Antiquarian Book Fair set for March 16

Book lovers will be pleased to hear that the 2008 Westmount Antiquarian Book Fair will be held on Sunday, March 16, at Selwyn House School. Now in its 16th year, the fair is a perennial favourite among area bibliophiles — despite the talk in some quarters about the death of the book, the end of reading for pleasure, and the like.

At Canada's Smallest Bookfair (as it proudly boasts of itself), the browser can find just about anything — from the latest bestseller to a first edition by Charles Dickens, a favourite book from childhood or an early map of the Island of Montreal. Whatever your taste, with 16 booksellers from Quebec and Ontario, you're bound to find something to take home.

Organized by Westmount booksellers Wilfrid de Freitas and Susan Ravdin, who have just returned from exhibiting at two major fairs in California, the book fair provides an ideal opportunity to handle and learn about antiquarian books firsthand.

"We sometimes get asked by visitors if they can take a book off the shelf and look at it," says de Freitas. "And it's one of the pleasures of our trade to see their eyes light up as they hold a first edition by their favourite author whose work they've read only in paperback."

Despite what one might think, book collecting is a very egalitarian pursuit: it can be done on as small or as large a budget as one's means permit. "Collect what you enjoy, what speaks to you," says Ravdin, herself a former rare book librarian, "After all, you're going to live with these books for a long time!"

• The 16th Westmount Antiquarian Book Fair will take place at Selwyn House School, 95 Côte St. Antoine Rd., Westmount, on Sunday, March 16 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $2. For more information, call 514-935-9581 or visit www.defreitasbooks.com