This month, book fair volunteers have started sorting through the collection of Vintage, Antique and Classic Books. Sorting vintage and antique are easy. Any hardcover book printed between 1918 and 1978 can be called vintage and any book printed before 1918 can be called antique.

Sorting ‘Classics’ is a whole lot more difficult. Usually a ‘classic’ is a book read by more than one generation and has a gripping story which is expertly crafted and well-written. What makes a book fit this description can be very subjective, i.e. based more on personal beliefs or feelings rather than facts. Penguin Books Australia conducted a reader survey in 2022 and came up with the following.

Classic Australian books:

My Brilliant Career, Voss, The Harp in the South, The Thorn Birds, Blinky Bill, Gould’s Book of Fish, The Getting of Wisdom, Storm Boy, Come In Spinner, Poor Fellow My Country, The Magic Pudding, A Town Like Alice, Seven Little Australians, We of the Never Never, The Muddle-Headed wombat, A Fortunate Life, Robbery Under Arms, Snugglepot and Cuddlepie.

Best Classic books of all time:

To Kill a Mockingbird, Moby-Dick, Pride and Prejudice, Peter Pan, Don Quixote, War and Peace, The Lord of the Rings, Jane Eyre, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Wind in the Willows, Gulliver’s Travels, The Diary of a Young Girl, Little Women, One Thousand and One Nights, The House at Pooh Corner, Robinson Crusoe, The Old Man and the Sea, All Quiet on the Western Front, The Tale of Peter Rabbit, The Idiot, Doctor Zhivago, Sherlock Holmes, Anne of Green Gables, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Murder on the Orient Express, Thirty-Nine Steps, Black Beauty.

Many of these books are actually either children’s books or books aimed at teenagers. Perhaps it is because they all contain adventure, imagination, heroes and a bit of magic. There are no guarantees that you will find all of these classics at the book fair, but you can nearly always find a treasure.

The next book fair will be on June 1, 10am – 2pm at 44 Victoria Street, Nhill. It is just one of a number of venues at the end of the main street where you can find a treasure on the first Saturday of each month. CWA has a pop-up opportunity shop with delectable Devonshire morning teas – open 9-1pm, LOL coffee van has freshly made hot food, coffee and sheltered seating in the sun (clouds permitting) – open 7.30-2pm. Lowana is well-known for its delectable homemade savouries and slices as well as plants and handcrafted items and is open 9.30-noon.

Book donations are gratefully accepted on Book Fair day. All money raised goes to the Nhill Aviation Heritage Centre.

This article appeared in the Nhill Free Press & Kaniva Times, 29 May 2024.