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Romancing the tomes

PHOTO: PHEROZE L. VINCENT

TOME AVENUE Sunday evenings on E. K. Street

In a neat row, clinging to the eastern wall of the Town Hall compound, lie treasures of knowledge and history, heaped in dusty stacks. “It is the abode of both Saraswati and Lakshmi,” says S. A. Sahabudeen, who runs Ruby Book Centre, on Eswaran Koil Street.

In existence since 1974, the old book market on E. K. Street, opposite Poompuhar , is not as famous as its counterpart in Ukkadam. But, while the old bookshops at Ukkadam mainly havebooks on computers and engineering, these shops also have a satisfactory collection on humanities and the social sciences.

Old booksellers buy the books, mainly from students, for 40 per cent and sell it for 60 per cent of the maximum retail price. It’s not just the comparative cost advantage over regular bookshops; these shops also sell books that are out of print.

“Most deemed universities and autonomous colleges here prescribe the third or fourth editions of Roger Pressman’s Software Engineering for their computer science courses. Currently the sixth edition is in circulation. I have the old editions and sell photocopies to students who need them,” adds Sahabudeen.

Booksellers say that they respect even the buyer who isn’t looking for much and is simply there to languorously survey the literature they have. That’s why, they say, people like to come here.

Everything from Lexicons to military history to Pop goes the weasel

“We have (district) collectors, superintendents of police and deputy inspector generals, even from other districts, as our clientele,” boasts Sahabudeen. A few years back the E. K. Street stalls were asked by the authorities to clear out, but the courts stayed the eviction. Stalls make around Rs. 6000 a month, says bookseller Mohammed Mustafa. The stalls here are family businesses where young boys take after their fathers, right after school. Their love for the trade makes them stick to it, says Yasser Arafat- a teenager who runs Rainbow Book Stall.

“It’s a service we do to society, more than a trade. We do earn our livelihood from it, but we get people books that are priceless,” he adds.

Booksellers here, travel to various state capitals collecting rare books. “It’s only your collection that helps you survive in the business, says Sahabudeen, whom the E. K. Street booksellers consider their leader and spokesperson.

“In the past we have sold leaf inscriptions of rare manuscripts on Ayurveda and astrology. We have even sold rare works on alchemy by Bhogar (the mythological Siddha Maharshi of Palani),” he adds. Old leaf manuscripts don’t have any punctuation dots in them. It is believed that dots attract silverfish that eat into books.

So fanatical are they about books that their eyes instantly dart at any book a passer-by may be carrying. The older booksellers say that books are all they even dream about. It’s in their blood.

The 25 shops here have hundreds of books piled on top of one another. It is solely in their memory that the inventory exists and a book is fished out for the customer in no time.

These booksellers say that they freely give away books to poor students. “We can recognize a genuinely interested student. Face reading and psychology is something every bookseller learns on the job,” says Sahabudeen.

Apart from academic books there is a cult of romance and thriller novel fans. These shops have large collections of Mills and Boon, Sidney Sheldon, and James Hadley Chase.

Indian writers like V. S. Naipaul, J. Krishnamurthy and R. K. Narayan are also hugely popular.

The shops have stocked up for colleges re-opening and seem ready to face the onslaught of science, engineering, agriculture and school students.

For seasoned hands like Sahabudeen, this season may bring his bread and butter, but it is his inventory of old books that gives him pleasure.

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