Pages of an old book trail

The journey to attend an event honouring Sir Garfield Sobers at the Bombay Gymkhana on a hot Monday evening reminded me of a book on Sobers that I had purchased in the vicinity of the venue that hosted Indiarsquos first Test match in 193334 The book written by his contemporary Trevor Bailey and simply titled Sir Gary was one of many works on Sobers published during and after his playing careerSouth Mumbai was and probably still is a goto destination for book lovers This became even more evident to me in the mid1980s when I made my rounds as a book salesman selling sports books for one organisation and general titles for anotherThe pavement booksellers who set up shop outside the boundary walls of the Central Telegraph Office CTO and the High Court always had secondhand cricket books on offer ranging from cheap to expensive and from damaged copies to those in mint condition That stretch has since been cleared and the presentday haunt for pavement book lovers is outside Oriental Building an unmissable stop on the way to admire the marvel that is Flora FountainDuring my sales trips around what my bosses called the Fountain Area mdash the South Mumbai round mdash I got to know the people who were the pillars of some of the cityrsquos prominent bookshops They had a remarkable rapport with their customers as well as with salesmen like me Sadly many of those bookshops no longer exist but the memories remainMy Fountain Area round began with a visit to the bookshop in the lobby of the President Hotel at Cuffe Parade Orders were few and far between at least in my caseNext came Causeway Book Stall in Colaba I vaguely remember its polite Parsi owners On the same road a small shop with Raj as part of its name sold books and audio cassettes The owner loved to chat and the struggles of the book trade often featured in our conversationsFurther down was Shankar Book Stall which stocked a large quantity of books If you were lucky you could land an order from Shankar Mani that would put a smile on your faceNalanda the bookshop at the Taj not only provided one an opportunity to experience unparalleled opulence but also a chance to meet genial men like Rajan and Gopi two of Nalandarsquos mainstays They were keen to order sports books particularly because cricket teams were generally accommodated at the TajIf you managed to get an order from the bookshop inside Chetana restaurant at Kala Ghoda it was likely to be for yoga titles Thacker amp Co on Rampart Row is one bookshop I dearly miss Its stock did justice to the large space it occupiedThe walk from Kala Ghoda to the next destination was not particularly short especially if you decided that a South Indian snack would suffice for lunch before you reached International Book House on Homi Modi StreetThe smiling faces of Prabhu and Ellis made every visit worthwhile Ellis a tall wellbuilt man would often talk about his son Andrersquos cricket pursuits at St Maryrsquos Andre was part of the schoolrsquos cricket squad that defeated Sachin Tendulkarrsquos Shardashram Vidyamandir in the 1988 Giles Shield final The tradition of gentlemanly behaviour continued at Peoplersquos Book House Krishnakumar the kind elderly man who sat behind the counter had a sound grasp of politics and sociology If you were a chess player you could also find books on the subject there From Cawasji Patel Street Sir PM Road was not far away That was where the cityrsquos finest bookshop was housed mdash Strand Its patriarch TN Shanbhag would invariably be there ensuring that every customer was attended to and advised on books covering whatever subject they were interested inKindness was infectious in that establishment and it is safe to presume that Shanbhag was the source of it You did not have to be somebody important to be treated with respect Salesmen received the same consideration as customers I remember Mahale and Pravin always active and alert selecting the right titles from the samples in our briefcase mdash books he knew would interest his customers Payments were never delayed eitherFor some reason I did not have to visit Kitab Khana during those days I do drop in occasionally now and I find that its staff are just as courteous as the bookshop attendants of yesteryear No Fountain Area round would have been complete without a visit to Smokerrsquos Corner bookshop at the far end of PM Road I rarely went there to sell books more often than not I went to buy them Sulaiman Botawala would usually be there chatting with his friends and recommending the best bargains He would leave us amazed at how back issues of The Cricketer magazine could be bought for just a few rupees or how a hardback of Test Match Cricket A Personal View by Tony Greig was always available for Rs 30Thankfully South Mumbai still retains some of its oldworld charm when it comes to books mdash its rich literary and commercial history reflected in the bookshops and the people who ran themmiddayrsquos Editor Clayton Murzello is a purist with an open stance He tweets ClaytonMurzelloSend your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper