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EMPTYING THE BINS of Colombia’s capital, Jose Alberto Gutierrez one day found a copy of the classic novel “Anna Karenina,” and kept it.
That was 20 years ago – and the garbage man continued to collect Bogota’s discarded books, amassing 25,000 in a free library, swelled by donations.
“I realized that people were throwing books away in the rubbish. I started to rescue them,” Gutierrez, a stocky, grey-haired man of 54, told AFP.
He never got past primary school as a student, but is now dubbed “The Lord of the Books,” in demand from schools across the country.
Epic undertaking
That first copy of Tolstoy was soon joined by “The Little Prince,” “Sophie’s World,” “The Iliad” and various novels by Colombian master Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Gutierrez’s neighbors started coming round to borrow books to help their children with schoolwork.
There was a lack of them in our neighborhood, so we started to help.
Now a whole floor of his house, on a hill in the working class Nueva Gloria district of the capital, is taken up by stacks of books.
Along with wife Luz Mery Gutierrez and their three children, Gutierrez opened it as a free library in 2000.
Volunteers joined in, word spread, and the garbage man found himself invited to international book fairs in Santiago, Monterrey as well as in the capital.
Where once he supplied the library by rescuing books from the street, now most his stock comes from donations. Aside from donations, Gutierrez covers any further expenses from his own pocket.
“We have a blessed curse upon us,” he said. “The more books we give away, the more come to us.”
The collection got so big that they had to halt the children’s reading sessions they held in the house, for lack of space.
Instead they started traveling around the country to deliver free books to hundreds of poor and remote districts.
Books for peacetime
Gutierrez says his mother gave him a love of literature by reading cartoons to him in the country shack where he grew up.
“It was she who enlightened me,” he says.
Having not finished school as a boy, he is now, well into middle age, studying for his school leaver’s exam.
Among the people across the vast jungle nation who have contacted him to ask for books was a fighter in the FARC leftist rebel group.
Its 7,000 members are gathered in demobilization zones to disarm under a peace accord signed last year with the government.
The FARC member asked Gutierrez to send books for the fighters. They will have to learn and train for new jobs once they lay down their weapons and make the transition to civil life.
“Books transformed me, so I think books are a symbol of hope for those places,” Gutierrez said. “They are a symbol of peace.”
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I know many people who cannot bear to throw or give away a book. This man, however, loved books enough to share them with people in need. My usual cynicism is silenced. He is an inspiration.
Who would throw a book in the rubbish! Fair play to them
@john Appleseed:
Much better to organise a good burning in the streets (followed by a purge of teachers and intellectuals…)
@Avina Laaf:
I only throw a book in the thrash of it’s really really bad and didn’t enjoy any aspect of it.
If the book was ok I would find a new home for it, it the book was good or great I keep it.
@Avina Laaf: Heir Heir
Fair play to him although I’d suspect it would take one hundred years of solitude to read them all….
@Frank Cauldhame: Damn you. Came here to post that. (Well something in that vein). Well done sir!
@David Hickey: What a book David, what a book . Cheers!
@Frank Cauldhame: Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Jose Alberto Gutierrez would recall that distant afternoon when he found a Tolstoy in the trash.
This man deserves an Honorary Degree in Literature at least!
Hoarder?
@Ian Moloney: troll
@john Appleseed: He has them stacked in such a way that shows he has no intention of reading them . It would take a couple of hours to find what he’s looking for in that mess. He’s very lucky his wife dosent black bag them all and bring them down to the nearest charity shop.
@Ian Moloney: if you bother to look at the picture you will see the books are stacked correctly but I would immagin lack of space means that he has not got the room to build shelving to accomodate them….
@Ian Moloney: where ignorance is bliss it’s folly to be wise…so no point answering you
@Ian Moloney: maybe she intends to black bag him instead. Before rescuing a book from the trash ask yourself why it should s there. I saved a book 12 years ago from the same fate. It turned out to be a unique edition. You can never be sure.
The book is mightier than the sword!
@Ian Oh: my friend, Jose, writes this for me: I have a very sharp sabre. You have a book? Let’s have a duel! We can settle this tomorrow at Dawn, if Dawn is not available, her sister Marie is willing to stand in for her.
Started a collection of the great unreadables!
Golden ticket in there somewhere
Are you American? Who says garbage ffs
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