More Book Burning at Prospero's Books

I blogged both here and elsewhere about the independant bookstore Prospero's Books in Kansas City, Mo. needing to get rid of books, and the signs of protest they were staging for the abandonment of thought in the US. Well, it looks like Tom Wayne, owner, is at it again, staging another book burning. I couldn't get the embed function to work for the current 10 second of coverage that KCTV posted, so here's the footage from the first book burning in May:

Did you see the title of that book burning? It was One Nation Under Television. How quaint. Here's the problem: I get the concept that your store is not doing well, and that you are trying to get rid of books. I understand your disgust that people won't take books for free (again, shocking, right? He can ship them to me, and I'll take them off his hands!) But the problem is, the man is mixing his messages. You can't whine about people not willing to take free books, and then when people offer to take them, say you want payment. Uh, what? Yeah. That's what Mr. Wayne is doing. Sure it would be great for him to get money for those books, but then what you need to do is to SELL THEM. Don't say you're trying to give them away (which, in itself, implies "free"), and then complain because people won't buy them.

Here's a clue: If they weren't buying them while they were sitting in your warehouse, then what makes you think they're going to buy them now? Especially after you just proved yourself an Indian Giver (wow, I now need to look up the origins of that phrase. I didn't even like typing it.). And for the love of all that is holy, do NOT burn books!! I watched that footage and actually had to calm my stomach! What's you're mentality? "Okay, if you don't buy this book I'm going to burn it!" That... You.... ~*seethe*~ You can't do that!

What is that proving? Yes, yes, you're lighting the funeral pyre for thought in America. You've said that already. But you said that in May of 07, and now it's September and you're doing it again. Same motive. To me that sounds like a publicity stunt. And publicity stunts at the expense of people who actually do read, makes them not like you, your transparent behavior and motivation to make money, or your store. I buy books. I buy a lot of books. I also have books sent to me for review, and I appreciate every last one that finds its way into my home. I had, at one point, considered contacting your store to purchase books--you know, back when I thought your publicity stunt was a genuinely motivated protest against the rampant anti-intellectualism in this country. But now? Now I'll go to the independant bookstores here in Pittsburgh, and Half Priced Books down the street. Thanks for saving me the time and effort.


~D.M. Papuga

Book Burning in Protest

So what do you do with thousands of books that you can’t give away for free? If you’re Tom Wayne, owner of the used book store Prospero’s Books in Kansas City, Mo., then you try and give them to libraries and thrift shops. When they won’t even take them, then you build a “funeral pyre for thought in America today.”

According to the AP, Wayne began burning the stockpile of roughly 20,000 books this past Sunday, and the blaze lasted ten minutes shy of a full hour when the Kansas City fire department put it out for lack of a permit. Apparently, Wayne plans to continue burning books until his warehouse stockpile is gone, and he plans to obtain a permit for the remaining fires.

But is this necessary? I mean, hells, I’ll take as many as you can ship! I’m a bibliophile (and if you don’t know what that means, then look it up, damnit!), as my Minute Lit partner in crime, Alex, can attest to. And I’ll admit that my reaction to the Publisher’s Weekly article on Wayne’s book burning protest to declining interest in books and reading in America sent a spasm into my jaw muscles. Burning books? It should be illegal (except, of course, if your city is under insane amounts of water and sub zero temperatures due to global warming, ala The Day After Tomorrow—but even they saved certain important books)! Isn’t that defeating the purpose? Didn’t anyone learn anything from Fahrenheit 451? But it certainly brought the issue to the attention of at least Kansas City, Mo., and now globally through various bloggers, and news sites. Maybe his pyromaniacal zest wasn’t so poorly thought out after all.

In the same article from the AP, they recount the 2002 study by the National Endowment for the Arts study that found that “less than half of adult respondents reported reading for pleasure, down from almost 57 percent in 1982.” Don’t be so shocked. I see it in the classroom every day, and things continue to get worse. I know I ranted about a student keeping a book I loaned him, but secretly I’m thrilled—as long as he’s reading it, that is. Along with the miserable instant gratification mentality that is so prevalent today (Thank you MTV for planting the seed of the poisoned apple…), people don’t enjoy reading. I have my own theory about this, and perhaps I’ll rant about it at a later date, but it has everything to do with the fact that people are rarely taught how to read more efficiently, or faster, and they linger in reading habits learned in grammar school, at the same speed. Who would want to read if it sounded like a 6 or 7 year old all the time? Nevertheless, Wayne raises an interesting dilemma in our society today. I’m a rare breed, and I’m aware of that. Perhaps that’s what drew me to English as a major and subject matter for scholarship. It’s certainly why I teach literature and writing. I hope that my passion for critical thinking, reading and using your imagination is contagious.

Strangely, a colleague of mine handed me an article today from the Wharton School of Business’s newsletter: “Dana Gioia on the Close Connection between Business and Poetry.” If the former vice president of General Foods, now the chairman for the National Endowment of the Arts since 2002, believes that literature and beauty in thought and writing is critical to business, then maybe there’s a silver lining to Mr. Wayne’s dark cloud of general ignorance after all.

~D.M. Papuga