THE PRINTED WORD/A book tour of Goa Frederick Noronha
On the past weekend, one had the chance to undertake a 'book tour' of Goa. It was not a 'complete' visit, nor did it end up at many of the big, deserve-to-be-visited book outlets in our small State. But, one did end up running into a number of printed pages that I found interesting enough and might be keen to recommend to you too. All this happened because of having to show a colleague around parts of the State, which we otherwise overlook and hence miss out on what's available. First of all: the great value for money ones. Have you checked out Literati's roomful of second-hand books? Literati, in case you didn't know (unlikely any bibliophile wouldn't) is located along the Calangute-Candolim road, quite near the once-important old landmark of the region, the Tarcar Ice Factory. Literati is online at http://literati-goa.com/ and is run by lawyer Divya Kapur, a colleague at the GoaWriters Group. The latter [groups.yahoo.com/group/goawriters] is incidentally currently crafting a logo for itself. Literati's main room -- set up in the old Simoes' home -- is packed with a small but neat selection of general books. Some focus on light reading, the tourist-oriented stuff, and also Goa-related titles. While few in number, these are well chosen. No wonder a number of travel guides visit this place as a must-visit for bibliophiles. But in the second-hand-books room next door, one found titles at Bombay footpath rates! This is something that Goa has long lacked, and is indeed welcome. I picked up Salman Rushdie's 434-page The Moor's Last Sigh, two Enid Blytons, and an illustrated classic version of Anna Swell's Black Beauty... all for less than Rs 200! No bargaining needed, the prices are indeed reasonable! AT OLD GOA Just before visiting Literati, at the Bom Jesus Basilica in Old Goa, one ran into this Directory of the Archdiocese of Goa and Daman (2008-09). Some 155 pages thick, it is priced at an unbelievable Rs 30. Not sure if this is a new edition or the earlier one in a new cover. But a similarly-priced directory has already been mentioned in these columns. It looks familiar though, even if the cover is different. At Old Goa too, one runs into the the Museum of Christian Art, where a small outlet selling souvenirs has a useful collection of Goa book too. As could be expected, the focus is on history and churches, in the books sold here. Meet up with Natasha Fernandes', who shared her helpful and enthusiastic. At the Porvorim-based Houses of Goa Museum www.archgoa.org, Architect Gerard da Cunha has an interesting story to tell about his fairly successful and very innovative efforts in publishing! But that really deserves more details, and will have to wait till another column. Just at one end of Panjim, the Goa Archives is another treasure-trove of books. Besides the journal it comes out (came out?) with, it also has a number of books, mostly collections of seminar papers. I found one which had not yet reached my collection -- 'Goa In the Indian Sub-Continent', edited by S. K. Mahmai (2001, Rs 250). ARCHIVES LISTING Panduronga S. S. Pissurlencar's [http:bit.ly/FHPN0] index or listing of documents contained in the Goa archives has just been republished. When I passed by, I ran into a copy (printed by the Government Printing Press, Panjim, 2009). It is printed on simple paper, and priced at just Rs 30. Unfortunately, I could not purchase a copy, as it had not yet been inventoried and approved for official sale. Others would surely be interested too. It's in Portuguese, and a reprint of the 1955 original work. I however think there is a good case that, when such publications are done by the government, these should also be made available in cyberspace as a download. Such a policy would help researchers, scholars and an overall general understanding of Goa in a manner that benefits all. Take this particular case. The book is about 80-100 pages thick (on simple, inexpensive paper). It is priced at Rs 30. Once all the handling and storing costs are involved, the earnings-per-book for the government would probably be negative! Anyway, the prime role of the government is not to itself be focussed on earning from selling books. It needs to focus more on making the information available. Besides, there are other inefficiencies involved with the current paper-and-ink form of distributing ideas. By the time scholars get to know of this book, it would probably be out of print. Each paper-and-ink copy costs money, cuts trees and is difficult to distribute. Why not launch all government publications (specially our laws) as e-publications available for a free download? ON RECOMMENDATIONS As an aside, my ad-guru friend Cajetan Vaz was critical about one of the recommendations of a particular bookshop, made in one of my columns (not in this publication). He also felt that bookshops in Goa could indeed do with a wider choice of books.... and better prices. Agreed. And he does have a point! But what is the frame of reference? Whom do we compare the Goa outlets with? Bookshops in the commercial and publishing capital of India, nearby Mumbai? Another big city like Pune? (By the way, I recently managed to get a rather reasonably priced 'pirated' copy at a Pune footpath of the apparently banned-in-India scathing biography of the Ambanis, written by the Australian journalist Hamish Macdonald.) I think not. We would simply get a misplaced inferiority complex if we did that. The real comparison should be against Goa itself, and how it has grown in recent years; or what more needs to be done. Some new book-related ventures have opened up in Goa, taking book-availability to a new high. This is welcome. Of course, there's a lot more work to be done, and we can't be complacent on that. -- Frederick Noronha can be contacted on 2409490 (after 2 pm) or SMS 9822122436. First published in the Gomantak Times.
