IRA MATH­UR

For more than three decades, Pa­per Based Book­shop has stood as a bea­con of lit­er­ary cul­ture in T&T. Es­tab­lished in 1987 by Joan Day­al, the shop carved a niche as a hub of Caribbean lit­er­a­ture. Day­al’s vi­sion was to cre­ate a sanc­tu­ary for re­gion­al voic­es, al­low­ing au­thors, po­ets, and thinkers to share their sto­ries with an ea­ger au­di­ence. Over time, Pa­per Based be­came more than a book­store—a cul­tur­al in­sti­tu­tion, a space for dis­cov­ery, con­ver­sa­tion, and com­mu­ni­ty.

Ini­tial­ly lo­cat­ed at the Nor­mandie Ho­tel in St Ann’s for 36 years, the book­shop be­came syn­ony­mous with cel­e­brat­ing the rich­ness of Caribbean sto­ry­telling. Its shelves fea­tured a care­ful­ly cu­rat­ed se­lec­tion of fic­tion, po­et­ry, and non-fic­tion that spoke to the heart of the re­gion’s iden­ti­ty. It host­ed read­ings, dis­cus­sions, and events that unit­ed writ­ers, read­ers, and po­ets, nur­tur­ing a sense of be­long­ing and pride.

In 2023, Pa­per Based Book­shop shift­ed to The Writ­ers Cen­tre at 14 Al­cazar Street, St Clair, a move that in­vig­o­rat­ed its role in Trinidad’s lit­er­ary com­mu­ni­ty while strength­en­ing its part­ner­ship with the NGC Bo­cas Lit Fest, the Caribbean’s pre­mier lit­er­ary fes­ti­val. To­day, un­der the stew­ard­ship of its man­ag­er, Si­mone Camps, Pa­per Based con­tin­ues its mis­sion to cel­e­brate the re­gion’s sto­ries and con­nect read­ers to the trans­for­ma­tive pow­er of lit­er­a­ture.

Camps has em­braced this lega­cy with pas­sion and ded­i­ca­tion. She brings a wealth of ex­pe­ri­ence and an en­dur­ing love for books to the role. De­scrib­ing her jour­ney to Pa­per Based, she says, “I didn’t choose it—it chose me.”

The tra­jec­to­ry of Camps’ ca­reer is as vi­brant and dy­nam­ic as the books she now cu­rates. She be­gan her pro­fes­sion­al life as a dancer, train­ing at Bal­let Ram­bert in Lon­don be­fore re­turn­ing to Trinidad, where she per­formed with renowned chore­o­g­ra­phers No­ble Dou­glas and As­tor John­son. She nev­er planned to pur­sue dance pro­fes­sion­al­ly; it was sim­ply some­thing she loved. When a friend sug­gest­ed she ap­ply to Bal­let Ram­bert, she agreed al­most on a whim, not ful­ly re­al­is­ing the mag­ni­tude of the op­por­tu­ni­ty.

“Af­ter two years of work­ing in Lon­don, I came home for a va­ca­tion,” she re­calls. “I fell in love, got mar­ried, and de­cid­ed to stay.” Camps per­formed lo­cal­ly, bal­anced a few sec­re­tar­i­al jobs and em­braced moth­er­hood. Dur­ing this time, she de­cid­ed to pur­sue her de­gree to be­come a psy­chol­o­gist.

Her path, how­ev­er, took an un­ex­pect­ed turn. While study­ing, she be­gan help­ing her sis­ter or­gan­ise film shoots for her di­rec­tor boyfriend. “My sis­ter even­tu­al­ly moved back to Trinidad and sug­gest­ed I start a pro­duc­tion com­pa­ny with her now-hus­band,” she ex­plains. “I said, ‘Sure!’ It wasn’t some­thing I planned, but I worked hard at it and loved it for 22 years.”

When the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic up­end­ed the film in­dus­try, Camps be­gan ex­plor­ing her next steps. She thought she had found her new di­rec­tion af­ter trav­el­ling in South Amer­i­ca and be­com­ing cer­ti­fied as a Mind­ful­ness-Based Stress Re­duc­tion (MB­SR) teacher. But life had oth­er plans.

“A friend men­tioned that Pa­per Based was look­ing for a man­ag­er,” she says. “As an avid read­er, I thought, ‘What a love­ly job!’ I ap­plied, and here I am.”

Man­ag­ing Pa­per Based is both chal­leng­ing and deeply re­ward­ing for Camps. She laughs at the mis­con­cep­tion that run­ning a book­store means spend­ing her days im­mersed in nov­els. “It’s far from that,” she says. “My days are filled with or­der­ing books, man­ag­ing ac­counts, meet­ing with cus­tomers, host­ing events, li­ais­ing with au­thors, and stay­ing on top of lit­er­ary trends.”

Her work has in­tro­duced her to the in­cred­i­ble breadth and depth of Caribbean lit­er­a­ture, some­thing she didn’t ful­ly ap­pre­ci­ate be­fore. “Most of my read­ing used to be in­ter­na­tion­al au­thors,” she ad­mits. “Work­ing at Pa­per Based has opened my eyes to the rich­ness of our re­gion­al sto­ries. It’s been a rev­e­la­tion.”

Camps find im­mense joy in con­nect­ing with peo­ple. Whether match­ing a read­er with the per­fect book, host­ing events that bring to­geth­er writ­ers and their au­di­ences, or shar­ing sto­ries with cus­tomers, she is in­spired by the con­ver­sa­tions and re­la­tion­ships her work fos­ters.

Si­mone Camps is an avid read­er with eclec­tic tastes. She ad­mits it’s hard to nar­row down her favourites but of­fers a se­lec­tion of ti­tles that have left a last­ing im­pres­sion. These in­clude The Sil­mar­il­lion, The Hob­bit, and The Lord of the Rings tril­o­gy by JRR Tolkien, which she de­scribes as “a whole world un­to it­self.” She is al­so deeply moved by The Road by Cor­mac Mc­Carthy, call­ing it “a haunt­ing ex­plo­ration of love and sur­vival in a post-apoc­a­lyp­tic world.”

Her oth­er rec­om­men­da­tions in­clude The Stand and It by Stephen King, which she prais­es for their abil­i­ty to bal­ance hu­man­i­ty and hor­ror; Beloved by Toni Mor­ri­son, a pro­found med­i­ta­tion on his­to­ry and iden­ti­ty; and Shake Hands with the Dev­il by Gen­er­al Romeo Dal­laire, a har­row­ing ac­count of the Rwan­dan geno­cide.

Camps’ list in­cludes Wild Swans: Three Daugh­ters of Chi­na by Jung Chang, The Lit­tle Prince by An­toine de Saint-Ex­upéry, Mid­night’s Chil­dren by Salman Rushdie, and Hun­gry Ghosts by Kevin Jared Ho­sein. She is par­tic­u­lar­ly fond of books ex­plor­ing re­silience and the hu­man spir­it, which res­onate deeply with her jour­ney.

In ad­di­tion to her rec­om­men­da­tions, Camps high­lights some of the OCM Bo­cas Prize-win­ning works avail­able at Pa­per Based, each a tes­ta­ment to the bril­liance of Caribbean sto­ry­telling.

OCM Bo­cas Prize-Win­ning Works at Pa­per Based

• Cur­few Chron­i­cles, a poignant nar­ra­tive re­flect­ing life dur­ing a na­tion­al cur­few

• Mad­woman, a lyri­cal ex­plo­ration of iden­ti­ty, fam­i­ly, and her­itage

• High Mas: Car­ni­val and the Po­et­ics of Caribbean Cul­ture, a vivid cel­e­bra­tion of Car­ni­val’s cul­tur­al sig­nif­i­cance

• When We Were Birds, a nov­el steeped in Trinida­di­an folk­lore and blend­ing themes of love and loss

• The Bread the Dev­il Knead, an un­flinch­ing por­trait of re­silience and self-dis­cov­ery

• How to Say Baby­lon, a mem­oir of re­silience and fa­mil­ial lega­cies

• Love the Dark Days, a haunt­ing mem­oir that delves in­to themes of iden­ti­ty and colo­nial lega­cies

• Pleas­ant View by Ce­leste Mo­hammed, a rich por­tray­al of Trinida­di­an life

• The Mer­maid of the Black Conch by Monique Rof­fey, a lyri­cal tale blend­ing myth and re­al­i­ty

• A Brief His­to­ry of Sev­en Killings by Mar­lon James, a sprawl­ing nar­ra­tive of vi­o­lence and re­demp­tion

• Claire of the Sea Light by Ed­widge Dan­ti­cat, a lu­mi­nous ex­plo­ration of love and loss

• Col­lect­ed Po­ems 1948–1984 by Derek Wal­cott, show­cas­ing the No­bel lau­re­ate’s mas­tery of lan­guage

• The Pain Tree by Olive Se­nior, a col­lec­tion that delves in­to hu­man na­ture and the Caribbean ex­pe­ri­ence

• The Drag­on Can’t Dance by Earl Lovelace, an icon­ic nov­el that ex­plores the com­plex­i­ties of post-colo­nial Trinidad

Pa­per Based Book­shop–a sanc­tu­ary for sto­ries

Pa­per Based Book­shop con­tin­ues to be a sanc­tu­ary for sto­ries, a space where re­gion­al voic­es are cel­e­brat­ed and read­ers and writ­ers can con­nect. Camps de­scribes her work as more than a job—it’s a pas­sion. Every day, she brings her en­er­gy and ded­i­ca­tion to en­sur­ing that Pa­per Based re­mains a cor­ner­stone of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s lit­er­ary cul­ture. So close to Christ­mas, the book­shop is a haven for those who love to re­ceive gift books.

Lo­ca­tion: The Writ­ers Cen­tre, 14 Al­cazar Street, St Clair, Port-of-Spain, T&T.

Con­tact: Phone: 1-868-628-3197 | Email: in­fo@pa­per­based­book­shop.com

Ira Math­ur is a Guardian Me­dia jour­nal­ist and the win­ner of the 2023 OCM Bo­cas Prize for Non-Fic­tion for her mem­oir, Love The Dark Days.

Au­thor in­quiries: iras­room@gmail.com

Web­site: www.iras­room.org