A Visit to the Fair
The Bangalore Book Festival is around at the Palace Grounds, just as it was last November, and the hubby and I went around to it on Saturday, despite the wind and rain that makes you want to just huddle in bed. Seriously, I cannot remember Bangalore winters being this rainy even 10 years ago. Global warming, I suppose. Still, the book fair is an unmissable at least as far as I’m concerned. And was it totally worth it!
This year’s haul consisted of:
‘Lives in the Wilderness‘ - a collection of 3 autobiographies, that of Jim Corbett, Salim Ali and Verrier Elwin; the last of the trio, I am not familiar with, but I’ve been in the mood for some good autobiographies, so this promises well.
A Jim Corbett Omnibus - The Man-Eaters of Kumaon, The Temple Tiger and More Man-eaters of Kumaon and The Man-eating Leopard of Rudraprayag. I read these when I was about 10 or 12, during a long, aimless vacation spent in Dehradun, constantly looking over my shoulder and expecting to see tiger or at least, a leopard. I imagine these will all be fun to revisit.
Bill Bryson’s ‘The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid’ - I’ve read this one before, and while it’s not my favourite Bill Bryson book (that would be Notes from a Small Island), its still pretty worth keeping.
Atul Gawande’s ‘Better: A surgeon’s notes on performance‘; I’ve much enjoyed Gawande’s writing in the New Yorker, usually incisive work on the American Healthcare system, so - thought this should be interesting.
‘All is Burning’, a collection of short stories by Sri Lankan writer, Jean Arasanayagam. I’ve just finished reading ‘Sri Lanka, Voices from a war zone’ by Nirupama Subramanian, a political correspondent with The Hindu, so that’s prompted me to read a Sri Lankan writer; I actually haven’t read a single one before, I think. Besides, I had to have some short stories!
‘The Pregnant King’, by Devdutt Patnaik - first read about this book at the Jabberwock blog, and thought the idea of a gender-blurring work based on a story from the Mahabharata was something!
Yaamam - a Tamizh novel by S. Ramakrishnan, whose Urupasi I had read and enjoyed earlier. No idea what this one is about, but thecover looks very attractive! (Good enough reason to buy?) and finally,
A collection of short stories by Ambai, whose work I have always read in English. Somehow the Tamizh original never seemed to be available, but managed to get it this year.
I set myself a budget of Rs. 2000 and managed to get away with exceeding that only by about Rs.700. Not bad, wasn’t it?
Bangaloreans, if you haven’t visited the book fair yet, please make space for it right away. It’s on till Nov 15th, and if the range of books isn’t enough to tempt you, there are great discounts too!
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Wow..you sure did some great book buying…Its great you could get the Jim Corbett Omnibus..I have been trying to find that..couldnt get it here…the rest of the books also look interesting..you read Tamil also..wow!
Cool!
I completely forgot about the book fair until I read this.
I hope I find time to visit.
I have been looking for this ‘The Pregnant King’ ever since I read about it @ Jabberwock. Landmark didn’t have a copy.
BTW, உங்களுக்கு தமிழ் படிக்க தெரியுமா? :). There is so much to Tamil literature. I wish I was a fluent reader in Tamil.
Hi Apu, long time no see.
I was just looking at some past comments of old commentators and came across yours. Thought I would drop in and well, this post has suddenly brought back memories of Bangalore. When we lived there we had discovered some great bookshops and had gone to some good book fairs too. Here nearabouts where I live, there is nothing much!
And apu, I am adding you to my blogroll at wide angle view of India, i dunno why I didn’t before. You have a great blog!
R’s Mom - you can always borrow it from me, come to bangalore
Praveen - தமிழ் படிக்க தேரியும், சரியாக ஏழுத தேரியாது! Actually, my mom taught me the alphabet, and after that, I taught myself to read longer works; I’ve never studied the subject in school and started reading books in Tamizh only 2 years ago; discovered that just reading regularly improved my fluency by leaps and bounds. You should try it if you are interested. And yes, do go to the fair…
Nita - So nice to see you here. Yours is a blog I admire - it gets me different and objective perspectives on all current affairs in one easily digestible form
Thanks for adding me…
hey thanks for this. i was told the fair has mainly kannada literature, and as much as i like the language, i cannot and don’t want to read serious stuff penned in it so was planning to give it a miss. looks like this aint true.
btw how was the kid lit section - you checked by any chance?
@ Apu: You put me to shame. I never learnt Tamil in school, being a Blore guy. My grandmom taught me to read and write whenever I visited her during vacations. I did try to read a little bit of Sujatha much later, but the lack of fluency put me off and I gave up.
I will try again
Chox - while there was lots of Kannada, there was plenty of English too. And while we didn’t visit many of the kids stalls, there were certainly lots of them. Also, the National Book Trust was there, with some good stuff for children, at incredibly low prices.
Praveen - good luck with that!
oh good! thanks
Lovely collection
@Nova - thanks! I saw your list too and was stuck by how similiar the photograph was!
I am in Bangalore, but I doubt I shall be able to make it to the book fair this year
I love book fair coz they usually have all the books that you never find at your fav book store!
did go and came back with around 70 books for the kids from CBT, NBT and pratham books - cost me <1k!
(all of which have been devoured up alreddy
)
Aathira - well, next year then…though really, if you can take out an hour, its worth it…
Chox, that’s great! I thought the govt stalls had some great stuff…and yes, what amazing prices.