Then beside the Bata store in a separate pile of books selling for twenty rupees I spotted a copy of‘Saving Agnes’ by Rachel Cusk, and also a copy of ‘I Heard the Owl Call My Name’ by Margaret Craven that I bought without a second thought because Rachel Cusk was a name I had frequently come across, and ‘I Heard the Owl Call My Name’ was a title I had read about somewhere.

The Sunday Haul (on 14/03/2021)

I think I am very lucky to live in a city like Hyderabad where I get to pick choice titles from a selection of thousands of books laid out on the pavements of Abids every Sunday.  Sunday is one day of the week I look forward to. Others want to stay at home and laze around but I want to go to Abids and browse for books to buy. It is a million dollar feeling nothing can beat, the feeling when I return home with a couple of good titles. Last Sunday too I managed to find three wonderful titles.

The first title I found was a copy of ‘Inside/out: New Writing from Goa’ that had articles etc by writers and others living in Goa. It has twenty eight essays by writers like Vivek Menezes, Savia Viegas, Damodar Mauzo, Amitav Ghosh whose names are familiar to me, and also by writers I haven’t heard of before. Wendell Rodericks is another name I am familiar with. On checking the flyleaf I saw that someone in Goa had gifted this book to a couple with the message: ‘ a bit of Goa to take back.’ I got this collection for hundred rupees.

Somehow the recent weeks seem to be Vijay Nambisan season. A couple of weeks ago I had found a copy of ‘Language as an Ethic’ by Vijay Nambisan. On Sunday soon after the Goa title I spotted a nice copy of ‘Bihar Is in the Eye of the Beholder’ by Vijay Nambisan with another seller down the road. It was a brand new copy. There are about a dozen essays in it and also a prologue, an epilogue, and afterword to the new edition. I was delighted to find it because I like to read such books and I had always wanted to read more of Vijay Nambisan’s journalism. I got this book for a hundred and fifty rupees.

 

Outside the Best Books branch in Abids, there’s a display of books laid out selling for Rs 20 and Rs 50. I stopped there to take a look on the way back. I spotted a book with the title ‘The Big Heat’ by William P. McGivern that appeared to be a crime fiction title. On taking a closer look at the cover I discovered that it was also made into a movie by Fritz Lang starring Glenn Ford and Lee Marvin so I thought it would be something worthwhile to read. It was in the Rs 20 section that I found it so that was what I paid for it.

The Sunday Haul (on 07/03/2021)

Not a week passes for me without doing something stupid, sometimes really stupid things I tend to regret later. Last Sunday at Abids while checking out two books I recalled two stupid things I did long back. Many years ago I had seen a copy of ‘Sunlight on a Broken Column’ by Attia Hosain that I thought did not deserve attention. After I read about this title somewhere I regretted my act of ignoring the copy of ‘Sunlight on a Broken Column’ by Attia Hosain that I could have bought. The pain of not having bought it lingered and last Sunday it became reignited when I saw a copy of ‘Phoenix Fled’ by Attia Hosain. At first glance I thought it was a novel but when I looked inside I saw that it was a collection of twelve short stories. The cover was very attractive and it also had an introduction by Anita Desai. This book was published originally in 1953 but the copy I found was an 1993 edition that I got for hundred rupees.

With the same seller who puts up his books on makeshift wooden shelves and some on a plastic sheet spread on the ground I spotted a copy of ‘Speedboat’ by Renata Adler. I remembered reading the name ‘Renata Adler’ somewhere recently but even otherwise I would have picked up this book that had a blurb by John Updike. I got it for hundred rupees which was a pretty steep price but I was in a different mood so I paid up and added it to my haul.

Then came the second occasion to feel the pain of past foolishness. This was an unbelievable act of foolishness. Years ago, in 2012, to be exact I had bought a copy of ‘The Savage Detectives’ by Robert Bolano that remained unread on my bookshelf for a long time because it appeared too bulky. I don’t understand why but I gave away the book to someone and forgot all about it until I began to come across this title being mentioned by several people on Twitter and elsewhere. I realized I had been stupid to have given it away. Luckily, I saw another copy of ‘The Savage Detectives’ by Robert Bolano that was in quite good condition and also came cheap at only hundred rupees which was far less than the two hundred and fifty rupees I had paid for the copy I found in 2012.

Every Sunday after returning home from Abids I take pictures of the covers of the books I had picked up at Abids and post it on Twitter. Usually these tweets get about twenty likes in all but the tweet last week about the above three titles got an unusually high 38 likes and also a couple of replies which were about Renata Adler’s ‘Speedboat’ and also ‘The Savage Detectives.’

The Sunday Haul (on 28-02-2021)

For the first time this year I ventured out to Abids carrying a cap that I put on after I reached Abids. The temperature here is hovering above 30 degrees and it is uncomfortably warm in the open. I was glad I had the cap on because I saw many people look at me with something like envy. Cap on head I browsed for an hour and half and managed to pick up four books. The first find was a title that I almost missed spotting because it was partly hidden under other books piled in a heap.

A week ago I began to read Robert Graves’ ‘Greek Myths’ and have been fascinated by the characters in it and what they do. It made me want to read the Greek philosophers to better understand people and their actions. I have always been fascinated by the writings of Aristotle, Sophocles, Epictetus and so on. I do not miss any opportunity to buy stuff that makes one think about the human situation and what people do in different situations in life. On Sunday I came across a copy of ‘In Consolation to His Wife’ by Plutarch, which was a slim, small book with an eye-catching cover. I picked it up for just thirty rupees.

The next find was a rather nice copy of ‘The Sense of an Ending’ by Julian Barnes that was with the same seller who had the Plutarch title. I already have a copy of ‘The Sense of an Ending’ and have read it a couple of times. I liked it so much that I bought the second copy I saw last Sunday because I want to give it to someone I know and also because it was priced at only fifty rupees. The first copy I had bought many years ago was two hundred and fifty rupees if I remember correctly. Getting it for just fifty rupees was a pleasant surprise.

The next find was another title that I already own. I saw a copy of ‘The Craft of Fiction’ by Percy Lubbock with a different cover and when I opened it I noticed that it was an Indian edition. Nevertheless I bought it for the seller asked for only thirty rupees for it. I don’t know where my first copy is so finding this copy was a happy coincidence since I was thinking about it a few days ago when I read about it somewhere.

The last find of the day was an unusual book. I couldn’t fail to miss it because it had an unusual title. It was a copy of ‘An African student in China’ by Emmanuel John Hevi. It had an intriguing ring to it so I picked it up. The seller asked for only twenty rupees for it.

That was last Sunday's haul at Abids.