英语书籍：The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop（The End）
=====TODAY'S BOOK=====================
THE YELLOW-LIGHTED BOOKSHOP
A Memoir, A History
by Lewis Buzbee (nonfiction)
Published by Graywolf Press
ISBN: 9781555975104
Copyright (c) 2006 by Lewis Buzbee
YELLOW (Part 5 of 5)
======================================
(continued from Thursday)
Leaving at dusk that day, I stopped to say good night to Greta. She
was sitting behind the long front counter, against the tall windows
that looked out on the covered walkway and the parking lot. She
asked to see Steinbeck's "King Arthur" again, and cooed over it.
"God d amn it," she said. "It is beautiful." We stood there talking
for the longest time. Greta Ray was a complete surprise to me,
certainly the type of person I'd never expected to meet. She was
close to my mother's age, I knew that, late generation World War II,
but far from the stereotypical housewife of my limited experience. I
would have called Greta a hippie then, in 1976, with all of that
word's positive connotations, but bohemian might be more apt. I had
grown up in a military family, traditional and working class; Greta
had lived the kind of life I thought existed only in books.
She had short peppery hair, the reddish complexion and angular
beauty of a native American, and startling blue eyes. She wore the
authentic hippie attire of northern California: blue jeans,
sometimes with patches; peas-ant blouses; Birkenstocks before they
got a bad rap. She also wore funky pieces of silver jewelry her
hu*****and made for her out of pre-war Australian quarters. Her
hu*****and, Jack, was a professor of logic, a writer, painter, and
flutist. I learned they had met in beachside L.A. in the late 1940s,
part of a glamorous crowd into jazz and sports cars. They had smoked
marijuana in the fifties and were early opponents of the war in
Vietnam. They were thrilled to be in the audience when Dylan went
electric. Their children attended a very alternative school called
Daybreak. Real paintings hung in their house, among them Jack's
"Logicians Dancing." Greta thought the Kinks were the greatest rock
band in the world.
She was also the most learned, voracious reader I had ever met, and
while raising her kids, and helping to write and edit Jack's papers,
Greta worked in bookstores. Her first job was at Buffum's Department
Store in Long Beach, California, in 1949. She had been working
across the street at a music store, but visited Buffum's basement
lending library so often they finally gave her a job. She had also
worked at Smith's Acres of Books, Iowa Book and Supply, Kit's, and
later, Printer's Inc. She'd been at Upstart Crow for five years when
I met her.
Greta and I had talked a couple of times when I was still a customer
at the store. During my freshman year in college, I discovered a
first book of stories by the still unknown Raymond Carver. I
borrowed and devoured "Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?" from the
college library, and unable to find the book elsewhere in San Jose
over winter break, I special ordered it from Greta, who knew the
book and talked at length about this writer I assumed I alone had
discovered.
Later, when I started at Crow, after having served my time as a
temporary shelving apprentice (something akin to a cabin boy), my
head now filled with thousands of new titles and authors, I was
rewarded with regular shifts and began to spend more time with
Greta, who taught me about the cash register, the inventory system,
customer service and special orders, the proper way to display a
table or stuff a shelf, and it would turn out, much that was not
included in the employee handbook.
For the first couple of years, Greta and I worked the night shift,
which is a different country indeed. We'd arrive at four in the
afternoon and leave near midnight after closing and cleaning up.
Most of the ordering and shelving was done by the day managers, and
for the two clerks on the night shift, the task was to keep the
store open and running. Without the busier work, we had time to
enjoy the space.
The coffee bar was set into the back of the brightly lit bookshop,
and behind it, lay the darker grotto of the coffeehouse's
constellation of tables. I always dropped into work early to scoot
behind the bar for a cup of Sumatra, chatting with the barristas,
students like myself, but whose style tended to be punkier than the
bookstore staff's--dyed hair, multiple earrings, thrift-store black.
I'd chat with some of the regulars at the bar and peer into the
coffeehouse to see who might be back there, maybe Chess Guy or Tarot
Lady. A lot of regulars came in every day for months or years at a
stretch. They came at prescribed times, stayed for hours, and while
we might talk to them daily, we might never know their real names.
The most regular of the regulars at this time was Zoltan, a
thirtyish fellow of seemingly independent means, who spent seven or
eight hours a day in the coffeehouse. He kept undisclosed notes in a
fat binder and was inclined to discuss issues of social philosophy
rather than the weather. Zoltan was still an everyday fixture at
Crow when the store closed ten years later, and we can only assume
he found a new home-away-from-home.
There were also the drop-ins and the semi-regulars, all seated at
the wrought-iron and wood tables in captain's chairs or rattan
thrones. Dim spotlights, heaps of open books and newspapers, a
rather lazy mood to it all. The bookstore and the coffeehouse are
natural allies; neither has a time limit, slowness is encouraged.
On her stool behind the front counter in the evenings, Greta would
be going through the special orders, sipping her coffee, smoking a
never-ending cigarette, and cursing the inability of most of
humanity to fill out a simple form. We'd play records we'd brought
in from home; Greta took me through the jazz catalogue to start
with, my first tastes of Miles, Coltrane, Bird. We'd ring up a few
customers, answer the phone, enjoy the lull.
Coffee finished, I'd wander off to straighten the store, a perpetual
chore (although Sisyphus never had it this good), and by the start
of the evening rush, the store was tamed and ordered, all
possibility, ready to get trashed again.
The rest of the shift was devoted to helping people find books. A
simple enough proposition, mind you, and frequently customers did
have the exact information and only needed to be guided to the
proper shelf and alphabet. At other times, finding the right title
could be like constructing an ancient religion from a single
artifact. Who could guess that "Roger the Sorcerer" was code for
"Roget's Thesaurus?"
No matter how roundabout the path, it's always satisfying to put the
right book in the right hands, but the real thrill in bookselling is
to put the right book into unsuspecting hands. Because I found her
name enchanting, I still remember Victoria Mcllvrag, one of the
first customers I ever surprised with a book. Today I don't remember
much about her, except that she wore a brown raincoat and was always
with her young son. The first time we met, she told me she had been
reading nothing but trashy best sellers--her words--and she loved to
read but wanted something new; she wanted to read about real women.
I led her to Fiction and handed her a blue and silver copy of Eudora
Welty's "The Optimist's Daughter." Ms. Mcllvrag looked at the book
with some skepticism, but bought it anyway, and came back the next
week asking for more by Ms. Welty, please, and anything else I cared
to recommend.
After the rush, Greta and I would redo the shelves for the last hour
or so, then close the store at eleven, and draw ourselves a glass of
Anchor Steam beer before we counted and deposited the money. We
would sweep and clean, yelling to each other across the loud music
we played, Neil Young or Genesis or whatever album we'd discovered
that week.
On one of those first nights, after closing, listening to Getz and
Gilberto, Greta presented me with three books, and said sternly,
"Now, god d amn it, Lewis, be quiet and listen to me. You have to
read these books, and that's all there is to it." She gave me
William Faulkner's "The Sound and the Fury," "The Essays of E.B.
White," and "Higglety Piggelty Pop" by Maurice Sendak. Just like
that, three entire worlds opened up for me, and thirty years later
I'm still reading these writers, their worlds still moving through
me. "Besides," she said then, pointing to the books, "just look at
them, they're gorgeous."
The coffeehouse was shut up, the parking lot a tundra, and Greta and
I often stayed too late, loading new records, jumping from one
section to another with books in hand, our enthusiasms wagging their
furry tails. We were quite happy there, alone together among our
books.
The conversation we began that night has continued for thirty years
now. Greta and I worked together forty hours a week for the first
ten years--four years at Upstart Crow and six at Printers Inc. in
Palo Alto. She saw me through my education, my first marriage, my
first madness, the subsequent madnesses, my second marriage, the
birth of my daughter. At various junctures I've lived with Greta and
her family, sleeping on the couch or floor. We've mourned her
hu*****and, her dearest friend, and her youngest son. While our
friendship has gone well beyond our love of books, that love has
always been central, and at least for us, it's impossible to find
any boundary between books and life in the world. Today, we see each
other maybe six times a year, but talk on the phone once or twice a
week. When she calls, it's always morning and she's already
breathless. "Have you read...?"
*****************
Paperback: Today's read ends on page 25.
=====TODAY'S BOOK=====================
THE YELLOW-LIGHTED BOOKSHOP
A Memoir, A History
by Lewis Buzbee (nonfiction)
Published by Graywolf Press
ISBN: 9781555975104
Copyright (c) 2006 by Lewis Buzbee
YELLOW (Part 5 of 5)
======================================
(continued from Thursday)
Leaving at dusk that day, I stopped to say good night to Greta. She
was sitting behind the long front counter, against the tall windows
that looked out on the covered walkway and the parking lot. She
asked to see Steinbeck's "King Arthur" again, and cooed over it.
"God d amn it," she said. "It is beautiful." We stood there talking
for the longest time. Greta Ray was a complete surprise to me,
certainly the type of person I'd never expected to meet. She was
close to my mother's age, I knew that, late generation World War II,
but far from the stereotypical housewife of my limited experience. I
would have called Greta a hippie then, in 1976, with all of that
word's positive connotations, but bohemian might be more apt. I had
grown up in a military family, traditional and working class; Greta
had lived the kind of life I thought existed only in books.
She had short peppery hair, the reddish complexion and angular
beauty of a native American, and startling blue eyes. She wore the
authentic hippie attire of northern California: blue jeans,
sometimes with patches; peas-ant blouses; Birkenstocks before they
got a bad rap. She also wore funky pieces of silver jewelry her
hu*****and made for her out of pre-war Australian quarters. Her
hu*****and, Jack, was a professor of logic, a writer, painter, and
flutist. I learned they had met in beachside L.A. in the late 1940s,
part of a glamorous crowd into jazz and sports cars. They had smoked
marijuana in the fifties and were early opponents of the war in
Vietnam. They were thrilled to be in the audience when Dylan went
electric. Their children attended a very alternative school called
Daybreak. Real paintings hung in their house, among them Jack's
"Logicians Dancing." Greta thought the Kinks were the greatest rock
band in the world.
She was also the most learned, voracious reader I had ever met, and
while raising her kids, and helping to write and edit Jack's papers,
Greta worked in bookstores. Her first job was at Buffum's Department
Store in Long Beach, California, in 1949. She had been working
across the street at a music store, but visited Buffum's basement
lending library so often they finally gave her a job. She had also
worked at Smith's Acres of Books, Iowa Book and Supply, Kit's, and
later, Printer's Inc. She'd been at Upstart Crow for five years when
I met her.
Greta and I had talked a couple of times when I was still a customer
at the store. During my freshman year in college, I discovered a
first book of stories by the still unknown Raymond Carver. I
borrowed and devoured "Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?" from the
college library, and unable to find the book elsewhere in San Jose
over winter break, I special ordered it from Greta, who knew the
book and talked at length about this writer I assumed I alone had
discovered.
Later, when I started at Crow, after having served my time as a
temporary shelving apprentice (something akin to a cabin boy), my
head now filled with thousands of new titles and authors, I was
rewarded with regular shifts and began to spend more time with
Greta, who taught me about the cash register, the inventory system,
customer service and special orders, the proper way to display a
table or stuff a shelf, and it would turn out, much that was not
included in the employee handbook.
For the first couple of years, Greta and I worked the night shift,
which is a different country indeed. We'd arrive at four in the
afternoon and leave near midnight after closing and cleaning up.
Most of the ordering and shelving was done by the day managers, and
for the two clerks on the night shift, the task was to keep the
store open and running. Without the busier work, we had time to
enjoy the space.
The coffee bar was set into the back of the brightly lit bookshop,
and behind it, lay the darker grotto of the coffeehouse's
constellation of tables. I always dropped into work early to scoot
behind the bar for a cup of Sumatra, chatting with the barristas,
students like myself, but whose style tended to be punkier than the
bookstore staff's--dyed hair, multiple earrings, thrift-store black.
I'd chat with some of the regulars at the bar and peer into the
coffeehouse to see who might be back there, maybe Chess Guy or Tarot
Lady. A lot of regulars came in every day for months or years at a
stretch. They came at prescribed times, stayed for hours, and while
we might talk to them daily, we might never know their real names.
The most regular of the regulars at this time was Zoltan, a
thirtyish fellow of seemingly independent means, who spent seven or
eight hours a day in the coffeehouse. He kept undisclosed notes in a
fat binder and was inclined to discuss issues of social philosophy
rather than the weather. Zoltan was still an everyday fixture at
Crow when the store closed ten years later, and we can only assume
he found a new home-away-from-home.
There were also the drop-ins and the semi-regulars, all seated at
the wrought-iron and wood tables in captain's chairs or rattan
thrones. Dim spotlights, heaps of open books and newspapers, a
rather lazy mood to it all. The bookstore and the coffeehouse are
natural allies; neither has a time limit, slowness is encouraged.
On her stool behind the front counter in the evenings, Greta would
be going through the special orders, sipping her coffee, smoking a
never-ending cigarette, and cursing the inability of most of
humanity to fill out a simple form. We'd play records we'd brought
in from home; Greta took me through the jazz catalogue to start
with, my first tastes of Miles, Coltrane, Bird. We'd ring up a few
customers, answer the phone, enjoy the lull.
Coffee finished, I'd wander off to straighten the store, a perpetual
chore (although Sisyphus never had it this good), and by the start
of the evening rush, the store was tamed and ordered, all
possibility, ready to get trashed again.
The rest of the shift was devoted to helping people find books. A
simple enough proposition, mind you, and frequently customers did
have the exact information and only needed to be guided to the
proper shelf and alphabet. At other times, finding the right title
could be like constructing an ancient religion from a single
artifact. Who could guess that "Roger the Sorcerer" was code for
"Roget's Thesaurus?"
No matter how roundabout the path, it's always satisfying to put the
right book in the right hands, but the real thrill in bookselling is
to put the right book into unsuspecting hands. Because I found her
name enchanting, I still remember Victoria Mcllvrag, one of the
first customers I ever surprised with a book. Today I don't remember
much about her, except that she wore a brown raincoat and was always
with her young son. The first time we met, she told me she had been
reading nothing but trashy best sellers--her words--and she loved to
read but wanted something new; she wanted to read about real women.
I led her to Fiction and handed her a blue and silver copy of Eudora
Welty's "The Optimist's Daughter." Ms. Mcllvrag looked at the book
with some skepticism, but bought it anyway, and came back the next
week asking for more by Ms. Welty, please, and anything else I cared
to recommend.
After the rush, Greta and I would redo the shelves for the last hour
or so, then close the store at eleven, and draw ourselves a glass of
Anchor Steam beer before we counted and deposited the money. We
would sweep and clean, yelling to each other across the loud music
we played, Neil Young or Genesis or whatever album we'd discovered
that week.
On one of those first nights, after closing, listening to Getz and
Gilberto, Greta presented me with three books, and said sternly,
"Now, god d amn it, Lewis, be quiet and listen to me. You have to
read these books, and that's all there is to it." She gave me
William Faulkner's "The Sound and the Fury," "The Essays of E.B.
White," and "Higglety Piggelty Pop" by Maurice Sendak. Just like
that, three entire worlds opened up for me, and thirty years later
I'm still reading these writers, their worlds still moving through
me. "Besides," she said then, pointing to the books, "just look at
them, they're gorgeous."
The coffeehouse was shut up, the parking lot a tundra, and Greta and
I often stayed too late, loading new records, jumping from one
section to another with books in hand, our enthusiasms wagging their
furry tails. We were quite happy there, alone together among our
books.
The conversation we began that night has continued for thirty years
now. Greta and I worked together forty hours a week for the first
ten years--four years at Upstart Crow and six at Printers Inc. in
Palo Alto. She saw me through my education, my first marriage, my
first madness, the subsequent madnesses, my second marriage, the
birth of my daughter. At various junctures I've lived with Greta and
her family, sleeping on the couch or floor. We've mourned her
hu*****and, her dearest friend, and her youngest son. While our
friendship has gone well beyond our love of books, that love has
always been central, and at least for us, it's impossible to find
any boundary between books and life in the world. Today, we see each
other maybe six times a year, but talk on the phone once or twice a
week. When she calls, it's always morning and she's already
breathless. "Have you read...?"
*****************
Paperback: Today's read ends on page 25.
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