Requiem for a refuge

Yesterday, George Whitman, 98, died in Paris. The New York Times notes that he had owned his bookstore overlooking the Seine, Shakespeare & Company, since 1951. His store, named Le Mistral until 1964, was a mecca and refuge for the post-World War II generation of American expatriate writers, and the spiritual heir of the original Shakespeare & Company, run by Sylvia Beach during the 1920's.

His death occurred, ironically, on the same date as my post announcing that I had purchased a Kindle.

These two events were on my mind today, as I walked out of Barnes & Noble in University Village. For several months, I'd been noticing that the shelves had grown smaller and smaller, and spaced farther and farther apart. I'd been worrying that B&N was focusing its attention excessively on Nook, its own version of Kindle, rather than on promoting the sale of physical books. Today I learned the worst possible news -- the Village's B&N is closing its doors at the end of this month.

My readers are undoubtedly familiar with Barnes & Noble. The Village store is a massive yet warm and welcoming establishment. Two expansive floors, which, for years, were packed densely with books covering every possible subject matter. Alcoves with easy chairs and library tables -- one of the alcoves upstairs graced with a gas fireplace. A large recordings department, carrying an impressive inventory of classical CDs. Areas where authors were invited to give readings. A mezzanine Starbucks where you could linger over the books you'd just purchased -- or might still decide to purchase.

I often spent an entire afternoon at Barnes & Noble, browsing and reading books (books that I sometimes purchased, although not often enough, it seems), ending my visit by dallying for a half hour over latte, surrounded by poster caricatures of famous authors, while watching customers wander about the first floor below. Students would crowd tables doing homework, researching from books from the store's shelves. No one was hurried or asked to leave. As did Shakespeare & Company itself, the store offered a haven, at least for the day, to anyone with time on his hands and a love of books in his heart. The store's ambience was as much library as bookstore, but a library that was far cozier and less institutional than our downtown public library.

Halcyon bygone days. Wandering about the maze-like stacks of the Village store came close to matching my own personalized image of heaven. One of those joys you never quite appreciate, unfortunately, until you lose it.

Barnes & Noble still has a large store downtown that I often visit. That outlet is a fine place to shop around and buy a book -- but it's crowded with shoppers and it's bustling. Intentionally or not, it doesn't encourage idle shoppers to linger for hours, reading books without necessarily paying for them. It's not "cozy."

With the downtown Borders having shut down earlier this year when its parent company went bankrupt, and with the closing now of the Village B&N, I wonder if it's only a matter of time until all large bookstores shut their doors.

I left the store this afternoon, picturing that moment a couple of weeks from now when the last customer walks out the door, the last latte is pulled, the gas fireplace is extinguished for good, the remaining inventory is boxed up and returned to the publishers. The sky seemed grayer, the drizzle more drizzly, as I walked away.

Is it all Kindle from now on? George Whitman may have sensed that now was a good time to quietly depart the scene.