The siren call of second hand books
The siren call
Of leather bound, cloth bound
Unbound books
And the smell of old paper.
Old knowledge, old stories,
Old ideas
Whose time came, and went
Or never came at all.
This is Booth’s book shop in Hay on Wye, South Wales. In the late 70s Richard Booth opened the first secondhand book store in the town, buying books in bulk in the USA and shipping them back. His success led to other secondhand book stores opening in the town. It didn’t hurt either that Mr. Booth has an eye for publicity, and acts like declaring independence from the rest of the UK, and proclaiming himself the King of Hay brought him some nationwide publicity which can’t have been bad for business. There are still many, many secondhand bookshops in the town, and it is actually known as The Town of Books. Visitors come from all over the world, and in June the Hay Literary Festival is one of the world’s most prestigious, numbering President Bill Clinton among the illustrious figures who have participated.
Just for a change I made this sketch in Biro. I used to sketch a lot in biro, and this reminded me why I stopped using it! The first half of the sketch was fine, but then it started blotting, the ink stopped flowing smoothly - urrgghhh
