Chapter 146 Fishing For Books, Part 2

Here’s the rest of the article I recently wrote for BookThink on scouting for and finding saleable books. Part 1 is here, in case you missed it. You might notice that some of Part 2 comes from an old blog post I did on this topic; I think the information is germane to the topic and worth repeating. Enjoy!

PART TWO
As I wandered the booths of the fair in San Francisco, I realized that if people are going to buy books from me instead of one of the other 200 sellers there, I had to do several things: offer books no one else was offering, offer books in the best possible condition, and offer books at a fair price.

First, I specialize in a field not already dominated by a dozen other booksellers and I know my specialties. I currently specialize in illustrated and unusual books by Dante Alighieri and in books written by or about American women in the 19th century, most of them pioneers. I chose my specialties primarily because these are subjects I love, and as a former high school English teacher, also studied and taught. I have better luck selling what I know and I expect to know more the more that I sell. I have taken the time to educate myself about the best books in my field. Who wrote them? What are their titles? What do they look like? Could I recognize one if it were found on the bottom of a heap of other books in a box?

I also buy /invest in bibliographies relevant to my areas of specialty. I read those repeatedly and also read other dealer catalogues on the subjects to improve my knowledge of what’s out there. That way, when I go “out there”, I know a bit about what I seek – titles, authors, editions. Additionally, I learn what characteristics will help me identify a book in the field previously unknown to me – names of significant people who wrote about Dante, artists who illustrated the Dante, or titles of books about places where pioneers settled, to give a few examples.

Secondly, I try to buy books in my subject area in the best condition I can afford. One thing I realized while looking at the books offered by other booksellers at the fair is something I had heard many times before but that didn’t register completely until I was at the fair: Condition is paramount. After seeing the books of 200 booksellers displayed right next to each other, I really understood this concept. If you are selling books at a fair with 200 dealers, chances are that someone else may be offering the same book or type of books as you. The factor that usually makes the difference in selling that book is better condition. The same is true when selling books on the internet. If a collector wants to purchase a book that has 12 copies listed for sale online, chances are he’ll buy the one in the best condition. Condition matters.

When I saw the range of books offered at the San Francisco fair, I resolved to quit buying those tempting books with a few flaws I come across every so often, like the first edition that sells for many hundreds of dollars in fine condition, but since my copy needs to have the front board re-attached, it will be worth significantly – no, exponentially — less. I don’t know why I continue to stockpile such books. I think that sometimes I become so excited to find a particular title that I don’t care about condition. If I find the title in question, I’ll buy it. Unless the book is truly rare – as in no other copies offered for sale in the last 100 years — all this leaves me with, really, is money poorly spent and books with flaws when there are plenty of fine books available. I concluded from my book fair observations that I would be better off spending my money on acquiring only a couple of fine books than I would spending my money on a dozen good books.

I also try to offer my books at a fair price, based on the current market value of the book, how much work I put into researching and describing the book, and based on making more than I paid for the book. This means that I have to acquire the books at a good price in the first place, which really means I have to be creative when hunting for books.

Where, then, to scout for saleable books?

Start with the ubiquitous estate sales and library sales. You won’t find hundreds of volumes of good material at one time, but these sales are excellent places to start. Library sales give a new bookseller a chance to see books of all editions and all conditions. It was at a library sale that I saw enough book club editions of books that I began to learn how to distinguish most of them from a real first edition. You won’t see any book club editions (at least I hope you won’t) in a true antiquarian bookshop, so it’s hard to learn if that’s the only place you shop. It was also at a library sale that I learned to differentiate condition — a good from a very good, a very good from a near fine, and a near fine from a fine book. Seeing the wide range of conditions on so many books helped me to know to know the difference. A library sale will add volumes to your education as a bookseller, if not to your bookshelves.

Don’t despair that you see a lot of dreck at most library sales (and you will see a lot of dreck). The term book hunter suggests that we must know the dross from the gold. If you are new to book collecting or bookselling, you need first to learn to recognize the dross in order to separate it from the gold. Once you attend the same sale a few months in a row, you will get pretty good at this and no longer feel like you aren’t seeing anything saleable at your library book sale. Also, if you inadvertently purchase some “mistakes”, you won’t have broken the bank to do so. When these mistakes happen to me, I chalk it up to “bookseller’s tuition”, the price I pay to learn to be a good bookseller.

When you’re confident at a library or an estate sale, start scouting your local historical society. Many of these organizations hold regular sales. Mine even has an open used book shop. I was once lucky enough to find books and ephemera donated to the historical society that have the bookplate of a prominent California historian, and that added somewhat to their already saleable value.

Another place I shop frequently is the open (and/or online) shop of my fellow booksellers. A very valuable part of my bookselling education has been to get to know other booksellers. Once you have some basic knowledge, it is worth your time to cultivate a relationship with more experienced sellers. I now know a few well enough that they’ll buy a particular book with me in mind, hoping they can sell it to me. I’ve also been able to supply a couple of booksellers whose likes and dislikes I’ve gotten to know. Sometimes they will offer me a book at a low price because it is a book outside of their own specialty and they want to get their money out of it and devote that money to another book within their specialty.

If you can’t exhibit at a book fair, attend one instead. Some of my best buys have been from other booksellers at book fairs. A book fair can offer 50 or more booksellers in one location, or in the case of San Francisco, 200 sellers. Frequently, sellers offer books at fairs that they do not offer online or in their shops. You can also occasionally find deals among booksellers looking to sell off books they acquired that aren’t a part of their specialty. They are wonderful places to scout and to meet your fellow booksellers in person.

I do go to the occasional book auction, though I don’t often find bargains there. Still, I learn a lot about what makes a book sell. It comes back to condition nearly every time. I also buy some books on ebay, but not unless I know a lot about the book I’m about to purchase. There’s nothing worse than a seller purporting to have a first edition and then seeing the actual book and finding out it’s a book club edition. Better to know the points of issue ahead of time and figure out for yourself if the book is actually a first. I’m wary of signed books sold on ebay, too. It’s just too hard to determine authenticity in most situations. Still, when you know what you want and you’ve done your homework, you can find interesting books there.

Purchasing an entire estate of books may also lead to some good finds, but, if like, me you are a new bookseller, take care to research how to evaluate and negotiate such a deal. I’ve purchased such an estate once before and it was a good experience for me and for the seller, but I asked the advice of more experienced booksellers as to the protocol of housecalls before I agreed to look at the customer’s books.

Finally, read Larry McMurtry’s entertaining novel, Cadillac Jack. It’s a fun read and is a great portrayal of the mindsets of collectors and sellers, even though the characters in the book are neither booksellers nor book collectors. The narrator, Cadillac Jack, repeats a mantra when he is looking to buy items he can resell later: “Anything can be anywhere.” I have discovered that, more important than where one hunts for books, is the attitude with which one hunts for books. I have had some of my best book finds when shopping while employing Cadillac Jack’s “anything can be anywhere” motto. When you find a saleable book, the main thing is to pay attention to how your own knowledge will help you sell this book, to condition, and to the price you pay for the book.

Chapter 145 Gone Fishing . . . for Books

Please accept my apologies for not blogging Friday. Huck was a bit under the weather, though he seems all better now. We spent the weekend coloring Easter Eggs and trying to finish painting the stripes on one wall in a bedroom. I must confess that, despite our bold plan, the painting is not going well. Though we meticulously taped off the areas to be painted in the striped colors, the paint bled under the tape and the edges of each stripe are smudged. We are still deciding the best way to remedy the situation. I could be disappointed. Instead, I choose to believe that it is confirmation that I am intended to be an antiquarian bookseller instead of a housepainter.

What was I thinking?

These smudges have to be fixed!

Tom and Huck have this week off of school, so blogging will be light as we fit in a few fun activities. I’ll resume my normal pace once they resume their normal schedules. Thanks for understanding.

Tom and Huck with Easter Baskets on their heads, getting into a bit of Easter mischief despite my best efforts to make them wear “dress up clothes” today.

Meanwhile, here is Part 1 of my most recent BookThink article. In an effort to break the reading into manageable chunks, I’ll post Part 2 tomorrow.

BECOMING AN ANTIQUARIAN BOOKSELLER:
SCOUTING AND FINDING SALEABLE BOOKS
By Chris Lowenstein

I recently exhibited at the San Francisco Antiquarian Book, Print, and Paper Fair. It’s a large fair with over 200 booksellers showing off and selling their best books and ephemera. Someone new to book collecting and bookselling might wonder where these sellers find their inventory — most of it varied, interesting, and in great condition. Though the ability to market and sell your books is key to succeeding as an antiquarian bookseller, perhaps more important is the ability to find good books. Scratch that. Good books are everywhere. What’s most important is honing your ability to recognize and acquire the best books in the best condition at the best price. This is an infinitely more challenging task, and one of the most exciting parts of the job of an antiquarian bookseller.

A new bookseller might ask, “How do you know when you’ve found a saleable book?” The simplicity of the question belies the complexity of its answer. Author, illustrator, title, subject, edition, condition, binding — all these things and less have attracted me to the books I’ve acquired and later sold. Sometimes I buy a book because it’s the first edition by a well-known author. Sometimes I buy a book because it is the first written account of a significant historical event, or because it offers a different perspective than most of the other accounts of an historical event. Perhaps it’s a much-loved illustrator or a beautiful binding that attracts me, content notwithstanding. Perhaps it’s a book completely outside of my field of specialty, but it’s in fine condition.

Just as it’s difficult to pin down the definitive characteristics of an antiquarian bookseller, it’s difficult to pin down what kind of book is best for an antiquarian bookseller to sell. Like true beauty — or dare I say –pornography, I just know a saleable book when I see it, and based on my knowledge of a particular author, genre, or subject, its value is sometimes in the eye of the beholder. Perhaps the best strategy a new bookseller can take is to learn what knowledge we need to recognize books that we can sell.

To be continued tomorrow . ..

See you in the stacks!

Chapter 143 Susan Halas with Advice for Newcomers in the Book Biz

I’ve sung the praises of the Bibliophile email list in the past. If you’re not already on the list, it is a good place to read the range of opinions of booksellers and book collectors on a variety of topics. Just the other day bookseller Susan Halas had a post on this list which I think is a good read. She has granted me permission to reprint it in its entirety. I hope you find it useful, too. I am always appreciative when other booksellers share their perspective. Thanks, Susan, for sharing the benefit of your experience!

Message: 1
Date: Mon, 17 Mar 2008 05:58:07 -1000
From: “Susan Halas”
Subject: [b] info Advice to Newcomers in Book Biz (long repost)
To:
Message-ID:
Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=”iso-8859-1″;
reply-type=original

Aloha Bibs,

This is a LONG re post. Some of you have read some or all of it before. I have requests for re-post so here it is again.

For what its worth, this some basic advice learned from my parents who were both dealers for more than 50 years and who made a pretty good living in the pre internet antiquarian, scholarly and out of print book trade.

For the record I am now 64 years old and have been working in the book biz since I could sit upright and hold a pencil which is just about the time my folks started their shop.

Much of what I know about books I learned from my Dad, MJ (Jock) Netzorg who was a noted antiquarian specialist, historian and collector and co-owner of the Cellar Book Shop in Detroit, Michigan. I learned it by going with him on his buying expeditions from the time I was a little girl in the 1940s until he died in 1996. I also learned it from my Mom who was concerned about things like invoices, packing, going to the post office, issuing catalogs and dealing with customers and libraries

My mother, the equally great Petra F. (Pete) Netzorg, was in charge of making sure at least half of what my Dad bought went out the door for money on a regular basis. My mother handled the sales, but my father wrote the blurbs and set the price.

My father was a wonderful teacher, he had a tremendous memory, he’d spent his life in the dark moldy basements of places like Goodwill Industries in the days when they just piled the books to the ceiling, and he never met a distressed but worthy tome he didn’t like. Lucky for me (and by extension my fellow bibs) that everything he said has turned out to not only be true, but profitable.

So for some of you who are starting out, or didn’t have the living incarnation of all book biz knowledge sitting next to you at dinner on a
regular basis, here are some of the things he told me, that have served me well.

1. What you pay for something has nothing to do with what it is worth. Zero, Nada, Zip! THIS IS THE MAIN RULE. Engrave it on your brain.

Over the past years I’ve seen a lot of posts expressing indignation that someone would ask top dollar for merchandise acquired for pennies.
But my Dad’s first rule was there is absolutely no relationship between the two. Once it’s yours, YOU assign the value. The more you know the more you see the more you touch the more likely it is you’ll find bargains.

2. TOUCH IT — It’s easy to fool your eyes, but it’s hard to fool your fingers. In the centuries of printing, papermaking and binding there have been many attractive reproductions and facsimiles. It’s hard to spot them visually, but you can almost always tell by touch. The difference between a wood pulp and a rag paper is obvious to yourfingers, same with letterpress vs. offset. So feel it, touch it, smell it — all these are better indicators of how old something is than what it looks like.

3 If it was considered beautiful once, it will be considered beautiful again.

This means taste goes in cycles, so while for the longest time you couldn’t give away Elbert Hubbard’s Roycroft material or people took
their Mission style furniture to the dump Guess what, both of these are back, and many other genres fit this model..

Next time you see odd stuff and you can not understand why on earth anyone would have ever wanted them, look again and think if maybe a few years from now this era will be in vogue again. The more horrible it looks, the more likely it will come back.

4. Invest in the 19th century.

My dad thought the 19th century was the great undervalued under rated era. So much happened, so much was invented, discovered and explored especially by Americans; but during the 20th century most of the snootier dealers thought the 19th century, especially the LATE 19th century was junk.

There is an awful lot of junk there, to be sure, but there is also some spectacular and wonderful stuff. I buy the 19th century and early 20th
century any chance I get and I don’t much care about condition.

5. Which brings us to the corollary - If it’s NON FICTION — condition doesn’t count — what counts is — Is it all there or mostly all there?

My dad was an expert in buying good books in bad condition, sometimes falling apart, sometimes without covers, sometimes scribbled or stained or water damaged or wormed, and in the fullness of time those defects became a lot less important–especially if the books had wonderful maps or plates or pioneering science, anthropology, or exploration, all highlights of the late 19th century.

There’s always been quite a bit of discussion about BREAKING books, so here for the record is his take on things. My dad wasn’t big on breaking, but he did think there was a difference between ripping the plates out of a book or magazine and taking it apart carefully and saving it in sections so it could be useful to a wide variety people with a variety of tastes and interests. So while you might not want a whole bound volume of Appletons or Harpers or the Bookman, or National Geo. you might very well want that one page with the ad for Darwin’s Origin of the Species, or the color plates by Maxfield Parrish, or the short story by Joseph Conrad, or the picture article of the Pan American Clipper on it’s first trans Pacific flight .

He also was one of several of the prior generation who pointed out to me that the invention of “binding” was a relatively recent development.
This was amply confirmed later in my life when I got more deeply into 18th century prints and maps and learned that for the longest time many important works were issued as loose sheets. Especially those with plates and maps.

That’s because people with enough money to buy these usually expensive works had their own ideas about how they should be put together. Some of them followed the printers instructions on placement of the plates and maps, but some of them didn’t and kept them loose to hang in the old baronial digs or bind (or not bind) as the fancy suited them.

So before you wring your hands over the evil book breakers just remember that most of the older good stuff really started life unbound — text and plates were printed on separate presses by different methods and onlycame together at the binders and only because it was cheaper to make one volume than to bind the text and box the plates (the really right way to do it according to the truly snooty end of the antiquarian trade).

Now — when we come to the second half of the 19th century — you are often doing the book a favor by taking it apart, because by the mid-late 19th century the paper used in making books changed from rag based to wood pulp based and the wood pulp paper is so heavily acidic that it often ate (or is right this second eating) through the pictures and everything else it touches, also the printing ink was/is so thick and black that it frequently offsets onto everythng it touches, that’s when the whole sheet isn’t crumbling in your hand.

And while I wouldn’t advise taking stuff apart in each and every case, there are definitely some instances you are doing yourself, the book and the collecting public a favor by taking it carefully apart. Please notice the word CAREFULLY.

Please hold the flames on this view, I know some of you think differently — this is my own and my dad’s opinion. and trust me, after nearly 30 years in my own business that’s the way it is.

6. Always look for value, especially check the EPHEMERA pile at fairs, at shops, at 2nd hand stores, on line, check the junk.

OK, some of you aren’t sure what ephemera is. Ephemera is misc. odd bits of paper, scraps like labels, pamphlets, broadsheets, handout, ads, news letters, all those little scraps of stuff. Most book dealers have a box or many boxes stashed somewhere because they don’t know what it is and they wish someone else would take it away.

That stuff that the other person doesn’t want, is often a gold mine for somebody else. Here’s an example. When I was back in Detroit a few
years ago I only got a little time to shop so I treated myself to the big Lansing book show, where I bought one small baggie of ephemera. Total weight less than 2 oz and I got change from a $10 bill.

The bag was stuffed with antique ephemera consisting of about a hundred cartoons by Thomas Nast, and other illustrators of the period all
carefully clipped from Harper’s of the 1880’s. They were all original issue, in great shape and most signed in the plate Th. Nast. The dealer I
bought it from was glad to see it go. He’d had it for a long time.

It was one of my most rewarding acquisitions. It included Nast caricatures of Oscar Wilde and other literary figures of the day as they looked to Nast — the quintessential irreverent American.

It was gold mine of stereotypes — Asians, Indians, Blacks, Immigrants, Mormons, as viewed in the 19th century.There was also a ton of NYC politics and law, as well as Jumbo the Elephant — a Nast favorite that later became the symbol of the Republican party, and there were even a few Nast drawings of Santa Claus another Nast contribution to the popular genre.

The hard part was not what it cost, the real challenge was to catalog take the pix and describe it well, and of course to decide what it was/is worth. I’ve spent many many hours on that little bag. I learned a lot.

I like the 19th century even more because of the time spent on researching those cartoons. I got my money back the first time I posted to this list and many times more since then. So, by me ephemera is good, it’s scarcer than books, usually worth more, doesn’t take up much space and can often be purchased for a low price.

See Rule #1 — what you pay is no indicator of what it’s worth

7. Know your printing processes, inks and papers.

It is impossible to know everything there is to know about books and prints and maps and photos, but you can easily get a pretty solid grip on the different printing processes: relief, intaglio (engraving, etching, drypoint), stone litho, photo mechanical, real photo with emulsion, offset, and now computer or digital generated print and images.

The better you understand the look and feel of each of these processes the better you will be able to judge the approx. issue DATE of issue of the many things that will pass through your hands. The more you TOUCH the more you fingers will be able to spot the difference in what the paper and printed surfaces FEEL like. These are the best indicators of the age and it’s not that hard to get the hang of it.

8 OLD is relative. The USA is a young country. So old for us, is 18th century–200+ years ago. Even 100 years is old. Sometimes 50 years, or 30 years or 10 years is old. This is not the case in other countries, especially European and Asian countries. An 1810 map of America with an American imprint (published in America) is worth a lot more usually than an 1810 American map published in England. That’s because 1810 for American publishing is “old” while it is bare a blink in the eye of time for the English.

And here’s a PS from August 2003.

Prior to the invention of the internet and computers the book biz had a long, glorious and noble tradition that went back some 500 years. So on the book side there’s an awful lot to know. But after the invention of the Internet the book business changed a lot, from a dusty back shop esoteric clique-y group of dealers/specialists, to a front of the bus, cutting edge, fast paced, highly competive LARGE group of solo operators. You already know that.

What you might not know know is it’s a lot easier to learn about books than it is to learn about computers and tech stuff. The most important asset any book biz can have besides knowledge, spirit, high standards and a sense of humor, is TECH SUPPORT. If you don’t know the tech stuff yourself, find someonewho does. You’ve got to keep up on the tech side, even if it doesn’t come naturally.

Not only must you use the new technology, you must be comfortable with it. Just like books, really you don’t (and can’t) know it all on the tech side, but just as having good stuff at good prices was the key to being successful in the pre internet world, the key to 21st century profitablity is understanding and embracing the technology.

PS from December 2004

On when to cut the price and when to raise the price.

My Dad was known to lower the price when the person on the other end of the transaction really wanted/needed and would provide a good home for the book(s) in question. He and my mom would also sometimes lower the price when people bought a group or lot of books, or when the book(s) in question had major defects. They sometimes offered discounts to the trade and they often paid a referral fee if a customer or colleague helped them make a decent sale.

Neither of my parents were big on cutting the price if things didn’t sell. That’s because my dad was pretty good at only bringing in things of value, and their assumption was that eventually that value would find a market. They also didn’t lower the price for people who haggled too much.

A little bit of haggling is good, shows interest and spirit. A lot of haggling is a turn off. Contrary to popular opinion sometimes when things didn’t sell they raised the price, even raised it steeply, and like magic those books went out the door. Don’t ask me why, but that works.

Also on a related subject is the advice given to me long long ago by Mr. Isadore Berkelouw Senior (whose name I’m sure I never spell correctly).

I was about 30 when I first went into business on my own as Prints Pacific, and my mom sent me to see him at his apt. in Santa Monica. Mr. B ran a global book business on several continents which I believe is still going.

I still remember his exact words: DON’T FALL IN LOVE WITH THE MERCHANDISE. By this he meant that some books belong to you, they are your personal collection you intend to keep them (forever or close to forever).

Other books are part of your inventory and you intend to SELL or TRADE them at a PROFIT. The ones that you intend to sell are there to be SOLD. So don’t like them so much that you forget to sell them. Keep that clearly in you mind and you will prosper. Forget it and you will have lots of books but maybe not as much money as you might want.

And a final PS
Some of you in the past have asked permission to forward or post this info
to others, permission granted.

The book trade is a noble & glorious profession, it’s now it’s a larger group. May we all go forth and prosper.

Visit my auctions at ebay user id Ppacific http://tinyurl.com/kbd4

Visit me live on Maui by appointment only.

Susan Halas
Prints Pacific, Ltd.
1939A Vineyard St.
Wailuku, HI, USA 96793
halas@hawaii.rr.com
(80 244-7777

Chapter 130 A Few (Short) Additional Thoughts

The downside of posting daily on a blog is that I don’t have time to edit and revise a lot of what I write. I try, but a lot of times I am just writing what I think. Sometimes this leads to good writing, and other times not so much. Despite the length of the three posts I wrote last week about introducing antiquarian books to the newcomer — sorry, not the best things I’ve ever written — I had a few extra thoughts after I posted.

Last week, I wrote about how, when I was teaching high school English, I sometimes used links to popular culture to help students relate to the sometimes ancient texts they had to read. I believe that the antiquarian bookseller who wants to reach the next generation of collector must reach out and make sure that antiquarian books are seen and discussed somewhere in popular culture — through blogs, videos, book fairs, even on movie sets. Will this persuade eveyone to suddenly start collecting antiquarian books? No, not likely, but it exposes those who might have the collecting bent to the fact that antiquarian books exist, something I don’t think the trade does very well. Apparently, I am not the only who thinks so. The Heldfond Book Gallery of San Anselmo has already taken a step toward doing this by posting on YouTube a promotional film that advantageously displays and promotes their lovely shop and their outstanding books:

Take a look at YouTube searching under Heldfond. They have done quite a few creative and fun promotional videos. And, to reach the really young generation — those Tom and Huck’s age and younger — this bookstore hosted an event where the characters all modern children know from Star Wars came alive in a bookstore. Watch it to believe it! While it’s not my cup of tea, my kids would want to shop any bookstore that had such an event.

‘Nuff said.

See you in the stacks!

Chapter 128 Introducing Antiquarian Books to the Newcomer, Part 3

Are you still with me? Bless you, patient reader. Thanks for coming back after reading Part 1 and Part 2.

For the past two posts, I’ve been trying (apparently in the most wordy way possible — sorry) to make the connection between booksellers who worry that few young people are becoming book collectors and teachers who worry that few young people read at all. I’m not trying to say that book collectors collect books because they read a lot and that we should all worry because young people don’t seem to read much. In fact, as a reader commented on yesterday’s post, most collectors (myself included) don’t read their books at all.

What I want to point out is that collecting books can be the way for a reluctant reader or a non-reader to enter and learn to appreciate the world of books. Collecting takes the view that a book is to be desired not only for its content, but for its edition and condition, its physicality as an object or artifact. Even a person who doesn’t read much can learn a lot by collecting books. I’ll tell you a little secret. I haven’t re-read Dante’s Divine Comedy (one of my areas of specialty) since I quit teaching seven years ago. However, in continuing to collect illustrated and unusual editions of Dante, I’ve learned more about Dante and his masterpiece than I did when I read the original. No, I am not concerned at all that kids who don’t read much may never become book collectors. The reading part is not entirely relevant.

What is relevant is that young people don’t know — and I mean have never seen nor heard of — antiquarian books at all. I have one good friend — went to same high school I attended, college degree, good job, reads bestsellers and magazines — who once seriously asked me, “Did you say you sold books about aquariums?” She had never even heard the term antiquarian. Once I explained what I did and showed her a couple of my books, she thought it was pretty neat, but said, “Wow! I thought only really rich people could buy leather-bound books.” I was, to say the least, stunned. While collecting does require funnelling some money towards books, I am by no means “really rich”, yet I have antiquarian books because I took my time in acquiring them and sought them out everywhere. If I can do that, most other people with even a passing interest could, too, given the right encouragement and a little guidance.

How can we let people know that book collecting requires neither millions of dollars nor a Ph.D.? Because the antiquarian books that often grab the headlines are often the ones sold for millions of dollars, those few who are aware of them think that only the very rich and the very erudite can collect books, and not likely being one of those, these few eliminate for themselves the possibility of collecting books. While money and education certainly don’t hurt in any field, they are by no means a pre-requisite to book collecting.

So, I abruptly ended yesterday’s post with this question:

How, then, do we troll for new collectors and make it known that book collecting is a possibility for anyone with a serious interest?

1) I may be veering from the orthodox view of book collecting here, but meaningful collections can be built over time without spending a ton of money. One of my neighbors, for instance, loves surfing and has since he was a teenager. He has a wonderful collection of about 300 books on surfing — not an area commonly thought of as book collecting territory. It’s something he has put together from teenage years into middle age, paying attention to condition along the way. He does not actively seek these books, but adds them gradually as he comes across titles here and there. I think it an original collection that captures a dynamic and popular sport, and I’m ready and waiting any time he wants to sell it. My son Tom is inspired to find books about skateboarding whenever we attend the library sale together. Though he is not currently an enthusiastic reader, he has fun gathering these books because they show photos of cool tricks or give him information he seeks about the subject.

2) Support book collecting contests. Fine Books and Collections sponsors the Collegiate Book-Collecting Championship. When my business allows it, I’d like to sponsor such a contest on a smaller scale at the high school where I used to teach. These small contests show the younger generation that others like them are collecting. They needn’t wait to be come stock-option millionaires to begin collecting books. It also shows the younger generation how to gather information on a subject they in which they are interested from multiple sources and sellers, a skill that I think has become increasingly important in our internet society.

3) Exhibit at book fairs (especially those where the fair organizers do a good job of promoting the fair to the general public). Book fairs are good for you and for your business and for the antiquarian book business as a whole. Even when the fair is not a financially successful one, you don’t know to whom you might have introduced the concept of book collecting. I say this because I was, until recently, one of those people who wandered the fair looking at books and silently wondering how to become involved. There seemed to be an overwhelming amount of knowledge required. A few booksellers were very instructive and very kind in answering my questions. Though I probably didn’t buy anything at the time — heck, I was probably called a “tire kicker” by a few — their instruction helped me determine how I could collect and what I wanted to collect. They planted the seeds for future purchases by spending time educating me. If you’re a bookseller, don’t be grumpy and tired when asked for the umpteenth time how you know a book is a first edition. Take the time and explain to the newcomer. This is part of your job, even when it doesn’t result in an immediate sale.

4) Read Book Collecting: Some New Paths, by Jean Peters. This book discusses all kinds of interesting and viable approaches one can take when building a collection. It was helpful to me when I was trying to decide what focus I wanted for my (yes, it’s still unfinished) Dante catalogue.

5) Be patient. I think one big reason there are not a lot of collectors under 35 is that most people that age don’t have ANY disposable income. More importantly, for some it takes that long to realize that culture and history as presented in books are things that connect us with our past. In my experience, many teenagers and twenty-somethings are so focused on being different from everyone else that they haven’t developmentally reached a maturity where they desire to see a connection between themselves and the past. I would love to hear from any long-time bookseller whether there were many collectors under 35 during the “golden age” of bookselling in the early part of the 20th century.

6) When you encounter someone with an interest, be proactive and cultivate that interest. Send them catalogues. Suggest they subscribe to Firsts or Fine Books and Collections. Recommend your favorite book about books for them to read and learn.

I’ve tried to give a few ideas for introducing antiquarian books to newcomers. I realize that none of them are very original, but I don’t hear many other booksellers saying these things. Perhaps they already know better or they are already obvious to everyone else. Part of the fun of being new is not always knowing when your ideas are completely off-base. Please let me know your thoughts in the comments below, if you have any. Part of the reason I blog is to learn from others.

Thanks for reading and sticking with me through these lengthy posts on this topic.

See you in the stacks!

Chapter 127 Introducing Antiquarian Books to the Newcomer, Part 2

If you’re returning to read the second part of this post after reading the first part, which took a direction I didn’t anticipate when I started writing, thank you. If you’d like to read my rambling preamble, which I posted yesterday, click here.

To succinctly recap, veteran antiquarian booksellers lament the fact that people younger than the age of, say 35, are not collecting books. I spent most of yesterday explaining a related complaint by experienced teachers that kids today don’t read. I then explained that some kids do read and read quite well, even though they are not the majority. I also explained how I tried to reach those students who were reluctant readers. Usually this involved showing them some kind of connection between what they were reading and contemporary culture. It didn’t work every time, but I think I won a few converts by doing this. (Why I couldn’t just say it this way yesterday is a mystery, but I just couldn’t.)

What attracts people to collecting antiquarian books? Is it because they love to read and to gain knowledge? Is it a desire to preserve and pass down history, literature, culture? Is it because they love the beauty of fine bindings? Is it because it makes them look intelligent? Is it because they love the tactile feel of a book in their hands? At least one of these things, or some combination thereof appeals to most collectors I know. Indeed, just as there are actually kids who read, there are book collectors out there, and according the Fine Books and Collections annual report on the top 50 book, map, and manuscript auction sales, a select few have even spent from $406,000 to $21.3 million on single item purchases in 2007. Granted, the great majority of us booksellers can only hope to sell such amazing items someday, but the great majority of those who collect and purchase books also can only hope to make such an amazing purchase as well. There are collectors out there who want to build an interesting, meaningful collection without committing to spend a half million dollars or more. Can that be done? I think so.

Despite a love of books and working in academia and publishing for a time, I did not know the world of antiquarian books existed until I was in my early 30s. Every day I ask myself why wasn’t I aware of antiquarian books before this? I wonder whether I missed the day in school where antiquarian books were taught.

Oh, wait.

Antiquarian books aren’t taught in school. Don’t get me wrong. At my high school we read the oldies but goodies going back to Gilgamesh. But we read them in translation in tiny print in cheap paperbacks — a dismal way to try to appreciate a good story and to enjoy a book. Students have the great literature of the world inflicted on them in the worst of formats. These flimsy paperbacks, encasing the literary classics of world cultures, are akin to a diet of caviar presented on a Saltine cracker. Ultimately, they will not encourage many to pursue gourmet food. Few students who have read an 8-point print, paperback Crime and Punishment have any desire to later acquire an expensive, leather-bound edition of the book whose very name suggests to the high school student that its assigment in school is retribution for a past transgression. No, rightly or wrongly, secondary school is not the place where the idea of antiquarian books or even primary sources are introduced. I’m not arguing for the use of fine first editions as classroom texts, but certainly showing students a fine first is something which could, in some cases, be done. I did it with a few of my Dante books.

Most people I’ve met who have been involved with antiquarian books their whole lives either got an early job in such a store or had a friend or relative who collected or was a librarian. Again, this was not the case with me. I don’t have any relatives or friends who collect books. I was not exposed this way. I do have a friend who obsessively collects automobilia, though, so I did have a good chance to observe the mindset of a collector and the long-term vision and perserverance one needs to build a meaningful collection in that field. My general impression at the time was that collecting looked fun, but that it was probably out of my modest price range.

Then, as many of my favorite books have, a book came to me via serendipity: Nicholas Basbane’s A Gentle Madness. If you’re a long-time reader, you already know that I read this book and it was as if a tuning fork had resonated in my heart in perfect pitch. I knew then that I needed to be in the world of antiquarian books.

I don’t want another person like me to miss out on the joy of book collecting for another second. I was not exposed to book collecting at a young age, and though I was taught to appreciate — no, love — literature, the idea that a book is a fine thing, to be appreciated as an object, was not reinforced in school. I suspect there are many like me, who really like books, but don’t know what that next step is. I want to help them. That’s why I’m a bookseller.

How, then, do we troll for new collectors and make it known that book collecting is a possibility for anyone with a serious interest?

Unbelievably, just when I (finally) seem to be getting to the crux of it, I keep getting interrupted by my real life today (hence the posts that never seem to get to the point)! Sorry to conclude abruptly. I have to end this post here (hungry children whining for dinner in the background). I apologize. I promise to wrap this up tomorrow with (finally!) some actual specifics about reaching out to new collectors and introducing antiquarian books to the newcomer. Please say you’ll come back tomorrow?

Chapter 126 Introducing Antiquarian Books to the Newcomer, Part 1

When I communicate with veteran booksellers about the future of antiquarian books, they frequently lament the fact that they don’t know where the next generation of collectors will come from. Most young people, it seems, are not book collectors. When I was teaching high school English, I often heard a related lament from the veteran teachers: These kids today don’t read.

Well, of course they don’t. There are 500 television channels (about 488 more than existed during my own childhood) with endless options, including 24 hours-a-day, seven-day-a-week cartoons, movies, and music. There are video games, which are so well-animated these days that they have the intensity and production values of a feature film. There are multiplex movie theaters, allowing one to choose from as many as 15 different cinematic experiences. There are the internet and email. Kids aren’t the only ones who can spend hours wrapped in these technological pursuits. In my own pursuit of buying, selling, and blogging antiquarian books, I myself have been — ahem — known to spend excessive time in front of a computer screen. When I hear that someone under the age of 35 likes books and chooses reading over these other activities, I am thrilled, even if this type of person seems to be in the minority.

When I started teaching high school English, I took over the classes of another teacher mid-year. The curriculum was already set. On the agenda for the students in Advanced Placement English were William Shakespeare, Dante Alighieri, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Mario Vargas Llosa, Toni Morrison, Naguib Mahfouz, and Chinua Achebe — a challenging group of authors for most adults, let alone teenagers, even those qualified to be in Advanced Placement. I worried whether students would actually read the books or go straight to the Cliff’s Notes to pass their exams and write their essays. My experience teaching these books for six years was that those who already liked reading — and there were some who did — read the books. I could tell from the quality of questions asked, class discussion and written work that this was so. There were also those who just read the Cliff’s Notes to get by, much the same as I did the bare minimum in Algebra II/Trigonometry as a student. I just wanted to pass the class and get out so I could work on reading and writing, the subjects I really loved.

There were students whose strengths were in reading and writing. They tended to gravitate towards the most challenging English classes, to write for the school paper, and edit the school literary magazine. Now, mind you, I was glad to have these students, but it was also my job — actually, it was especially also my job — to teach the reluctant learners — the ones who just wanted to pass the class and move on — that there was something to be appreciated in good books and in articulating one’s thoughts clearly and concisely. This concept may seem obvious to us bookish folk, but I promise you that when you are trying to convince a roomful of 37 seventeen-year-olds of the merits of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment and its relevance to their daily lives, it is a tall order indeed.

So, how did I try to engage the reluctant learners? I did a number of things that would be regarded as unorthodox, but which I found to be effective. In addition to their traditional academic essays and tests, when they read Dante, my students designed their own high-school hells, complete with nine circles of hell created just for certain types of teachers, students, friends, administrators and classes. (Really, is there any more hellish time in life than high school? What a perfect chance to think about punishment fitting crime.)

When we read Dostoevsky, we spent a lot of time talking about Nietzsche’s concept of the Superman (ubermensch), who considers himself so valuable to society that he is above the law. Next, we read Crime and Punishment and discussed how Raskolnikov fits that concept when he commits murder, but, with his emotional breakdown after the murder, discovers that he is not indeed the Superman he had supposed himself to be. Finally, we watched Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope, the film where two young men who think of themselves as perfect Nietzsche Superman candidates murder another young man just to see if they can get away with it and if they are indeed Supermen. When we compared the film to Dostoevsky, I tried to point out how the themes of the enduring classic books are transcendent — readers can recognize and relate to these themes down through the ages.

These supplementary activities (always done in tandem with more academic written assignments and tests) were the type of thing that helped some of my reluctant students to engage with the text. Did they work all of the time? No, but I do think they helped. Indeed, my Dante collection started as a modest collection of illustrated editions of The Divine Comedy to show students how the work had been interpreted differently by artists through the centuries.

I’m having a tough time articulating what I want to say in this post. (Ironic, for the English teacher to be without words, isn’t it?) I’ve covered why kids don’t read and how I got some to think about literature and how it relates to their teenage lives, which tend to revolve around relationships, film, art, and music. What I haven’t said is how this concept relates to introducing antiquarian books to the newcomer or even to someone who doesn’t yet know antiquarian books exist. I’ll cover that tomorrow, and I hope you’ll be able to see the connection then. My apologies for being so discursive today. Thanks for reading this far!

To be continued tomorrow.

Chapter 121 Becoming an Antiquarian Bookseller: Knowledge Adds Value

I am knee deep in income tax preparations with Thoughtful Husband and slowly (oh so slowly) learning how and why this former academic must learn proper accounting techniqes. To save you from listening to my whining (though you may be able to hear it over the din of the calculator keys), I’m posting my most recent article for BookThink. Thanks for reading!

BECOMING AN ANTIQUARIAN BOOKSELLER
PART 1: KNOWLEDGE ADDS VALUE
By Chris Lowenstein

Last month I wrote an article that discusses the difference between a bookseller and an antiquarian bookseller, arriving at the conclusion that specialized knowledge allows an antiquarian bookseller to create value and, sometimes, even create new markets. Like all booksellers, the antiquarian bookseller will research the current price and availability of a particular book to determine its current market value. But unlike other booksellers, the antiquarian bookseller also researches the book to see if others have overlooked anything significant about it that would add to its value. When this type of research turns up something new, the antiquarian bookseller can, with a well-written and well-placed description, sometimes set his price above what others are asking, thus driving the market upward.

When I decided to become an antiquarian bookseller, I wondered how I could obtain the kind of specialized knowledge that adds value to books. Was this knowledge something I should possess innately? Was it something that could be taught, and if so, where could I go to learn it? Did antiquarian booksellers ever share their research secrets? In answer to these questions, I learned that several things help build the knowledge of an antiquarian bookseller: experience, education, and expansion. If you’re bored just listing books you find based on the prices others are asking for the same book, this article is for you.

When I started selling antiquarian books, I failed to take into account how my prior experience could help me. I was an English major in college and also taught high school English for several years. During my teenage years I worked in a bookstore, for a university library, and for a small publisher. While this might seem very literary, I had little if any exposure to antiquarian books at the time. Still, my education combined with my work experiences exposed me to the names of the high spots in literature and to the processes by which literature is marketed to and judged by consumers. This experience has turned out to be very beneficial, in terms of providing a good foundation of literary knowledge upon which I could build.

Wanting to learn all I could about antiquarian books, I read every book I could find on the subject, beginning with Nicholas Basbanes’ excellent series on the history of books and book collectors. A few years later, I’m still working my way through stacks of bookseller memoirs, collector reminiscences, and books about books. Whatever your experience prior to antiquarian books is, you can stand on the shoulders of the giants who came before us to get a good introduction to antiquarian books by reading what they’ve left behind.

Prior experience and self-education are good beginnings for an antiquarian bookseller; however, if you are serious about your career, you should plan to continue your formal education. In addition to reading about antiquarians and their books, several courses are available. David Gregor, ABAA bookseller travels to different parts of the country a few times a year offering two excellent, one-day seminars about book collecting and bookselling.

If you find you have the inclination for an overview of all the types of antiquarian booksellers available, take the week-long Colorado Antiquarian Book Seminar. Offered at Colorado College in Colorado Springs, it features a diverse faculty made up of all different types of booksellers – internet only, open shop, librarian, book conservator, specialist dealer, etc. It covers the gamut from how to find and evaluate stock to buying at auction to writing a print catalogue to selling on the internet and attending book fairs.

The Seminar has existed for 30 years, offers both partial and full scholarships, and offers you the chance to meet other booksellers and to expand your knowledge. If you want to know exactly what topics are covered in Colorado, I also suggest you read Karen Isgur Bergsagel’s highly informative BookThink article about her experience in Colorado last summer here.

If you need less of an overview of antiquarian bookselling and more specific information about antiquarian books themselves, consider Rare Book School at the University of Virginia. Founded in 1983 by Terry Belanger (recipient of the 2005 MacArthur “Genius” Grant for his rare book prowess) , Rare Book School offers courses with names like “Book Illustration Processes to 1900”, “Introduction to the Principles of Bibliographic Description”, and “Introduction to Illuminated Manuscripts”. If you find yourself interested in these subjects, antiquarian bookselling may be just the thing for you! Like the Colorado Antiquarian Book Seminar, Rare Book School also offers scholarships. Both organizations realize the importance of helping antiquarian booksellers, particularly those of us new to the trade, learn to be professionals. New booksellers with serious intentions of becoming professionals are welcome.

Antiquarian booksellers must learn to do thorough research. Good research skills give you the ability to turn up some new or little-noticed fact about a book you are selling, and they are key. If you want to be an antiquarian bookseller, learn about the resources for research – bibliographies and reference books. Learn how to cite your resources properly in a book description. Rare Book School offers many courses that can help in this area.

UCLA also offers a smaller but similar program for those of us closer to the West Coast. Among the courses offered this summer are: “Descriptive Bibliography”, “Book Illustration Processes to 1900”, and “The Book in the West”.

I’ve attended a David Gregor seminar and the Colorado Antiquarian Book Seminar and recommend both very highly. I plan to attend the University of Virginia Rare Book School this summer, and, if I can gain admission, the UCLA Rare Book School as well.

Closer to home, you can easily expand your horizons by getting to know other booksellers. Those of us who sell only on the internet can sometimes feel as though we are working in a vacuum, and meeting other booksellers can alleviate that feeling, as well as give you a sounding board for your bookselling ideas. Once you make a good friend, you can talk about prices, compare your condition standards, etc. You might even get to know another bookseller well enough to share a booth and exhibit at a book fair or to purchase a very expensive book together. Having colleagues who can assist in fields outside your own specialty and whom you can sometimes assist is a priceless asset.

Though they are often crowded and don’t often yield many antiquarian finds, go to your local library sale. Frequent attendance will help you learn to distinguish edition and condition — things you can’t learn by spending time in an antiquarian shop, because all of the books there are only very good or better condition. At every library sale buy at least one book on the speculation that it may be valuable. Don’t use your scanner, and pay attention to what instincts lead you to choose that book. Is it a beautiful binding or lack thereof? A famous author or illustrator? Take your speculative purchase home and research it. If you purchase a mistake — a book whose value does not lie in its financial return — you likely haven’t spent too much money because you purchased it at a library sale.

Another way to expand your knowledge of antiquarian books is to study the catalogues of other antiquarian booksellers. These can help you to get a sense of the market, and more importantly, demonstrate what fine researchers and scholars many antiquarian booksellers are. Auction catalogues are useful to study as well. Many booksellers and auction houses will even send their catalogue right through the computer as a pdf file. Services like Americana Exchange and American Book Prices Current can give you the results of auctions so you can see if a particular book sells above or below its estimate.

Illustrated catalogues are particularly good for getting a handle on evaluating condition. The next time you see an illustrated catalogue, try reading the descriptions and comparing the images of the books with the condition notes. You’ll get a sense of how much evaluation of condition varies among different sellers, but also of how much it does not. There are certain standards that go into deciding something is Fine vs. Very Good and Very Good vs. Good or Fair. Familiarizing yourself with those standards is one of the best ways to help yourself learn to choose better books.

Finally, go to book fairs, whether as a spectator or as an exhibitor. See what other sellers are offering, in what condition and at what prices. Talk to the other booksellers. Get to know your market and who are the top specialists in particular subjects. Book fairs are also great places to scout books. A book fair is like having 50 or more antiquarian shops in one location at the same time. It’s one stop shopping!

Being an antiquarian bookseller takes a great deal of work, but, if you like research and learn to use your resources in a professional manner, it can yield great returns. You need to be willing to rely on your experience, increase your education, and expand your contacts in the bookselling world. If you can do so, you will be well on your way to becoming an antiquarian bookseller.

See you in the stacks!

Chapter 101 As NASA says, “It’s a Go!”

Late last week, I got a phone call from the high school where I used to teach English. Since I stopped teaching in 2000, I get this same phone call about once a year, offering me my teaching job back. Sometimes teachers quit unexpectedly or go on maternity leave mid-year and the school needs an immediate replacement. Sometimes enrollment grows and they need an additional teacher. I loved teaching and I loved my school, and I am always flattered that they want to ask me back for more, so there wasn’t much holding me back from wanting to return each and every time they’ve asked.

Except two small kids who I wanted to be with every second and who would then need day care, which — at last check a few years ago — actually cost more than my teacher’s salary.

Except my own rather low tolerance for being pulled in many directions at once.

Except my lack of time (20 hours or so per week outside of teaching in the classroom) to grade papers and prep lessons at home after work, when my family demands my full attention.

Except, while I love teaching, I hate the ridiculous politics involved in weekly faculty meetings, department meetings, and academic committee meetings which add quite a few more hours and quite a bit more stress to your teaching load.

Except I didn’t have time attend my students’ sports games or theater productions or chaperone their dances the way I could before I had a family, when teaching was my life. (This may sound like an extra, but all good teachers of adolescents know that occasionally supporting them outside of the classroom helps them to connect inside the classroom.)

Except I discovered while home the past eight years that I want to be an antiquarian bookseller.

Too many exceptions to make for a job performance that would make either me, my family, or my school’s principal unhappy. Though I taught part-time after the birth of Tom, after I had Huck, I decided to stay home with my children until they were both school age and then re-evaluate my career plans when my youngest son entered first grade. Huck began first grade in September, but my plans for becoming an antiquarian bookseller began long before that time. As you know, I spent a couple of years reading everything I could about books and bookselling. I never told the school about my plans because I wasn’t sure I could make it work. Antiquarian bookselling was still a dream.

When I decided I wanted to be a bookseller — a job that would allow me to work from my home and to determine the amount of hours I could put in each week — the first thing I did was send a letter to the Bibliophile email list, a sort of bulletin board for booksellers and book collectors, asking:

What are your thoughts? (I have already taken under advisement someone’s comment a couple of weeks ago that the best way to make a million dollars selling books is to start with two million.) If you could do it over, would you become a bookseller again? Am I realistic to think I can make a go of it? (I plan to start with an inventory of 300 or so books.)

You are probably well aware by now (at least if you’ve read this blog before) that I got numerous responses, some positive and some negative, all insightful. I always figured I could return to teaching as a possible back-up. During the years that I’ve been on “maternity leave” (almost eight, lol), I’ve taught summer school twice, substituted occasionally, graded extra papers at home for other teachers, and tutored a few students in order to keep my relationship with the school (which, ironically, is also my alma mater — but that’s a story for another post). I made a little extra money for doing so and also kept up my skills. Through careful and slow shopping over a few years, that money enabled me to collect enough books to start my business.

I officially started Book Hunter’s Holiday as a business a year ago. Since then I’ve found that working from home fits my family’s needs best right now. I can work during the day, pick kids up myself at school at 3 and be available to supervise homework, friends coming over to play, and soccer practice. I can also make sure a decent dinner gets put on the table most nights. I like it this way. But, I’ve also found that if I am to consider myself serious about being an antiquarian bookseller, it needs to be high on my list of priorities, with some activities getting jettisoned. I did not teach summer school this past summer. I went to the Colorado Antiquarian Book Seminar instead. In September, I resigned from my last tutoring job (which I did at night after the kids went to bed). I built a website and started to blog about my business instead. The money from teacher-like activities tapered off, but I could focus on building my book business, which, if it’s successful, will bring in other money.

Last week, when the call came about teaching again, I swallowed hard before I replied. Took a breath. Thought it through once more.

I said, “No thanks. I’ve started my own business and I really need to focus on that at this time.”

Do I really think I can make a go of it as a bookseller?

If I believe in this business and if I believe it’s a good fit for me — and I absolutely do — then I need to put my money where my mouth is, and give the business my full attention during working hours. This is scary.

It means no more paycheck-subsidized acquisitions of books.

It means that I have to sell enough books to acquire the books I want.

It means I have to act like a real business; my business must be self-supporting or it is simply a hobby.

It means that, other than adopting an abandoned farm, I have no Plan B. Bookselling is Plan A, B, and C.

To which I say, “It’s a go!”

Ready for lift-off!

Chapter 88 What is an Antiquarian Bookseller, Anyway?

Recently, I was asked to write an occasional article for an online publication for booksellers called BookThink. I wrote an introductory article in November and in December was asked to write an article that defines antiquarian bookselling. Any experienced bookseller will tell you that this term is almost impossible to define, as an antiquarian bookseller may deal in such disparate items as ancient incunabula and modern first editions. If the term antiquarian doesn’t refer to a book’s age, what does it mean? I wrote an article explaining why the term has not been narrowly defined and what, in my opinion, makes the difference between a bookseller and an antiquarian bookseller — applying knowledge (usually specialized knowledge in these internet days) to add value to a particular book.

It’s a little lengthy for a blog post, but I haven’t posted anything bookish lately, and I want to know if you think I was on the right track with this one. Feel free to leave a comment, especially if you disagree. I’m still a beginner at bookselling, and I want to make sure I get things right.

What is an Antiquarian Bookseller, Anyway?
by Chris Lowenstein
Book Hunter’s Holiday

Every antiquarian bookseller’s lament is that there are so many people who don’t understand her chosen field. Mention the words “antiquarian books” to those who aren’t collectors or sellers of them and you’ll likely hear, “Oh, you sell books about antiques. That’s wonderful!” or, my favorite, “Did you say you sold books about aquariums?” One wishes there was a simple way to clarify what we do for a living for the uninitiated.

Even amongst other booksellers, the term “antiquarian book” evokes heady thoughts of papyrus, vellum, parchment, rag paper, leather binding, gilt tooling, or marbled paper. While these words certainly suggest ancient tomes, the term “antiquarian book” actually has a broader meaning, one that is at once simple and difficult to articulate.

A history of the Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America found on its website reveals that the initial group of 50 booksellers who met in 1949 to form the well-known bookselling association had a tough time determining the best definition of antiquarian: “ The next question arose as to the definition of an ‘antiquarian bookseller’, and debate centered on such issues as the necessity of having sales-tax registrations, and the ineligibility of persons engaging in the trade as a ‘sideline’. Herman Cohen brought what was described as ‘appreciative laughter’ when he asked, ‘Who wants to define sideline?’”

Coming up with a rigid definition was contentious even for this group of experts in the field. Presently, in their handy glossary of terms, the ABAA has not included definitions of “rare” or “antiquarian books”, suggesting just how difficult it is to pin down to a specific meaning this seemingly innocuous term.

Like the ABAA, John Carter’s well-known reference, ABC for Book Collectors, a readable dictionary of terms related to the field of book collecting, has a rather vague definition of an antiquarian bookseller: “The lines of demarcation between ‘rare books’, ‘old books’, and ‘second-hand books’ have never been, and can never be, clearly defined. The same applies to most of those who deal in them; and the Antiquarian Bookseller’s Association of America (ABAA) makes no distinction between a man who specializes in incunabula, another who deals only in modern firsts, and a third who restricts himself to botany, and finally a general second-hand dealer, provided that his business is primarily in old books.”

Astonishingly, another usually quite useful reference, Geoffrey Ashall Glaister’s Encyclopedia of the Book, a compendium of many useful book-related terms, does not have any entries for the words “antiquarian”, “rare”, or “scarce”. How, then, to define this term, “antiquarian”?

If you’re interested in selling or collecting antiquarian books, you’ll need to inform yourself a bit further, so that you know what is generally meant by the term “antiquarian book”. In fact, I think that the word “information” is one thing that sets the antiquarian bookseller apart from his other bookselling colleagues. In my experience, antiquarian books are books that have required me to have either particular knowledge to understand their value (e.g. I recognize a book as the unknown first work of a later famous author) or, in the absence of that knowledge, have required me to research the book to discover what might be especially valuable about it. Sometimes this research pays off, and I discover that I have a good “find”. Other times, further research reveals that a book I selected merely because of its age or its pretty binding is not especially valuable at all. As I gain more experience and more knowledge, I become better at selecting antiquarian books, which are the focus of my business, Book Hunter’s Holiday.

In Nicholas Basbanes’ book about book collectors and booksellers, Among the Gently Mad, the author credits John Hill Burton, a nineteenth century Scottish bibliophile with this glib comment about collectors (and by extension sellers) of antiquarian books: “It is, as you will observe, the general ambition of the class to find value where there seems to be none, and this develops a skill and subtlety, enabling the operator, in the midst of a heap of rubbish, to put his finger on those things which have in them the latent capacity to become valuable and curious.”

Two other veteran antiquarian booksellers, now deceased, mention a term for Burton’s description above that, to me, sums up perfectly what an antiquarian bookseller does. In their memoir Old Books, Rare Friends, Leona Rostenberg and Madeleine Stern call the ability to discover value in a book “fingerspitzengefuhl”. They say, “As far as we know, the word Finger-Spitzengefuhl never made it to a dictionary. It was originally Herbert Reichner [another bookseller to whom Rostenberg was an apprentice] who passed it on to us. A tingling of the fingertips becomes an electrical current of suspense, excitement, recognition. In an artificially controlled voice, one of us calls to the other, ‘Look! This may be something.’ And two heads look down upon the title page of a discovery. Sometimes the Finger-Spitzengefuhl occurs on the spot as we scan the shelves of a foreign dealer. Sometimes it takes place only after the purchase has been made and we study our finds. Whenever or wherever it occurs, it is an experience that makes the rare book business a hymn to joy.”

Additionally, Pat and Allen Ahearn, experienced booksellers and authors of Book Collecting: A Comprehensive Guide, and Collected Books, weigh in with the opinion that books bought as objects deserve special qualification as antiquarian: “It would seem that the transition from reader to collector occurs when the book itself is perceived as an object, akin to art perhaps. Certainly, if you are going to pay $25 or $50 for a first edition when you could borrow a copy from the library or purchase a paperback reprint for $5.95 (and up), you have bought an object that you want to own and actually look at occasionally, just as you want to own an original painting or a signed limited print when there are copies available at significantly lower prices.”

If we begin to think about owning books as objects, as opposed to owning books for their reading content alone, we can establish some other guidelines. Some of the assumptions others make about antiquarian books can be easily dispelled here. First, scarcity does not equal rarity. If only ten copies of a book exist but there is no interest in the subject, it may not be a significant enough book to be financially valuable for an antiquarian bookseller. However, when I find a book that is scarce, I take the time to research whether it is or is not a significant book. Sometimes that research pays off and sometimes it leads to a dead end. For me, this not knowing the end result in advance is part of the fun and challenge of antiquarian bookselling.

Secondly, age does not necessarily imply rarity or value. Many people assume that because a book is old, the book has value. This is usually not the case, unless that particular title is in demand or that particular subject generates a lot of current interest or has an intrinsic importance. Bibles are a good example of this principle. Although Bibles are considered important by those who own them, most of the thousands of editions of the Bible published over time are not financially enriching, with the exceptions of a few early printed Bibles. The Bible has been printed so often that it is not, at this point in history, a rare book by any means.

Finally, condition plays an important role in antiquarian bookselling. A book that is in less than fine condition must be in very high demand or contain very important information in order to be of substantial value to the antiquarian bookseller. Otherwise, an antiquarian bookseller seeks to sell fine books as opposed to reading copies.

The antiquarian booksellers I know personally include, among others, sellers of ancient books about science and medicine, sellers of great works of literature, and sellers of modern first editions (books published in the twentieth and now the twenty-first centuries). On the surface, these sellers would seem to have nothing in common. However, they are all antiquarian booksellers. The unifying factor among them is their ability to apply their specialized knowledge to the books they find and create value, and, in some cases, even create new markets. The ability to do this is, in the words of Rostenberg and Stern, a hymn to joy indeed.

The End

Sorry for all the bold type. Sometimes I fall into my pedantic, former teacher mode. Just wanted to highlight the points I think most important. Thanks for reading such a long post.

See you in the stacks!