Not very long ago, I was asked to impersonate someone I wasn’t: a wealthy book collector. I had to pretend to be a collector with deep pockets to help a friend’s friend negotiate the sale of a scarce and expensive book. The irony here was lost on the others involved in this tense and strained negotiation: that I was, if anything, an impecunious collector.
I was dragged into my friend’s plan because even if I was a bottom-feeder in the collector’s hierarchy, I was still a fairly knowledgeable one. But I am getting ahead of myself, and should begin with Thomas Velu, the antiquarian book dealer who initiated all this in his dogged pursuit of a beautiful 18th century Turkish calligraphic manuscript.
Family heirloom
It was some three years ago that Velu first heard, via the antiquarian dealer grapevine, of this fabled calligraphic manuscript that was said to be apparently lying unrecognised — languishing and perhaps rotting away quietly — in the home of a man — a renowned cook, actually — who ran a catering service in Ambur that specialised in, what else, gourmet biryani. One or two from the antiquarian community had actually seen such a manuscript in his house, even handled it, when they had visited to ask if he would cater for weddings at short notice.
And on one occasion — during a sahan saapadu banquet where guests sit around a large common plate and eat from it — the master chef, an amiable, proud man I will simply call Biryani Bhai — had actually removed the book from its tacky glass showcase and passed it around for people to casually handle.
Velu, an art and antiquities dealer, aghast at hearing this, decided he had to rescue this precious book from the clutches of Biryani Bhai. He was a fair-minded dealer and was willing to offer double the market price. When he finally met Biryani Bhai in Ambur under the pretext of hiring him as a caterer for a family feast day, he was impressed at how carefully the cook handled the manuscript, and even more surprised at how knowledgeable he was. Those accounts of mishandling the book and his ignorance were plainly rumours, possibly put forth by competing dealers to keep others away.
When Velu finally laid eyes on the book, he was struck by its beauty and rarity. The kind of Islamic calligraphic manuscripts more commonly found in India are usually 19th century Kashmiri examples, most likely in the form of unbound leaves.
This one was a sophisticated Ottoman beauty that looked older: 12 stitched leaves with sumptuous illumination in gold and other rich inks. It was decorated with a rectangular gold and blue border, at the centre of which was a piece of exquisitely calligraphed text.
How had he come by such a wonderful thing, the dealer asked the cook. “My wife’s family are partly Turkish, and this has been a kind of family heirloom for generations,” the Bhai is said to have answered. The dealer now realised there was no chance of acquiring it, but having come this far, asked if he would consider selling it. “For the right price,” came the snappy reply, startling Velu.
Apparently, the family was in the process of moving to Turkey, and the money would be handy in relocating. The dealer offered a sufficiently high and tempting price (which he never revealed to me, keeping the transaction confidential), which the Bhai readily accepted.
They agreed to firm up the sale later in the week, with the understanding that Velu would return to Ambur after making arrangements for the payment, and take the manuscript. As the dealer was taking his leave, the cook, perhaps to keep some convivial banter going, remarked, “You must really prize the manuscript if you wanted to pay so much.” To which Velu said on his way out the door, “Oh, it’s not for me, bhai, I’m a dealer, not a collector.”
A lovely thing
“The deal is off,” said the Bhai abruptly, “I’m sorry.” When a shocked Velu pressed him to say why he had changed his mind, the cook said vehemently, “I want it to go to a collector, not a trader.” The dealer pleaded with him, pointing out that he would ensure it went into the hands of a collector who would care for it, but Biryani Bhai would not be moved, and Velu returned empty-handed.
After this, every other month Velu would phone the cook from Secunderabad (where he lived at that time), asking after the manuscript, and finally, after nearly a year of phone calls and letters, the Bhai said he would sell if the dealer could produce a knowledgeable manuscript collector with at least some interest in buying this calligraphed beauty. And that’s when Velu turned to me and asked if I would at least evince interest in it, if not outright tell the cook I was ready to buy it.
That was easy enough to do since it seemed such a lovely thing, going by Velu’s rapturous descriptions. All it required was that I speak to Biryani Bhai over the phone and introduce myself as a serious collector (which was true) and murmur the right things about the beauty and rarity of such a manuscript.
I probably didn’t do such a bad job of this, because the Bhai sounded mollified enough at the end of the call to say he’d keep an open mind about letting it go. It was only many months later, when the dealer had located an even more (I’m relieved to say) knowledgeable manuscript collector who could really afford to buy it, did the two finally complete this rare book transaction. That was the first time I realised how tricky — and occasionally intriguing — selling or buying a rare book can be.
The author is bibliophile, columnist, critic.