The founder chairman of Osian's loves collecting unusual books. | |
| Neville Tuli's contempt for mediocre reading material has softened with time and today he realises that not everyone can share his passion for Byzantine introspective texts. |
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| "I use to have that patronising attitude but over time I understood that all texts have their special place for the people who have relied on their words for some strength, wisdom, joy or even pastime," he says graciously. |
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| Playwrights and philosophers (Voltaire, Camus, Beckett) have kept him company for most of his adult life. |
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| "Dostoyevsky is my favourite for his deep introspection linking literature and philosophy more than most, his clear understanding about pain, fragility, the beauty of being alone and his idealism, amid dark humour..." he explains. |
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| There was a time when Tuli's reading habits bordered on the obsessive , accomplished in "deep, focussed bouts", although today time doesn't permit that joy and he finds his patience is a dwindling reserve. Owing perhaps to the demands of his pet task at hand "" the building of Osian's archive and library collection to be housed at Osianama, an arts and film institution in the making. Having himself had the opportunities afforded by some of the world's greatest libraries at Oxford and LSE, he believes it is imperative that he do his bit to gift people with the greatest knowledge resources he can afford. And so while he trawls, with obsession, nooks and corners of the world for unusual finds, the old book shops of London and Oxford still offer some of the most old-fashioned but satisfying shopping experiences. |
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| Ironically, for a man who, for the last decade, has been accumulating literature to place at the public's disposal, Tuli is loath to lend his personal books, even to friends. "I don't understand what happens to the human psyche when it comes to books because very few would return a book unless poked to return." |
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