Books are disappearing not only in bookstores but libraries
as well. That leaves us with fewer, if any, independent bookstores and
libraries’ budgets, usually funded by local governments, are purchasing instead
rows of computers. I fully expected Savannah’s imposing Bull St. Library to
change the motto over its main entrance to now read “MAKE COMPUTERS THY COMRADES”.
Somehow it just doesn’t make the same awe inspiring inscription as “Make Books
Thy Comrades”.
Computers are certainly a wonder of modern convenience. Not
only have they replaced what a former DeKalb neighbor called her suicide
hotline, the Sears catalog’s 24 hour shopping, but can masterfully handle
massive amounts of data efficiently. Beware though of the details of products
for sale and the sources of computer data .The former is generally replaced
with customer reviews easily manipulated by writing one without guarantee they
are neither an employee of the maker nor competitor. The latter generally
ignore footnotes and all references. One is left to merely hope it wasn’t
gathered by those ‘researchers’ commonly found in Malls with their clipboards
and questions. And don’t get me started on that most popular online
encyclopedia Wikipedia.
Athens is the home of the University of Georgia, first
public university chartered (1785). (North Carolina takes issue with that claim
as UNC was the first to actually admit university students (1789). Atlanta has
its state rival (publicly funded) Georgia Tech (1885). Colleges and
Universities provide captive customers for bookstores, of course, but academic
books are their bread and butter. Since the South built most colleges and
universities inland, the coastal towns were deprived of these state funded academic
bookstores just as their residents were of the opportunity of a nearby place of
higher education.
Despite this, while wintering in Savannah 2017, I found time
to read and so set out to browse Savannah’s independent bookstores. I was most familiar
with Ester Shaver’s since I had my first book signing there and was a docent
for Ester’s home a couple of years for the annual Savannah Tour of Homes and
Gardens. Ester has since sold it, remarried and moved from the city. However, I
didn’t make it that far. On Liberty Street I passed my first store, The Book Lady,
and went in. I was very familiar with the building as I studied there in the
40s when it was the dance studio of Dorothy Davis. That acute attack of
nostalgia was cut short when the first book I saw was “The Damned Don’t Cry”
(not to be confused with the totally unrelated Joan Crawford movie of the same
name). The main ‘character’ was a house despite the plethora of human characters. The house had personal significance to me but not nearly as much as
it did for the main female character of the book. I bought it on the spot,
turned and started home to read it. Again however, I didn’t make it that far. I
sat on the first park bench I passed in Colonial Cemetery and only put it down
when chores, company or eye fatigue called.
The book was out of print for 50 years because it was
definitely not politically correct. However it was an excellent book and I
highly recommend it. As one of my visitors who noticed it said, it would hurt a
child to the core to read such descriptions of his ethnicity. I agreed. Can’t
imagine why any child would wish to or be allowed to read the book. It had
bigotry loud and clear but as I pointed out at least it was equal opportunity bigotry.
It left no class, ethnicity nor gender un-offended. It was a snapshot of a time
when the whole world practiced wholesale bigotry. It was an excellent read.
Friday,
March 26, 2010