The Sunday Haul (on 24.03.2024)

 It is the month of Ramzan which means all shops that usually close on Sundays are open for the festival shoppers which in turn means that the second-hand book sellers at Abids shift away to other places. Though not at their usual places they are all present at Abids. As is my habit I was there last Sunday too, and there was a special reason to go early since I had to meet my friend Jai who I had not met for a long time. 

 

The first title I found was a copy of ‘Caste, Society and Politics in India: From the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age’ by Susan Bayly that I got for a hundred rupees. It is another addition to my collection of books on various issues including caste in India. Later when I met Jay for chai he told me Susan Bayly’s title was quite well known in the academic circles. We talked about books, politics, and what books we’ve read since the last time we met. 

 

Later with a seller beside the Irani café I spotted a copy of ‘Borneo, Celebes, Aru’ by Alfred Russel Wallace, Sl No. 12 of Penguin Great Journeys series, and is an extract from ‘The Malay Archipelago’ by Wallace. I have a few titles of this series including ‘Snakes with Wings and Gold-digging Ants’ by Herodotus and ‘The Cobra’s Heart’ by Ryszard Kapuscinski. I got this book for hundred rupees.

 

Two years back, in 2022, I had found a copy of ‘The Visiting Moon’ by Susan Visvanathan and had also read it soon afterwards. I was not so impressed with it. Last Sunday in a heap of books selling for fifty rupees I found a copy of ‘Something Barely Remembered’ by Susan Visvanathan that I bought since it was also a hardcover copy and I thought it could be better than ‘The Visiting Moon’. 

The Sunday Haul (on 17-03-2024)

 Until recently I had no idea at all about Brendan Behan. It was on Twitter that I first read about this Irish writer and his fame. Last Sunday at Abids I found a copy of ‘Brendan Behan’s Island- an Irish Sketch Book’ that had illustrations by Paul Hogarth that seemed to me a good find. 

 

A major portion of the titles that I have on my shelves are Penguin titles. Sometimes I think i blindly buy anything published by Penguin and it was in that same belief that I picked up a nice copy of ‘The Discovery of Heaven’ by Harry Mulisch. After I read the blurbs on the back cover and the inside pages (one by John Updike in New Yorker) by such publications like The Times Literary Supplement, New York Times Book Review, London Review of Books, and Kirkus Reviews. I was glad I had discovered another wonderful writer I had not known until then. I am quite eager to begin reading but I am hesitant because it runs into 727 pages. I got it for hundred and twenty rupees. 

I’ve never read anything by Simone de Beauvoir except for the occasional essay somewhere because I have never come across any title by her. At Abids last Sunday I found a copy of ‘All Said and Done’ by Simone de Beauvoir, the third volume of her autobiography. I’m in a bind whether to begin reading it or wait until I find the first two volumes which looks quite impossible. On the other hand there is strong temptation to read it since flipping through the book I noticed that there is an entire chapter on what she reads. 

The Sunday Haul (on 10-03-2024)

 The previous Sunday in fact I had not picked up a title that I already have two copies of but later after I got home I realized that I should have bought it if only to give it to someone. It was a copy of ‘The Art of Dramatic Writing’ by Lajos Egri which is one of the best books on writing that I’ve read, and I am not saying it lightly because I have read nearly two hundred books on writing. Last Sunday I was relieved to find the copy and picked it up and the seller told me to give him whatever I thought the book was worth. So I gave him a hundred rupees.

The next find was also a title that I have numerous copies of and which I like to give to people who tell me they love books. It was a copy of ‘84 Charing Cross Road’ by Helene Hanff with an entirely different cover from the ones I have. I got this lovely book for eighty rupees only.

 

Ayn Rand is one writer I struggled to read. Somehow I couldn’t finish any of her books that I read. But this title by Ayn Rand that I found last Sunday at Abids I intend to read. It was a nice copy of ‘The Art of Nonfiction’ by Ayn Rand that I spotted with a seller. He also told me to pay him whatever I thought fit so I paid him hundred rupees for it.

 

This title too I had spotted last Sunday but this was at Chikkadpally, and since I had bought five books already I told the seller to keep it aside for me. It was a copy of ‘Jurgen Habermas: Critic in the Public Sphere’ by Robert C. Holub that I got for hundred rupees. I had read about Habermas only recently and finding this title was a pleasant coincidence.

 

A little more than two years ago I found a copy of ‘The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East’ by Robert Fisk that I realized was a wonderful book by a great journalist. However, I haven’t yet read since I kept it aside to read along with a few other books on the Middle East. Last Sunday at a seller in Chikkadpally just before I picked up the Habermas book I spotted another Robert Fisk title. It was a nice copy of ‘The Age of the Warrior- Selected Writings’ by Robert Fisk that I immediately grabbed. 

The Sunday Haul (on 03-03-2024)

 Missing three Sundays of browsing at the second hand book market of Abids made me so desperate to be back in Hyderabad that I couldn’t wait for it to be Sunday since the day I returned from Ooty last Tuesday. After four agonizing days it was finally Sunday and I rushed off after breakfast. Returning from a much cooler Ooty I felt it was uncomfortably hot on Sunday morning at Abids. However, it did not really bother me because I was fixed on the titles displayed on the pavements.

 

The first title that caught my eye was a hardcover copy of ‘A Saga of South Kamrup’ by Indira Goswami that had a tattered and torn cover that did not prevent me from buying it. It was a novel and I was glad I found this title by an acclaimed writer. A long time back I had found a collection of short stories by Indira Goswami that, I regret to say, I haven’t yet found the time to read.

In a heap of books selling for only fifty rupees I spotted a new title by an author I haven’t read about before and who I read on the back cover was an acclaimed South African writer with many other artistic talents. It was a copy of ‘The Textures of Silence’ by Gordon Vorster that I picked up. 

Next find was a title I read about in a book my son picked up a couple of weeks ago when he came along with me to Abids. I read about ‘Stumbling on Happiness’ by Daniel Gilbert in ‘Tools of Titans’ by Tim Ferris, and luckily I recollected having read about it when I actually spotted it at Abids last Sunday. 

 

When I found a copy of ‘Flights’ by Olga Tokarczuk at Abids a couple of months ago I felt ecstatic about finding a title everyone seemed to praise to the skies. Incidentally it was a Fitzcarraldo edition that I found. However, last Sunday at Chikkadpally where I stopped to take a look at the books with a seller, I spotted another copy of ‘Flights’ by Olga Tokarczuk with a different cover and published by Riverhead Books. Though I already had this title I picked up this copy too. 

 

The last find was with the same seller. I managed to spot this title at the last minute just when I decided to leave. It was a copy of ‘Up & Down & Around; A Publisher Recollects the Time of His Life’ by Cass Canfield. I had never heard of the name Cass Canfield, and since my interest extend to reading memoirs of editors and publishers too I felt it would be an interesting read so I picked it up. 

The Ooty Haul

The past two weeks I was at Ooty on work and therefore could not go to Abids. I missed Abids very badly and it was pure agony for the two Sundays I was at Ooty. This is my eleventh and last visit to Ooty about which I will write in another post. Since I would be at Ooty for two long weeks I took along three books to read one of which was ‘The Snow Leopard’ by Peter Matthiessen that I am reading for the fourth or fifth time since I last bought it almost two decades ago. 

 

Though I had three books to read I was longing for something else to read and it so happened that I came across a Tweet about ‘The Cooking of Books’ by Ramachandra Guha that I had earlier planned to buy sometime in the future. Somehow I felt a desperate need to read it and I was disappointed not to find it at the Higgin Bothams store in Ooty, and they told me that it would take a week for them to get it if I want it. Not wanting to wait so long I placed an order for it on Amazon and five days later I got it. However I did not read it right away since I planned to read it on the twenty hour long train journey from Coimbatore to Hyderabad.

 

As planned I finished reading it by the time the train reached Hyderabad. I got to know more about Rukun Advani than Ramachandra Guha after I read it. I will read it once again after sometime and want to do a slow read.