The Haunted Bookshop

Narrative

of Doctor of Letters by a Leading University," and it presented so many alluring possibilities that Roger's mind always wandered from the paper into entranced visions of his imagined scene. He loved to build up in fancy the flattering details of that fine ceremony when bookselling would at last be properly recognized as o

ve of reasonable letters into countless thousands; to whom, and to whose colleagues, amid the perishable caducity of human affairs, is largely due th

the garlanded bibliopole turning to the expectant audience, giving his trailing gown a deft rearward kick as the ladies do on the stage, and uttering, without hesitation or embarrassment, with due interpolation of graceful pleasantry, that learned and unlaboured discourse on the delights of bookishness that he had often dreamed of. Then

imagine a great map of New York State, with the daily location of each travelling Parnassus marked by a coloured pin. He dreamed of himself, sitting in some vast central warehouse of second-hand books, poring over his map like a military chief of staff and forwarding cases of literary ammunition to various bases where his vans would re-stock. His idea was that his travelling salesmen could be recrui

valley. The original Parnassus, a quaint old blue wagon in which Roger had lived and journeyed and sold books over several thousand miles of country roads in the days before his marriage, was now housed i

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ng Street

er 30,

AR AN

ritten no letters at all. Like everyone else I am thinking constantly of this new peace that has marvellously come upon us. I trust we may have statesmen who will be able to turn it to the benefit of humanity. I wish there could be an

he War. I fear it would have bowled him over. He thought that this is not a world "that sensitive and timid natures

poem-old George Herbert's

use sometimes

; see what thy

thy chest, for

nd down what th

these days! The sudden and amazing turnover in human affairs, dramatic beyond anything in history, already seems to be taken as a matter of course. My great fear is that

is not very good at "elucidating" anything!) I have heard somewhere or other that this is one of Wilson's favourite books, and indeed, there is much of the Cromwell in him. With what a grim, covenanting zeal he took up the sword when at last it was forced into his hand! And I have been thinking that what he will say to the Peace Conference will s

he squarely push

conclusion in

oing to win. I feel the whole current

who might reasonably be supposed to be pretty tired in body and soul! When that book comes out I'll spend the rest of my life in selling it. I ask nothing better! Speaking of Wordsworth, I've often wondered whether Woodrow hasn't got some poems concealed somewhe

oth eat thy ca

n

ue: nothing c

eeds it most, gr

perhaps A book in which the tempest-shaken soul of the race will speak out as it never has before. The Bible, you know, is rather a disappointment: it has never done for humanity what it should have done. I wonder why? Walt Whitman is going to do a great deal, but he is not quite what I mean. There is something coming-I do

's soul superb in its own free azure-but helpless, insulted, ugly, clumsy when striving to

ts' tastes! But later on, after we have had our evening cocoa and Helen has gone to bed, I prowl about the place, dipping into this and that, fuddling myself with speculation. How clear and bright the stream of the mind flows in those late hours, after all the sediment and floating trash of the day has drained off! Sometimes I

all alike unfortunate? Suffering is universal; hands are outstretched to each other, and when they touch … the great so

nd someone comes along and picks your pocket.… I suppose we must

, for instance, has been largely determined by the books Wilson has read since he first began to think! If

r my customers to ponder. It was written by Charles Sorley, a young Eng

GER

ke us. Your hurt

med the conques

through fields of

nd we do not

your future b

pering paths o

her's dearest

e. And the blind

ace, then we

eyes each oth

own more lovin

hands and laugh

ce. But until

nd the thunder

le desolation men MUST rise to some new conception of national neighbourhood. I hear so much apprehension that Germany won't be punished sufficiently for her crime. But how can any punishment be devised or imposed for such a huge panorama of sorrow? I think she has already punished herself horribly, an

human heart you find some sorrow, some frustration, some lurking pang. I often think of Lafcadio Hearn's story of his Japanese cook. Hearn was talking of the Japanese habit of not showing their emotions on their faces. His cook was a smiling, healthy, agreeable-looking young fellow whose face was always cheerful. Then one day, by chance, Hearn happened to look through a hole in the wall and saw

mind appears suddenly and inexplicably out of some unknown and unimaginable void. It passes half its known life in the mental chaos of sleep. Even when awake it is a victim of its own ill-adjustment, of disease, of age, of external suggestion, of nature's compulsions; it doubts its own sensations and trusts only in instruments and average

ne stainless and unimpeachable achievement of the human race. It saddens me to think that I shall have to die with thousands of books unread that would have given me noble and unblemished happiness. I will tell you a secr

g man along at an ever-increasing rate so that he will either solve all her problems or else die of fever in the effort. But Adams' candid portrait of a mind grappling helplessly with its riddles is so triumphantly delightful tha

ingly must an angel from heaven smile on a poor human sitting engrossed in a romance: angled upon his hams, motionless in his chair, spe

tice bookseller. It's a quaint idea, done at the request of her father, Mr. Chapman, the proprietor of Chapman's Daintybits which you see advertised everywhere. He is a great booklover, and is very eager to have the zeal transmitted to his daughter. So you can imagine my glee to have a neophyte of my own to preach books

you like Erewhon? It's pretty near closing tim

rs

R MI