The Sunday Haul (on 01-09-2019)

It was the first Sunday of September, a rain-free one once again. My weekly trip to the Abids second hand book market ended with four good titles in the haul. Of these four titles two were titles that I already had picked up several copies of earlier.

I am not exactly a fan of Khushwant Singh but I find his books a lot serious and better than his syndicated columns. Sometime back I had found a copy of ‘Khushwantnama’ that had a nice list of books by Indian writers I hadn’t known about. The first book I found at Abids last Sunday was a copy of ‘Around the World with Khushwant Singh’ by Khushwant Singh in a reasonably good condition though the spine appeared to be a bit out of shape. It is a collection of his travel writing edited by Rahul Singh. I got this copy for just thirty rupees.

Next find was my third copy of ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ by Maurice Sendak. A copy I had seen with a seller about a year ago I did not buy because he had quoted what I thought was an outrageous price. Last Sunday however the copy I found cost me only twenty rupees. It was in quite good condition and I was glad I found it.

One of my all-time favourite writers is Chinua Achebe and his book that made a big impact on me was ‘Things Fall Apart’ that I, for some reason, came to rather too late in life. But late of whatever I am glad I found it and read it. After reading it I found many copies that I picked up and gave away to people who asked me to recommend a good book to read. Last Sunday I found another copy of ‘Things Fall Apart’ by Chinua Achebe that was a different edition published by Allied Publishers. The simple looking cover is quite striking and it caught my eye when I was with a seller who had a large spread of books on the pavement. I got it for only forty rupees.

I know it is quite stupid of me but I thought that ‘Catcher in the Rye’ by J.D. Salinger was the only book by Salinger that was worth reading. Though I came across copies of ‘Raise High the Roof Beam Carpenters...’ and also ‘Franny and Zooey’ by Salinger I did not buy them, and so have missed reading them. Recently I read somewhere that the short stories by JD Salinger were worth reading and luckily enough I saw a copy of ‘Nine Stories’ by J.D. Salinger with a seller at Chikkadpally on the way home from Abids. It appeared to be quite an ancient copy and when I looked inside I saw a name, place, and date inscribed on it by the previous owner. I couldn’t decipher the name but and the name of the place was Kharagpur and the date underneath the name was July 7, 1965. I was born a year before that which means that the book is 55 years old. The copy was in wonderful condition and I got it for only thirty rupees.

It had, as it says on the cover, nine stories: A Perfect Day for Bananafish, Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut, Just Before the War with the Eskimos, The Laughing Man, Down at the Dinghy, For Esme-with Love and Squalor, Pretty Mouth and Green My Eyes, De-Daumier-Smith’s Blue Period, and Teddy.