Repacking My Library

One of our pipe dreams - ain't that a lovely phrase? - has long been to own and run our own second-hand bookshop. We just love 'em, especially those run by and aimed at bibliophiles of all stripes. I suppose we have a couple of thousand books here, dotted about between shelves and boxes - it used to be more I think, but I can't be sure, and I haven't stopped buying books, so it could be more. My best personal library space was an upstairs room at number six Gerlan Terrace, the first house we bought. It had a 'corridor' formed by  a six-foot plus high double-sided bookshelf, which opened out into a small space with an open fire, two overstuffed armchairs with a full-size chessboard between them, and my easel and work table by the window. Magic on a winter's evening with a glass of wine and a roaring fire.

A couple of instances spring to mind from when I was still working. I met a woman whose broadband I'd been sent to sort out - then in her late eighties or early nineties - living in Mynydd Llandegai on the other side of our valley. I was directed to the  phone jack and router, which were in a small library with a day-bed under the window at the end of the room. Whilst I was running tests on the broadband, I was furtively scanning the well-stocked shelves around me. Most of the works were Marxist, and a good number of the authors familiar to me: Adorno, Marcuse, Benjamin; and of course Marx.

There were a number of similarly-bound volumes in a single run by an author whose name I didn't recognise. The woman came and chatted as I was working and we talked about books in general: I said that I had around 2-2,500 at present, although my collection was somewhat less focussed than hers. Her reply was that she had recently slimmed down her library from around ten thousand volumes to something like two! I also later realised that she was the author of that run of volumes I couldn't identify, and to my shame, I've lost the references to either who she was or the books themselves, and the memory itself.

The second meeting was at a house at the back of Y Felinheli, on the top of the hill. Again, I found myself surrounded by books - this time mostly hard-bound and old. The room I was working in was pretty much all books, as were the rooms I had passed through to get to what I thought was probably the 'inner sanctum'. Again, talking with the chap who lived there, we fell into a conversation about books, our personal histories, politics and much besides. When I asked if he was a collector, which seemed like a pretty good bet; he told me he was, but also a dealer, and that in the room beyond were around twenty thousand volumes.

The idea of owning a dusty old bookshop still appeals, reinforced by a piece in last weekend's FT, in the big comic, entitled 'The 20 Most Brilliant Bookshops'; and magnificent they all appear: but the kind that still appeals most is embodied by 'Shakespeare and Company' in Paris, which is exactly the kind of bookshop we like: old, dusty, crammed floor to ceiling, and just plain interesting. Over the years, we found bookshops like this all over the place: a couple of notables being nearby, neither of which have survived Covid, unfortunately; but the one that I dearly used to love to potter around in was in Holt in North Norfolk, although I'm not sure that it's there now either, as it's been three or four years since we ventured over there and we can't find any reference to it on the net.

There used to be a good one in Much Wenlock in Shropshire, but again it's been a while since our last visit so I'm not sure whether that's survived the pandemic, either. However, there is one I know to definitely still be in business - although it's not the floor to ceiling type, nor is it dusty - Yarborough House in Bishop's Castle, Shropshire. I know it's still going because I bought a couple of volumes there only recently. How much longer it will survive is anyone's guess though, as the owners of the place are older than we are. But it is well worth a visit if only for it's modest but eclectic collection of classical LP's and CD's, quite apart from the books on offer.

Of course, the place to go is Hay-On-Wye, which truly is a bookshopophile's idea of heaven. Must make time to visit again soon. And maybe get some plans on the table for opening one of our own? Watching the interview with the ninety-five-year-old Sir David Attenborough tonight gives one the inspiration that while we're still viable as a species we really do have to carry on - in his case both reporting on the sorry state that we are dragging this planet into, and being active in lobbying for the desperately-needed change we need to see to reverse that situation - but also that while there's breath in the body, there's no end to what we can achieve personally, given the will and sufficient means. Here's to the next project. And the next...