The Sunday Haul (on 04-02-2018)

Until I reached Abids last Sunday I was of a firm resolve in mind. I had decided not to buy any books at Abids since I had picked up twenty six books at the Hyderabad Book Fair less than a week ago. It would be madness to add more books to the large haul or so I thought until I saw a mouth-watering title on the shelf with one of the sellers at Abids. I saw a nice copy of ‘The East Indian Kitchen’ by Michael Swamy that had the sort of cover that mades me go weak at the knees. I had come across the name ‘Michael Swamy’ only the previous week somewhere. I decided I would buy just one title and temporarily put my resolve on hold. I got this wonderful title for seventy rupees.

A week before my birthday a dear friend asks me which title I would like to get as a present. This year I decided to ask for a cookbook and while searching for something good I came across ‘The Complete Vegetable Cookbook’ by Vasantha Moorthy that looked good but the price was too, too high. So I opted for something different and got it only today. The second title I found at Abids last Sunday was a copy of ‘The Complete Vegetable Cookbook’ by Vasantha Moorthy. I did not hesitate because I was getting it for just a hundred rupees whereas the online price was over five thousand rupees. However the copy I found was in a good condition except that the bound pages were detached from the spine on the inside. It was a big disappointment since everything else was in good shape. But I bought it since it wasn’t something that couldn’t be fixed. I could glue together the cover and the rest of the book.

Then just as I was thinking that there was no chance I would find another title I would be tempted to buy I came across a fat book with a cover I couldn’t take my eyes off from. It was a copy of ‘The Portable Plato’ edited by Scott Buchanan. Inside it said ‘Protagoras, Symosium, Phaedo, and the Republic, complete, in the English Translation by Benjamin Jowett.’ It was no small book but was a nearly 700 pages tome. I got it for just fifty rupees. With these three titles the number of books I bought in 2018 so far adds up to thirty six.