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For nearly 40 years, 91-year-old Rizkullah Abd has run a secondhand bookshop in the Syrian city of Aleppo, building a massive collection of rare and antique books that spans several languages and helps preserve the city's cultural memory.
Abd, who runs his secondhand bookshop in Aleppo's Tilel neighborhood, takes his place among his books every morning in his small shop on the edge of a narrow sidewalk.
Carefully preserving works that can no longer be found in modern libraries, Abd continues to be an essential stop for students, researchers, and book lovers with works he has collected over the years, some of them more than a century old.
Alongside Arabic-language works, the shop also contains books in French, English, and German, featuring handwritten manuscripts from different eras as well as books produced using various printing techniques.
Abd said his collection includes lithographic works more than 100 years old, and that he continues to preserve some books despite missing pages and worn condition because of their historical value. "Saving rare works from disappearing is a responsibility for me," Abd said.
Abd said the collection he has built over the years has become an important resource for Aleppo, noting that people sometimes find books there that they have been searching for for long periods.
Abd said he does not view bookselling merely as a commercial activity, saying, "I collect, preserve, and deliver the books that others do not care about, that have been abandoned and are at risk of disappearing, to people who wish to benefit from them."
Emphasizing that his devotion to books is the greatest motivation that allows him to continue this work at his age, Abd said, "My collection holds 1 million books. I ask my Lord to give me the strength to keep collecting new books and preserving them."
Despite his advanced age, Abd continues to collect books, stressing that for him, books are not merely objects sitting on shelves. Continuing to work in his small shop amid Aleppo's changing streets, Abd strives to find the books his customers are looking for while passing on works that carry traces of the past to future generations.
Abd, the 91-year-old fixture of Aleppo, carries a deep sorrow in his personal life. He said one of his sons was forcibly disappeared in 2012, and he has had no word from him since. He said news of his son remains one of his greatest hopes, and he is still waiting for information from anyone who might be able to help him.
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