The Book Fair Haul

Only two weeks earlier I had returned from Bengaluru with more than a dozen books and I was not in a mood to buy any more books until the end of the year. Since I had read about the dates of the Hyderabad Book Fair I had been keeping a sort of countdown to the day it would open on the 19^th of December. I told myself I would buy just five or six books during the Book Fair and not more than that but things did not happen that way. I dropped in at the Book Fair almost every day and ended up buying more books than I thought I would buy. 

The 38^th Hyderabad Book Fair began on the 19^th of December and I was there on the first day even before it had been properly inaugurated. On my very first visit on the first day of the book fair I ended up buying eight books.  In one second-hand book stall I found two titles. I found ‘Indian Realities: Bits & Pieces’ by Sham Lal who was editor of Times of India in the past. I had found a hardbound copy of ‘A Hundred Encounters’ long back. ‘Indian Realities’ is a large tome and has hundreds of pieces on persons, books, and also reviews. I got this for two hundred rupees. 

Chinua Achebe happens to be one of my favourite authors and I do not miss buying anthing by him. So when I spotted a copy of ‘There was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra’ by Chinua Achebe I grabbed it. This too I got for two hundred rupees. 

In another stall I found a copy of ‘On Writing’ by Stephen King that I already had bought more than a dozen copies of in the past. I simply cannot resist buying this wonderful title whenever I see a copy.

The next find was a copy of ‘The Truth (Almost) About Bharat’ by Kaveri Nambisan who also happens to be another favourite of mine. This copy was a new edition with a beautiful cover and I read inside that the cover was designed by Vijay Nambisan, poet, author, and also her husband. 

I found a copy of ‘The Untold Charminar: Writings on Hyderabad’ by Syeda Imam that I grabbed the instant I saw it. Hyderabad is where I live and I want to read everything about Hyderabad, especially the past. I am still looking for references about the Sunday Abids second-hand book market but haven’t found any so far. 

I already have a copy of ‘The Emperor’ by Ryszard Kapuscinski but I couldn’t stop myself from buying the copy I saw at the book fair. Kapuscinski is a wonderful journalist and I have almost all of his books. I do not remember how much I paid for this book and also for other books. 

Somehow I seem to be finding copies of titles by favourite authors that I already have. I have four copies of ‘The Snow Leopard’ by Peter Matthiessen at home. But when I saw the cover on the copy I saw at another second-hand book stall I knew I had to buy it whatever the cost. It was one of twelve influential American literary classics Penguin published on the 70^th anniversary of Penguin Classics, calling them Penguin Orange Collection. The pages were deckle edge and I paid four hundred rupees for this copy. 

Along with ‘The Snow Leopard’ was a copy of ‘Essays: Stranger Shores-essays 1986-1999’ by J.M. Coetzee that also I bought for four hundred rupees. I have a collection of his earlier essays titled ‘Inner Workings’ that, incidentally, I found at the 2014 Hyderabad Book Fair. 

Though I felt guilty that I had bought eight titles on the first day of the 38^th Hyderabad Book Fair I went again on the second day. Luckily, I could find only two titles worth buying. The first of these was a copy of ‘The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers’ by Paul Kennedy that is another massive tome running into hundreds of pages. It is in keeping with my new found interest in geopolitics. 

I had seen copies of ‘The Last Post’ by Narendar Pani at Abids and also in second-hand bookstores but somehow did not feel like buying it. However, at the book fair I saw another copy and took a close look at what it was. When I read that it was a novel about a small town newspaper and its editor I decided to buy it right away. 

I skipped going to the book fair on Sunday as I knew there would be huge crowds. I went on the fourth day and picked up a copy of ‘Testimony to the Invisible: Essays on Swedenborg’ ed by James F. Lawrence. I had no idea who Swedenborg was but when I read the names of Borges, Czeslaw Milosz and others on the cover I decided to buy it. 

Another title I see at Abids quite frequently was ‘Close to the Bone’ by Lisa Ray, a memoir about her cancer. I wanted to read it but the price of the hardcover was too high for me so I skipped buying the copies at Abids. The copy of ‘Close to the Bone’ I found at the book fair was a paperback and as it was for a hundred rupees I bought it. 

I went again the next day and found four wonderful titles. In one stall I found a copy of ‘Glittering City’ by Cyprian Ekwensi whose ‘People of the City’ I had found long back in 2017. The sticker on the cover mentioned ‘Rs.100’ but the seller, an Abids bookseller gave it to me for seventy rupees. 

In another stall I found a copy of ‘Inside the Whale and Other Essays’ by George Orwell. It had two of his famous essays: ‘Shooting an Elephant’ and also ‘Politics and the English Language’ among the nine essays in it. Also, it had a wonderful cover which was another reason I gave myself to buy it for two hundred rupees. 

When I saw the copy of ‘Trespassers on the Roof of the World: The Race for Lhasa’ by Peter Hopkirk I dived and grabbed it before anyone could take it though no one seemed to be even looking at it. Sometime back I had found ‘The Great Game’ a thick tome I am yet to read that did not prevent me from buying ‘Trespassers on the Roof of the World’. I loved the cover on it. 

The best find of the day was a beautiful copy of ‘Africa: A Biography of the Continent’ by John Reader, a Penguin title. I love reading about Africa and this title seemed to be all about Africa so I bought it without a second thought. Again, this copy too had a beautiful cover.

 

On my fifth visit on the sixth day of the Hyderabad Book Fair I looked for a copy of  a Franz Fanon title that I missed buying but I was informed it was sold. I was terribly disappointed with myself for not having picked it up the first time I saw it. Then as if to make up for the disappointment I found another wonderful title on a topic I’ve been reading up on quite seriously. I spotted a nice copy of ‘Sowing the Wind: The Mismanagement of the Middle East 1900-1960’ by John Keay, another hefty volume that seemed to run into hundreds of pages. I was very pleased to find it and more so when I got it for just two hundred rupees. 

The next find was a shrink-wrapped copy of ‘Mirrors’ by Eduardo Galeano, an author I had not expected to find but was keen to read. But this wasn’t a book of his journalism or his novels. I got it for two hundred and fifty rupees. On five visits I had picked up a dozen and half books at the Hyderabad Book Fair spending a couple of thousands of rupees, but all worth it I feel.

Next visit would be on Saturday and I hope that would be my last visit to the Book Fair though it would go on until the 29^th of December. Who knows I might drop in again on the last day?