Nepal
Nepal (; ne, :ne:नेपाल, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne,
सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in S ...
in 1984. It formerly published books under the Book Faith India imprint and now publishes under the Pilgrims Publishing imprint. Pilgrims Book House is currently headquartered in
Varanasi
Varanasi (; ; also Banaras or Benares (; ), and Kashi.) is a city on the Ganges river in northern India that has a central place in the traditions of pilgrimage, death, and mourning in the Hindu world.
*
*
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* The city has a syncretic t ...
, India.
Pilgrims Book House sells and publishes books in a number of South Asian and Western languages. Its areas of speciality include:
*
Buddhism
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religions, Indian religion or Indian philosophy#Buddhist philosophy, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha. ...
*
Hinduism
Hinduism () is an Indian religion or '' dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global p ...
and
yoga
Yoga (; sa, योग, lit=yoke' or 'union ) is a group of physical, mental, and spiritual practices or disciplines which originated in ancient India and aim to control (yoke) and still the mind, recognizing a detached witness-consci ...
* Mountaineering
*Reprints of classic books on India, Nepal, Tibet and Central Asia
*Languages ( Nepali, Tibetan,
Hindi
Hindi ( Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been ...
)
*Children's books
Company history
Pilgrims Book House was established by Puspa and Rama Nand ("Rama") Tiwari in
in 1984, succeeding the Tiwaris' earlier book business in Varanasi. In the year 1999 they started a branch in Varanasi, and in 2006 a second branch opened in Delhi.
For many years the main Pilgrims Book House bookshop branch in Kathmandu was located in
Thamel
Thamel ( ne, ठमेल) is a commercial neighborhood located in Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal. Thamel has been the centre of the tourist industry in Kathmandu for over four decades, starting from the hippie days, when many artists came to Ne ...
. It was one of the largest bookshops in Asia with hundreds of thousands of books on display. It was praised by several travel guidebooks and websites (including by
Lonely Planet
Lonely Planet is a travel guide book publisher. Founded in Australia in 1973, the company has printed over 150 million books.
History Early years
Lonely Planet was founded by married couple Maureen and Tony Wheeler. In 1972, they embarke ...
who called it "Kathmandu's best bookstore").
On 16 May 2013 the Thamel branch of Pilgrims Book House caught fire and almost everything inside was burnt to ashes. Since the fire Pilgrims has operated two bookshops, one at JP Road, Thamel, Kathmandu and the other at Durgakund, Varanasi.
Pilgrims operates two websites, one for its bookstores and the other for its publishing division. The company also maintains a rare books department.
Publications
Pilgrims Book House has published more than 1700 books. These include:
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Paul Brunton
Paul Brunton is the pen name of Raphael Hurst (21 October 1898 – 27 July 1981), a British author of spiritual books. He is best known as one of the early popularizers of Neo-Hindu spiritualism in western esotericism, notably via his be ...
Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki
, self-rendered in 1894 as "Daisetz", was a Japanese-American Buddhist monk, essayist, philosopher, religious scholar, translator, and writer. He was a scholar and author of books and essays on Buddhism, Zen and Shin that were instrumental in s ...
, '' The Lankavatara Sutra'', Pilgrims Publishing, 2005, .
* H. W. Tilman, ''Mount Everest 1938'', Pilgrims Publishing, 2004,Everest Series (Pilgrims Publishing) - Book Series List publishinghistory.com. Retrieved 2 May 2020. (contains the infamous Appendix B on the
* Everest Series
* Pilgrims Colouring Book Series
* Pilgrims Folk Tales
* Pilgrims Pocket Series
* Pilgrims Quotation SeriesFriends (Pilgrims Quotation Series) amazon.in. Retrieved 30 June 2022.
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'', 19 February 2009 - mention of Rama Tiwari and Pilgrims Book House in review of Rory MacLean's ''Magic Bus: On the
Hippie Trail
Hippie trail (also the overland) is the name given to the overland journey taken by members of the hippie subculture and others from the mid-1950s to the late 1970s between Europe and South Asia, mainly from Turkey through Iran, Afghanistan ...
From Istanbul to India'' Ramanand Tiwari seopati. com - article (in Nepali) profiling Ramanand Tiwari, the Pilgrims Book House proprietor
*Tarquin Hall "In search of paradise" ''
New Statesman
The ''New Statesman'' is a British Political magazine, political and cultural magazine published in London. Founded as a weekly review of politics and literature on 12 April 1913, it was at first connected with Sidney Webb, Sidney and Beatrice ...