Second-hand book store provides glimpse of a life well lived

JORDAN MOSHE

When he was not penning letters to the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation), Polnay enjoyed attending symphony concerts (admission by invitation only) or advising the Johannesburg Art Gallery on how its lighting could be improved. While he was committed to his job at the city council, he always found time to hop aboard the tram and visit his local music shop in search of the latest album.

Polnay was what some would call a man of culture, and though it has been almost a century since he walked the streets of Johannesburg, a chance discovery at a local second-hand bookshop effectively brought him back to life again.

“David Polnay was a book, watch, stamp, and vinyl collector of extraordinary energy,” says Richard Welch, the owner of Kalahari Books in Orange Grove, where the items were found. “He collected books for about 75 years, and he died in his home in Berea when he was 97. He was a pipe-smoker, pipe collector, Mars-Bar eater, and accumulator of a unique propensity.”

Although the two never met, it was through Polnay’s possessions that Welch became acquainted with him. A dealer in second-hand books for several years, Welch has had a few adventures with books, acquiring them from estate sales, emigrating families, or individuals looking to make room in the house. “Such occasions are nearly always emotionally exhausting,” he says, “because a person’s books are an accurate reflection of the inner person whom one confronts uniquely.”

His encounter with Polnay was no different. It was through a friend who hailed from an old Northumbrian family, Mary Lipnicky (now in her late nineties), that Welch was first introduced to Polnay’s collection about ten years ago.

Lipnicky had lived a few houses down from the Polnays in Honey Street, Berea, and had known the family for years. Says Welch, “Hearing I was in the book-business, she told me she’d be in touch about books in a friend and neighbour’s house in her street. He had recently been admitted to Sandringham Gardens Old Age Home after collapsing in the kitchen at home where he lived alone. His name was Alan Polnay, the son of David Polnay, and his cousin, Louis Shakenovsky, had asked Lipnicky to dispose of the household effects.”

Scaling the perimeter wall, Lipnicky retrieved the key to the Polnay home, and showed Welch in. What he saw was nothing short of extraordinary, starting from the moment he walked into the kitchen. “The kitchen was full of books,” he says. “The walls of the passage were lined with books. The sitting room, bedrooms, the bathroom – all were lined with books, magazines, and newspapers.

“She showed me the library, where, to head-height, all over the carpet, the room was full of books. It even had a small passage carved through piles of books, newspapers, and magazines, and in the very middle was a kind of nest with an armchair, where the old man had sat, reading the newspaper and smoking one of his pipes (pipes were everywhere) and eating his chocolate bars (petrified bars were all over).”

According to Lipnicky, the house and remained virtually untouched since David’s death about thirty years earlier, and many of its rooms had remained closed while his son, Alan, had lived there. In spite of the enormity of the collection it housed, Lipnicky heard that David wasn’t much of an actual reader. She told Welch, “Alan,” I once said, “Your dad must have been a prolific reader.”

“I don’t think he read much,” said Alan. “He collected.”

It was into this collection that Welch threw himself, working through it all until the early hours for interminable weeks. For thirty years, books, vinyl records, watches, pipes, and other items had become vulnerable to rats, dust, and disorder. Finally, after removing the damaged and unsellable items, Welch came away with a sizeable quantity of material, most of which was taken to his shop for sale.

With time, Welch has learned much about Polnay and his family. He shared what he could with me in detail. “He’d changed his name when he came to South Africa after an unfortunate sojourn in Palestine as a very young man, fleeing the Poland of that day. Poloniewski sounded a bit like one of his admired authors, Peter Polnay, so that seemed a good and pronounceable name for someone who wanted to make his way in a new country.”

Polnay had been a communist since his youth in Poland and he remained a communist, if a sedentary one, his whole life. Through the apartheid era, he wrote to and received post and communications, books and pamphlets from the Soviet Union, and had a vast collection of Russian literature.

The rich tapestry weaved by Polnay’s effects tell the story of a man who resided at 19 Honey Street in Berea, corresponded with art galleries and radio broadcasters, travelled extensively, and kept up to date with world affairs. During the course of the early 1900s, Polnay’s recipients included the BBC, Portuguese Mozambique Radio, the London Gramophone Monthly Review, and even relatives on the continent with whom he corresponded in Yiddish. Before the books took over, he and his wife would entertain friends at cultural evenings, where they’d play records and discuss music and books.

It is clear, however, that when South Africa found itself drawn into World War II, Polnay left this life behind, and chose to join the armed forces. While based at the Lyttelton military camp in the then Transvaal, Polnay kept in regular contact with his wife, Dora, and son, Alan, sending regular missives penned in a looping fountainpen. Although he finds little fault with his bungalow accommodation, he seems particularly peeved by the lack of comfortable bedding. “We’re well-provided for,” he writes, “but they haven’t given us pillows!”

Says Welch, “In the many years he worked as a clerk for the municipality, he would walk or ride on his bicycle to work in town, and he continued doing this when he got a job as a clerk at the Chamber of Mines. He was a prolific letter writer, corresponding with stamp societies, record clubs, radio programmes and societies, and clubs of every type the world over. He wrote innumerable letters to the city council and public bodies drawing attention to problems in the city. He was a master-complainer about the discourtesy and inefficiency of public officials, shop assistants, and their employers.”

For all his oddities, the changing of his name, and his obsession with collecting, Polnay represents one of the hundreds of Jewish personalities which populated a burgeoning Johannesburg, engaging with its culture and challenges as the 20th century unfolded. While no descendants of this unique individual are around today, we are fortunately still able to gain access to the life of a man who once lived at 19 Honey Street, Berea.