Select Book Shop’s ongoing exhibition and sale of rare and out-of-print books at the Alliance Française is but an extension of this unique book store’s philosophy of selling books that have disappeared from the public eye. Select, located in a small bylane off Brigade Road, has made something of a speciality out of hunting down and selling rare books and manuscripts, which draws not just students, academics and visiting tourists to the shop but also some of Bangalore’s most famous artists and writers, such as Ramachandra Guha, Girish Karnad and Yusuf Arakkal.
The exhibition, which is on till April 7, has become an annual event organised by the bookstore. It was held for the first time at Alliance Française last year but before that KKS Murthy, Select’s owner, used to conduct it at the Mythic Society building in
Nripatunga Road.
While last year, the list of books exhibited included such gems as the American poet Robert Frost’s Some Remarks on the Occasion of the Tagore Centenary based on the tape-recording of a talk given by Frost on April 19, 1961, this year’s list is equally impressive. It includes rare books like copies of prolific American historian and philosopher Will Durant’s The Case for India, published by Simon and Schuster in 1930. Another celebrated book by the same name, written by John S Hoyland and published a year before Durant’s by JM Dent, is also on show. Both books, which would be difficult to locate in an ordinary book store and would perhaps only be available in public libraries, were available for interested buyers at this exhibition.
Old and rare books are a passion with Select’s owner, bibiliophile KKS Murthy, who inherited the shop from his father KBK Murthy, who set it up more than 60 years ago. Incidentally, Murthy’s son K Sanjay has joined him and mans a part of the book store — making it three generations of a book-mad family.
The rare-books exhibition has been receiving good response, says Murthy. “Earlier it would just be elderly and middle-aged people looking for old books, but this year a lot of young people have shown an interest in these tomes,” says Murthy.
While books on art and literature are the ones that generate the maximum amount of interest and get picked up most often, there are many takers for rare books on philosophy and religion too. Many young customers at the exhibition were searching for old books by Latin American authors, reveals Murthy.
These books are sourced by Murthy from private collections that are being sold or from libraries that hold annual sales of unwanted copies. A lot of books come from Mumbai and Delhi. Murthy also has a special set of distributors who deal in old books.
“A lot of my customers have also become my friends, and they often give me a tip on where I can find old books or buy them for me,” says Murthy with a smile. Maybe that’s the reason people like author Ruskin Bond make it a point to drop in to his book store whenever he is in Bangalore. Murthy also has a correspondence with the author, who lives in Landour near Mussoorie.
While Select does specialise in selling old books, it also does a brisk business in new books and best-sellers. This part of the business is mostly overseen by his son Sanjay. “We sell all kinds of books. Except computer and management ones,” says Murthy with a chuckle.
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