ANN/THE STAR – More secondhand bookshops are popping up all over Malaysia, but it’s unusual to find one hidden within an old wooden kampung home near the heart of Melaka.
But that’s exactly what Ahmad Luqman Zahari, 33, is doing from his great-grandmother’s home in Kampung Mata Kuching, where he sells a broad variety of antique and used books.
When you walk inside this inconspicuous location, the air is filled with the earthy fragrance of ancient pages. The bookcases are home to literary heavyweights such as Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, Jane Austen, and the Bronte sisters. Here, you’ll find a treasure mine of (mostly dead) Russian writers and others, whose works span literature, philosophy, and psychology.
“Our books are mainly imported from overseas and we have a modest amount of vintage hardcover literary books from the 1970s and 1980s,” said Luqman, a trained civil and chemical engineer, who made the leap into the bookselling and independent publishing world to explore new horizons.
“From time to time, we do get requests from customers to view the books in person, but for the most part, we sell via online platforms, such as Carousell and Shopee,” he added.
A LITTLE BIRD THAT COULD
Beyond selling books and dabbling in freelance editing jobs, Luqman also runs Pipit Press, which translates and publishes classics in Bahasa Malaysia.
“The idea for Pipit Press came to me during the pandemic. I was already selling used books then, and I realised that there are many great classics out there that can be hard to come by, but can be a quick sell, such as those by Khalil Gibran, Albert Camus, Osamu Dazai, Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky.
“While Pipit Press came about so we can have unlimited stock of these types of books, we also wanted to introduce these great books to the Malaysian audience in Bahasa Malaysia, as these are the titles that we love to read over and over again,” said Luqman.
BOOK READING IS COOL
Luqman, who previously worked as a farmer in between growing his book collection, views the act of reading as an investment. “In this era of short attention spans, it’s become more important to choose the right books to spend your time with,” he said.
“And what has stood the test of time better than classical literature? The great Greek philosophers are still relevant to us, as are the 19th-Century Russians who wrote about our universal suffering.”
Luqman noted that locally, there’s been a resurgence in book reading because of the Internet.
“People are getting aware of these so-called ‘high-brow’ books, which are increasingly in demand by young readers,” said Luqman, pointing out that around 80 per cent of his customers are below 40.
“Many of them are progressing to more complex books because they’re looking for reading materials that will push them to think beyond the limits of what they’re accustomed to,” he added.
Translating classical texts into Bahasa Malaysia is no cakewalk.
“Many are hesitant due to the lack of significant profit and the potentially tedious nature of the endeavour. However, I believe there’s considerable untapped potential in this field. For us at Pipit Press, it’s not solely about financial gain,” he said. With every translated publication, Luqman views Pipit Press as rejuvenating the Bahasa Malaysia language. “In translating these works, we need to add non-existent vocabulary and create new words, so in a sense, we’re continuously upgrading the language with each printing – kind of like software,” he said with a laugh.
FLYING HIGH
In Bahasa Malaysia, pipit is the swallow bird, which Pipit Press takes its name from.
Though it may have started out as a parody of international publishing house Penguin, Luqman admits that the indie outfit – which includes a translator and designer – may have also subconsciously placed Penguin as its “benchmark”.
“The swallow is a small bird, like how Pipit Press is a small team. We started out printing only four books, then 50, then 100, and now we are printing 1,000 books. We’re still a fairly new player in the publishing industry, but we believe that much like the swallow, we can fly higher and withstand the strongest winds by virtue of our small size.”
There are also no plans to leave the rustic home base in Melaka, with Luqman happy with the present day arrangements, where he can easily connect with indie book retailers nationwide.
The plans are to keep the overheads low, and focus on producing quality translated works, which will find a wider audience in the Bahasa Malaysia literary scene.
“We’ve translated nine masterpieces of world literature with this small team in just two years, and we believe we can do more,” Luqman concluded. – Hanis Maketab
