Last week’s installment vented more of the knock-on effects of the closing of hundreds of bricks-and-mortar bookshops, the transition from them to bookstore-chain bookstores to superstores that sold books to on-line selling of books via the juggernaut of all juggernauts: Amazon. As we’ve collectively brushed neighborhood bookshops aside we’ve lost another bit of the Commons and, with it, an instant source of bibliotherapy.
I might want to mention here the Frankfurt School leading light, Walter Benjamin. He wrote magnificently about the origins of art and art objects and their transformation under capitalism. He writes about books, too. He writes that art objects and books-as-objects provide object lessons about the fact and function of our human sensory perspectives that are “natural” and “biological” and “historical,” too. Think of the transition from physical book to Kindle, for example, from bindings, paper, glue, type-font and illustrations to a virtual download to an e-reader that requires batteries. Benjamin argues that art came from ritual and that ritual carried “auratic” qualities to its practitioners and participants, qualities that adhered to books, too.
So, Amazon. A bookselling buddy of mine, Eddy Nix, runs Driftless Books and Music, located in beautiful, downtown Viroqua, Wisconsin. Mr. Nix writes an annual, never-answered letter to Jeff Bezos, founder and C.E.O. of Amazon, a man so wealthy that, when a jury awarded his now-ex wife in settlement 25% of Amazon’s stock (estimated as worth thirty-eight billion dollars), he was still the wealthiest American. Anyway, Eddie writes “Dear Jeff, I hope this letter finds you well. I have not heard back from my latest missives, so I thought I would send another quick note.” He complains rightly of “the tightening hold [that] corporate power, exemplified by Amazon, is having on small town America” and on bookselling. He notes the 40% loss in numbers of independent bookshops since 1995. He writes, “I have suggested that you consider transferring ownership of this division to a multi-stakeholder cooperative composed of bookstores, libraries, authors, and readers. This cooperative would be dedicated to reversing the negative impact Amazon has had on the bibliographic ecosystem.” Like my reference to Walter Benjamin above, Eddie makes good use of the theories of Peter Lamborn Wilson whom he says explores “the subversive power of the [C]ommons [that] aligns with the cooperative's mission to reclaim the cultural and intellectual value of books.” He tacks on Hakim Bey's concept of “temporary autonomous zones” in which, he hopes, books can thrive outside of corporate control. Most subversively, Mr. Nix damns Mr. Bezos with the faint praise of a prediction that the latter could make a considerable contribution to literature by caving to his outrageously apt vision. . . before issuing him a challenge, a duel, in fact, or at least a debate insofar as Mr. Bezos might profane of physical contact.
Afraid of the “auratic” are we, Jeff?
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