The Uncensored Diary of a Bookseller — bookshop

I recently came into ownership of a first edition copy of Bookselling by Thomas Joy. This textbook for the bookseller has now fallen into obscurity, with only anoraks like me still vaguely interested. This one is of more interest however, as it carries two inscriptions of note for a bookseller like me. The first is a signature from the author made out to Doreen Enright, with the legend, ‘all good wishes for happy bookselling.’ This is dated April 23rd 1955. The second description is ‘John Jackson, from Doreen Jackson 1978.’ This would seem to be the now married and elder...

“God’s make their own importance” – Patrick Kavanagh   The Cribber Kelly has mounted a one woman protest against St Patricks Day outside the bookshop. The Cribber claims that St Patricks Day has become an excuse for the rest of the world to culturally misappropriate the very worst stereotypes of Irishness – leprechauns, drunkenness, brown paper envelopes, etc.   “I see the Cribber is at it again,” Flash says, staring out the window, making no attempt to hide his nosiness. “Last week it was the refugees she was moaning about, week before it was misogyny. Hard to keep up.”  ...

Mosley is after getting himself hired as a sensitivity reader for Puffin. It’s a freelance job, now very much in demand, as legacy publishing houses scurry to scrub out anything even remotely offensive from their back catalogue.   “I’m a very sensitive person Wally,” Mosley tells me, as he runs around the bookshop waving a permanent marker menacingly at vintage paperbacks. “I was the first person in school to have a gay pen pal you know. A big fan of Chris De Burgh he was and I didn’t hold it against him. Sure, I stopped replying to his letters for...

“Torch every book. Burn every page. Char every word to ash. Ideas are incombustible. And therein lies your real fear." ― Ellen Hopkins Papa John the self-proclaimed great African Mystic wanders into the bookshop, shouting into his camera phone about ether spirits in a thick, badly put on Nigerian accent. When the call ends, he reverts to his own Wexford town lingo. “Alright sahn, what’s the crack?” “How’s business John?” “That’s Papa John there brudder. Don’t ruin me rep. I have eighteen clients now getting hexes and love potions and rain dances. All sorts of auld nonsense. Paying the bills...

“If he was indeed mad, his delusions were beautifully organized.”- Arthur C. Clarke, 2001: A Space OdysseyPockets sits on the shop window sill trying to beat the lid off a bent tin of quality street with a stick. He reminds me of one of the ragged hominids in 2001 inspired to use clubs to beat the hell out of wild game, and then each other, by a giant alien monolith. He manages to get rid of the lid and fills his pockets with the precious cargo as I open the shutters to another grey miserable day. January is depression incarnate,...