Shakespeare and Co. Booksellers

E. M. Forster:

By a vestibule, by a lift, by a tubular railway, by a platform, by a sliding door — by reversing all the steps of her departure did Vashti arrive at her son’s room, which exactly resembled her own. She might well declare that the visit was superfluous. The buttons, the knobs, the reading-desk with the Book, the temperature, the atmosphere, the illumination — all were exactly the same. And if Kuno himself, flesh of her flesh, stood close beside her at last, what profit was there in that? She was too well-bred to shake him by the hand.

from The Machine Stops

The excellent Cintra Wilson, writing in Salon in August 2005:

[p. 7] Scott McClellan is the Undertaker of Information. With the gentle sterility of a mortician, McClellan puts a dark suit on every day and tells us, in a soothing voice, how comfortable our beloved information will be now that it is dead and resting in an attractive coffin. The press — outraged family members of the strangled Truth — wail, “But Scott, it wasn’t dead before you guys got your hands on it!” And the Undertaker, unruffled, sympathetic and appropriately somber, politely informs you that it is part of an ongoing investigation, and he believes he has already told you what the president’s comments were on that.

After a while, it is sickeningly passive-aggressive.

But the bottom line is, Scott is telling the truth: The truth is dead. And you’re never going to see it again. It’s in heaven now, with Chandra Levy and JonBenet Ramsey and Nicole Brown Simpson. He understands your grief, but getting angry won’t bring it back.

Worst of all, where to put the blame in Washington is never entirely clear — all the alleys are big and dark, and everyone knows that if blame is ever placed anywhere higher than the collective navel, it will only get deflected.

“This president cannot get up at this stage and explain this war,” said Helen Thomas. “If he did, and if reporters asked at his very few press conferences — his rare press conferences, How can you defend all the untruths that were said in the run up to the war? How can you stand there, when thousands of people are dead when we went to war under false premises?”

“Have you asked this question?” I asked.

“No. I don’t have a chance, but somebody should. I want everybody to wake up, and say, Is this us?”

Thomas is right. The White House press corps needs serious help — a rallying point, a Charlemagne, someone who could take its beaten peoples and convince them of how much they could achieve together. But seriously, there is nothing more the corps could have done, those weeks in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room. I was there. They could have ganged up and pistol-whipped Scott’s molars into glue and punctured his eardrums with his own American flag lapel pin, and they would have gotten the same sunny, bleating drivel until he was unconscious or dead. He’s a damn good soldier, that McClellan. If any major player in this administration is ever kidnapped by al-Qaida and tortured for national secrets, we can only hope that it is he. Like a quality linoleum, Scott will never crack.

The McClellan book. I ask you — Is it not just the latest example of something so wrong on so many levels that you scarcely know where to begin? Some public official participates in what is basically criminal activity, resigns from office, gets a book deal; and then the corporate media complex (such a large part of what props up the whole incestuous and very powerful mess in the first place) pretty much tries to jam the book up everybody’s ass for two or three weeks with a lot of help from the greatest crap-availability-machine of all time, Amazon. Most of the people who buy it on Amazon will never read it. Most of the people who comment on Amazon have never read it. Why read 368 pages of Scott McClellan? Is there a greater waste of life? Who is he, Gen. Grant? Where are the Cliff’s Notes?

The McClellan book is what is known these days as an op-ed book. Boiled down, it amounts to probably two to five pages of material. If McClellan really gave a shit about his integrity he’d have told his story to the New York Times or the Washington Post and left it at that. But there’s a lot of money in op-ed books and so that’s how we do it now. This is how we salve our conscience.

Bullshit, I say. At this shop, we do not support memoirs of disgraced former officials and we don’t support books by overrated celebrity journalists like Bob Woodward. (Bob Woodward, who is totally — totally — unreadable.) We do not support op-ed books padded to length, designed specifically to hit like a bullet on Amazon and on the tables at CostCo (backed by tremendous media hype) and then sink beneath the waves two or three weeks later. At this shop, we try our best to bring in real books by real writers and real journalists, books which are worth your time and money, now, next month, next year.

There are many such books.

* see above.

This week, hundreds, thousands of bookstore people and publishing people and industry folks head to Los Angeles for BookExpo America. Myself, I’ve never gone to this annual event. Whenever I’ve asked about BEA I’ve always gotten mixed reviews. I’m not sure how bookstore people can afford to go (?!). All my money, every month, goes to buy books (for the store), and so where anyone finds the extra for plane tickets, hotels, meals … No idea. I think it would be fun to go as a writer (not that I am one), to report on the event, but not so much as a store owner. It’s not for me. I’m too agoraphobic! I think I would stand around feeling very intimidated by it all.

Some nice people in here just now from New York City. Welcome faces.

Anyway, after reading the Taibbi book and the Gourevitch book and part of the new Jeff Sharlet book (The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power), my cynicism levels are so dangerously high that I must read some fiction to calm down. I am off to a good start with Joyce Carol Oates‘s new story — “Suicide by Fitness Center” — in this month’s Harper’s. Oates is at her best in this one, intimate, sharp, cutting, funny. Amped up. The story is a knockout. So good. It’s like watching Richard Thompson on the guitar. I was reminded again why Joyce Carol Oates is a national treasure.

On page 29 of the Indy this week an ad for Dennis Daneke, candidate for County Commissioner … and what’s with the American flag, Dennis? Is it there in honor of Memorial Day? Is it there because you are running for Commander in Chief of the County Commissioner’s Office? I don’t get the flag thing.

Odd.

In any event, here’s his website.

[Later: As a friend points out after reading Mr. Daneke's bio, Dennis seems to be something of a gun enthusiast, and so perhaps that explains it.]

Please note: Michele Landquist is also a candidate for this office.