The Cemetery of Forgotten Books, and other Magical Spaces

by Kim, October 20, 2009 at 6:00am

One of the most magical passages I've read recently comes from Carlos Ruiz Zafon's mystery "The Shadow of the Wind." Besides being a rather supernatural whodunit, the book is a love letter to books. Its Cemetery of Forgotten Books is a little-known shelter for books that have been, lost, forgotten, or persecuted. The reader encounters the wonder of reading both in this dusty cemetery/sanctuary and in a small bookstore where the main character seeks solace as a child.

There's some ineffable quality to be found in a bookstore, one that has both everything and nothing to do with the actual book purchased. Yet independent booksellers are now valiantly fighting to survive against the onslaught of the big box stores and online giants like Amazon.

Since the early 1990s, the number of independent bookstores has dropped from 4000 to 1800. Some communities are feeling this loss so acutely that they are stepping in and buying up independent bookshops, which provide a community meeting place, book recommendations, and sometimes classes.

In The Shadow and the Wind, Zafon impresses upon the reader the responsibilities that come along with a love of books. Each person who enters in the Cemetery of Forgotten Books must choose (or be chosen by) one volume, which becomes a binding responsibility: one must do whatever it takes to keep the book from slipping into oblivion. The magic of reading like all magical things, is difficult to monetize. A community with a scanty library or where you may only purchase books at a generic chain is somehow impoverished, in my opinion. Magic is skittish: it doesn't live as easily on fluorescent-lit shelves as it does in baroque havens like The Strand in New York City, where the profusion of books makes you feel very lucky indeed when you find the right one.

We've all heard the reasons why it's important to buy local food: the fuel saved in transportation, the support of local farmers.  But there are other reasons to seek out locally-run businesses: it helps shore up a sense of place against the generic predictability of a franchise, which after all is about getting the same experience every time. A specificity of place is just good for the soul. The archetypal psychologist James Hillman says that the soul needs to be able to hide in complications, in the nooks and crannies of the specific rather than the gleaming generic spaces so common in modern life.

Want to help save the magic of books in your area?  Find an independent bookstore near you. Or, consider creating your own haven for books like the Chicago Underground Library. Increase the availability of used (and loved) books in circulation as an alternative to new ones: join one of the many online book swap groups.  However you choose to do it, honor imagination and the spaces where it grows.