VBS.TV Blog

NYC: DO THE READING

February 02, 2010
by AUSTIN CARR

I bet you right now, this very moment, there’s some white kid at a sidewalk bookstand in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, flipping through a dirtied copy of Ann Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. Let’s make another bet. I bet that more than a few readers just took some satisfaction in my misspelling of Ayn’s name (be honest). Now I can’t possibly prove the latter, but the odds on our first bet are heavily in my favor. Why?

Well, if you check out any of the book vendors on Bedford Ave, I can guarantee you’ll find a copy of Kavalier & Clay, Gravity’s Rainbow, Kafka on the Shore, some diary by Kafka himself, Lolita, and at least two novels by Coetzee, Rushdie, Ishiguro, Updike, and Marquez. And I don’t mean these books are sprinkled about the various bookstands between North 5th and 7th; I mean that e-v-e-r-y seller on the street is hawking e-v-e-r-y one of these authors and titles–all of them. Do Brooklynites just inherently love modern fiction? Or is there some joint Junot-Diaz-Safran-Foer-Dave-Eggers city ordinance that requires vendors to peddle their books within a 20-yard radius of the Bedford L stop?

If you aim to sell merchandise, you ought to make it unique–you know, somehow distinguish yourself from competitors; yet these vendors all sell the exact same products in the same location–hot dog vendors in Central Park have more diverse inventories. And if you want foot traffic, there are much busier streets in Manhattan; there are also wealthier zip codes and more educated neighborhoods: why not vend there? If you want kids that are likely to read literature, why not sell around N.Y.U., Columbia, or any number of schools in the city? For that matter, why even sell such sophisticated lit at all – why not appeal to a wide consumer base, and sell mass market fiction? In other words, why sell these books in this neighborhood? The easy answer to this question would concern a lot of done-to-death stereotypes about hipsters (likely the same ones who took pleasure in my misspelling of Ayn’s name) and what hipsters consume. To answer my question, I decided instead to skip right to the source: the book vendors themselves. There had to be some science behind it, I thought, some socioeconomic reason for selling what they sell, where they sell it.


While interviewing my first vendor (most asked to remain anonymous), I realized that maybe ‘socioeconomic reason’ was going a bit overboard. Several times I asked the vendor where his books came from, and why he chose Williamsburg in particular to hawk his collection. “I buy what I think people should read,” he told me, arms folded. Minutes later though he said that hipsters “definitely read more fiction,” and that he simply “buy[s] what sells…it’s bread and butter.” Okay, seems contradictory, but still, why Williamsburg? Since its gentrification, he must have noticed an increase in sales, right? “The opposite,” he answered. “The initial gentrification process triggered a better environment…but now what you got is an influx of wealthy, younger people.” Wealthy, younger people – isn’t that good for business? “I just don’t think they read as much.” So again, why vend in Williamsburg? “Well,” he clarifies, “obviously, it’s a gold rush here.”

I just couldn’t figure this fucker out. When we first met, he described himself as a noble vendor, who sells books for books’ sake even as the community succumbed to rich, jaded youths; then he transformed into an opportunistic peddler, who sells for the sake of selling, capitalizing on the boomtown-hipster-milieu. Is there perhaps another reason?

“Well, a lot of it has to do with proximity. I used to sell at N.Y.U. …but I don’t want to be driving too far with a heavy load in the car, so I stay [around here],” he finally explained.

Of the booksellers I talked with, many expressed this same sentiment. “I live in this area, so it’s good for me,” one book vendor near Bryant Park told me. I asked if he would ever sell anywhere else, if it meant making more money. “I live in this area, so it’s just more convenient for me. It doesn’t make sense to commute.” Not even for a better market? “Yeah, I would commute…but I don’t have transportation.” Back on Bedford, one regular interrupted another interview: “Yo, I just wanna say, this guy is 50 years old, lives with his mudda, and he’s sellin’ his mudda’s books!” Though vendors cited numerous reasons for where and why they sell, one overriding factor was the ease of their travel, understandably. Still there was another equally important factor: demographics.

“The thing that appeals to a bookseller in Williamsburg is that you don’t have to sell the stories, the authors. The people are very knowledgeable, they know the stories; they know what they are looking for. They have an intense interest in anything with art, literature…it’s not a hard sell,” one Bedford bookseller explained. He continued, “Look, I really can’t speak to the race or class, or issues of that nature, but I can tell you that this is just a great area for selling books. If you went somewhere else to where people were not as fortunate financially, it might be a tougher sell.” Other booksellers were not so politically correct.

“Look, I would never sell this on the Southside, and I’m Puerto Rican,” one particularly enthusiastic Williamsburg vendor informed me. “They would never understand the type of collection that I have because they are not, not to put them down, but that educated. They have different states of mind. If I was to take this collection and sell it on South 2nd, it’d be a different story. If I take this to Bed-Stuy: different story. In other words, you have to be in the right community to do this…so yes, location is very important…I would not sell over there. How’s this? And it’s not being racist or anything, but I’m not going to sell in an area where I’d have a bunch of Hispanics who aren’t accepting. They don’t understand this higher level of thinking, so hell no. I wouldn’t sell over there.”

As blunt as he was, I appreciated his candor. Most vendors danced around explaining why they sold in the area, or at least tiptoed around why they didn’t sell elsewhere. But when it came to why the demographic of Williamsburg is ideal for selling books, the answer came easy: Williamsburg is young, and more notably, white.

It’s hard to say whether the vendors meant anything racialist by this response – certainly Williamsburg is predominantly white; almost 65% white according to the New York Times. Apart from race though, the features that most vendors cited were the population’s wealth and education level. Were these features unique to Williamsburg? As the not-so-P.C. vendor explained, “If I take this to Bed-Stuy: different story.” How different? In comparing central sections of Williamsburg (11211) to Bed-Stuy (11216), the median income is actually higher near the Nostrand AC stop ($31,241) than it is around the Bedford L station ($30,081). Regarding education, Billyburg slightly edges out Bed-Stuy here, but not by much, with 28.3% of Williamsburg residents having either a bachelor’s or graduate degree, compared with 23% in Bedford-Stuyvesant – only a 5.3% difference. One vendor cited crime and safety as a concern. But Bed-Stuy’s crime index, a scoring of an area’s risk of danger, ranks 7 points safer than Williamsburg’s, and is below the national average.

So what makes Bed-Stuy’s neighborhood such a “different story” from Williamsburg? The statistic is obvious: race. 78% of Bed-Stuy residents are black.

But maybe I’m missing something unique about Williamsburg residents that can’t be illustrated by mere data and statistics:

“[The Williamsburg] clientele is, you know, radical people! I tell you one thing, man, I ain’t never sold a bible out here. In this neighborhood, I mean with the regulars, you ain’t ganna find anybody lookin’ for a bible,” the not-so-P.C. hawker mused. While I might trust his grasp of his godless Williamsburg regulars, I didn’t trust his assumptions of Bedford-Stuyvesant residents. I decided to head to the area that a few sellers mentioned as less-than-ideal for vending, and check out the neighborhood’s book culture.

Venturing to Bed-Stuy, far down Bedford Ave closer to where it connects with Atlantic, I found PrimeTime Books, a store that specializes in urban fiction. Popular titles include Last Bitch Standing and Queen Bitch: Part 4 (of the Bitch, Bitch Reloaded, The Bitch is Back series) by Deja King, who is, as I was told, the store’s most popular author. “The type of literature that is sold here is more urban fiction…it’s suitable for the demographic – primarily African-Americans,” one manager explained, “Ten years ago it was all the Maya Angelou’s, the Toni Morrison’s, but the last five years it’s changed to more urban fiction.” Why? “It’s something similar to hip-hop, the demographics that buy hip-hop music is the younger generation – the demographic that reads these books is a younger generation.” I had trouble getting past his phrase “suitable for the demographic” – how did he know what was suitable? I posed the same question to him as I did the Bedford booksellers: why sell these books in this neighborhood? “You go in an area where it’s most suitable for the area,” he said. “It has to deal with more the circumstances. This is a community for that type of material.” In this sense, while the Bedford vendors decided what to sell the young and white, PrimeTime Books essentially targeted the young and black.

Closer to downtown, I stumbled across another bookstore. The awning read:
Respect For Life
Books-N-Things
Books – Posters – Videos – Bean Pies, etc.
The advertisement was too appealing; I couldn’t resist finding out what etcetera would mean for a list that already included books and bean pies. As I entered, I glanced at a sign on the door about the ‘Crucifixion of Michael Jackson’ – an interesting welcome. The store was shoebox-sized, but cozy. Immediately to the right was a large poster documenting the history African Kings and Queens; to the left, books lined the walls with titles I’d never heard of before. Photographs of black leaders were everywhere: Malcolm X, MLK, Louis Farrakhan, Master W.D. Fard Muhammad. A black comedian squawked on a T.V. screen: “…as soon as the white man got off the slave ship, he could only think with his penis!” A few tables in the center were strewn with books, videos, a few pies, etc. – the awning told the truth. A couple of books that caught my eye: From Niggas to Gods, Why Black Men Love White Women, and The Slaughter: An American Atrocity. To the side of the counter hung a few Nation of Islam t-shirts; a poster nearby outlined the Never Forgotten Black Holocaust; on the counter, a basket of pins all reading “The Black Man is God”; and behind the counter sat Sister Shanida, the only female bookseller I interviewed, and by far the most cordial. Her store was the antithesis of PrimeTime Books – Sister Shanida was certain to avoid selling such “smut,” a word she used often throughout our interview. When I told her after that I was writing for Vice, a word practically synonymous with smut, and a magazine proud to be peddling it, she was a bit thrown off.

Admittedly, I was a bit thrown off too when I first entered her stop – being white, I honestly felt very out of place. But contrary to my initial impressions, Sister Shanida was extraordinarily welcoming, and her book collection mainly consisted of writings by African scholars and religious texts from the Nation of Islam

Now I can’t say that e-v-e-r-y author was African-American (Sister Shanida refused such generalizations), but it was pretty damn close. To be overly fair to the Sister, I did scan through the store, and managed to find a small, very eclectic assortment of white authors, 4.5 of them: Virgil, Dan Brown, Beowulf, and Bob Woodward (I count Obama as half, so as not to be called out on a technicality) (kidding).

I have included below my interview with Sister Shanida, a part-owner at Respect For Life, a nearly all black bookstore, that is (as she explained) absolutely, definitely not, in no way geared toward African-Americans or the Nation of Islam, but nonetheless, a store that serves up a mean bean pie.

………………………………………………………………………………………………

Vice: How long has Respect For Life been here?
Sister Shanida: We’ve been here 12 or 15 years. It was only owned by brothers. So I just came on about five and a half years, a sister and a brother.

So it mostly religious geared?
Oh, no! Not at all, you can look around and see for yourself. When it says “books” outside, it means “books.” But not smut things like that. Just conscious things.

The title of the store is…
…Respect For Life, Books n’ Things, the House of Knowledge. It’s right on the awning.

What does that say about the books your selling?
Oh, we have different sections: spiritual, economics, health, you know things like that, it gears toward each and every aspect of our lives.

What is the clientele that comes in here?
Some of everybody. I just had someone in here today, she was 100. So that made me feel really good. She was telling me about Mississippi and things like that, so young and old, whoever wants some knowledge.

Is it mostly people from the community?
Ohhhhhhhhh noooooooooo! Noooooooo, not at all!

In terms of race, is it mostly…
Oh no! It’s mixed. Yes, it’s mixed. Because I have people coming in here from New Jersey, I have people coming from their home Trinidad, I have a brother in England, when he comes, his family, everyone! Books! They’re looking for books!

How is the collection decided?
Actually it’s what people mostly ask for, but when a brother goes out and he sees something, he usually picks it up…but we give everyone a chance, because we have unpublished writers, you know unpublished writers, they can’t get published. We line up and put their books on the table, and it sells from there, ‘cause they can’t vend outside anymore. So we buy their books off of them, and put them on the table.

Looking around here, I see Louis Farrakhan, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X – are those some of the more popular writers?
Ohhhhhhhh nooo! Noooo, nooo, no, no no, no, not at all, not at all. Everyone comes in, now they asking for Amos Wilson, Dr. John Henry Park, Ivan Van Sertima, Eric Williams, you know…But we are just in the Nation of Islam, so things like that. We are the Nation, yes.

Oh, ok, so this is mostly geared toward the Nation of Islam?
No, NOOO, no. We are in the Nation of Islam, but it’s geared toward community development.

*Now when you’ve said ‘brother’ – *
Well I call everyone – well not everyone – but most people brother and sister.

Not me?
ACTUALLY, in faith, yes. But usually, you know, brother Brown, he comes in, and the brothers that used to own the other bookstore at the corner before they moved, and the other one who got shut down because the rent was so high, yeah, and we try to give the community a little bit more because a lot of times people come and they don’t have enough money, they can come up with the $5 or $10, that’s alright. And people can’t believe that someone is actually saying, oh you need a number? We don’t need a number, just bring it back, because it’s on you, not me. Because I have to live with myself and you have to live with you. It helps a great deal when we try to help each other.

Why sell books – do you just love them? Are books a hobby of yours?
No, I met the brother, he invited me to get books for mosque, and I was a Christian. And I went back to the mosque a couple of times, and he was talking about Jesus, and I did my research on Jesus, in the Church they told us that Jesus was God, an ultimate power, come to find out Jesus says, he would say, Our Father, Who Art in Heaven, and you know the words got mixed up. And I did more research and found out that Jesus said he was a prophet of God, but not God. So that helped getting me coming in the direction of the Nation of Islam. And at that time, it was 2001, and in 2004, I became a business partner.

Did you get involved here because this is the message that you want to spread?
Oh most definitely: truth. Truth, plain, unadulterated truth, that’s it. It’s either between God or the devil, yes or no. There’s no in between, so with that, I’m just happy with that.

Do you have a lot of students coming in? What are they reading for school?
Oh, yes. Well I know when it’s time for the finals and they have to write papers, they need books from Anthony T. Browder, of course, and they are just putting on Eric Williams, and they want them to study about Haiti, so J.A. Rogers as well…

How are these books chosen? Are you marketing to the community?
We try to give something to everybody cause – Yurugu! Okay? You know what this is about right?

(She shows me a book, and I read the title)

It’s the African-centered Critique of European Thought.

You know what that books about, right?

I would assume about critiquing European thought?
No, it’s not that at all. She’s just so fascinated, she gets deep into the science of it, so it’s, persons or people that we conversate with when they come in here, and places that we go, and when a person asks for a particular book, then we try to get it, then we see what’s next, closest to that book…

What message are you trying to get across with these particular books?
Oh, no, they come and ask for a particular book, and if we don’t have that…they say can you give me something closer to that? And I point to this, what you need it for? And they may say I’m working on right now chemistry, and I’ll say, let me call a sister for you to find out. And I call the sister and she’ll say, okay get this book and that book for him.

Since you are in the Nation of Islam, are the people who most often come in here interested in, or a part of, the Nation of Islam?
Nooo, oh God no.

So there’s a wide mix of everybody?
Yes, yes, yes.

Is it predominately black?
No, it’s a mix. It’s really a mix. Because I have a couple of rabbis that come in and purchase tapes, particular tapes, so forth and so on. So it’s a big mix. And I have ministers that come in and they purchase particular books besides bibles. So there’s a mix. And people come in for the bean pies, which I don’t have right now.

Uh-oh. So I was trying to take in your collection, and we have Barack Obama’s book next to Bob Woodward’s, you know, it’s such a –
It all coincides with one another, this whole area. This whole area.

Some of this section has to do with war –
So, no, I mean, like I said, you have The Slaughter: An American Atrocity, you have the Forbidden Fruit here, so it just goes on and on…we have a bit of everything.

(There are several piles of newspapers around the store)

What is The Final Call?
It’s our paper that we publish every week.

This bookstore?
No, the Nation of Islam. So we publish our paper every week to let people know what’s going on in the world, not like the news media – found out there’s a lot of smut stuff in the news – I don’t want to know what’s going on with Tiger Wood’s marriage, I need to know that my bus 15 crashed into like 5 people up here, last week a house burnt down on the block.

So local news?
And Queens. And the gentleman who shot his wife and two sons, you know, things like that. And the gentleman that they just shot, and claimed he shot 4 police officers. First they said that he was just someone they wanted to question. Then they said, a second report was that he’s not a suspect. Then a third report said that he’s a suspect now, after they shot him. And I’m looking at the whole story, and I said wow, one lie after the other, and I said, nah.

So the paper would have some breaking news on that?
Actually, if The Final Call gets the truth, then it’ll put it out there, but most likely the news media, they don’t do justice for us, and we allow them to keep –

For us, meaning the Nation of Islam?
No, us as a people.

When you say a people, you mean typically African-Americans?
No, for us as a people. Just for us as a people.

Everyone?
Everyone.

Interesting.
‘Cause a lie is a lie whether you tell it to a black person or a white person, a lie is still a lie. So it’s not differentiating ‘cause truth doesn’t differentiate between colors. But that’s a good paper though.

(A few people enter the shop; a short conversation between Sister Shanida and a customer)

Sister Shanida: As-Salamu Alaykum, how are you, sir?

Brother W: Alright now.

Sister Shanida: Wonderful, sir.

Brother W: Just got back.

Sister Shanida: Oh, yes sir.

Brother W: I went down to North Carolina.

Sister Shanida: Oh, how was the trip?

Brother W: I had to confront that situation.

(They discuss the situation in vague terms while she gets him a delicious pie.)

………………………………………………………………………………………………

A couple blocks away is True South Books, a store with a bold message above the door that I imagine was written with Public-Enemy-Fight-the-Power fervor (but maybe I’m just a disconnected white man). “DO THE READING” the sign exclaims. Obama posters are glued to the windows, along with a small, humble cardboard sign that says simply, “Reading is more important than watching T.V.” True South is a bookstore, yes, but also a barbershop, allowing it (as many Bed-Stuy residents described) to really connect with the neighborhood. While the owners would not grant me an interview, True South appeared genuinely concerned about selling books to the community, getting people to read, and spreading a certain message, just like Sister Shanida. I asked a manager at PrimeTime whether he started the store, in part, to bring reading to the community, especially the younger generations that otherwise might not be exposed to books. I basically led the witness: it was a real softball pitch and would make for an easy answer. But his response was curt, disingenuous, and telling: “Yeah,” the manager replied, “and to make money.”

Throughout my interviews, I had expected to hear stereotypes about Williamsburg residents. I assumed I would spend time listening to vendors yap about how hipsters are pseudo-intellectuals, or how comparing editions of Pynchon and Kafka strokes their faux-academic egos. But the vendors didn’t touch on these stereotypes, and only rarely did they even stereotype Williamsburg residents negatively. Many though conveyed the perceptions of the neighborhood’s locals. “These people here are educated, very very educated…a whole bunch of artists,” one bookseller told me, “Someone who knows about literature, they could stand here, and look at all these, and go, Wow! I know that guy! I’ve heard about it!” Another seller saw it differently. He argued that Williamsburgers read Kerouac, for example, not because he’s a good writer (he’s not, according to the seller), but because “he’s hip and popular.” Arguably, that claim extends to any of the authors I mentioned in the earlier paragraphs – Chabon, Murakami, Diaz, Foer, Eggers – after all, they are popular: of course they’d sell. “They are called classics for a reason, and if you want to be anyone on this planet, in any field, you have to have a basic background in some of the classics,” another vendor contended. Fair enough.

And maybe that’s just it. Williamsburg residents are educated; they obviously read authors that are trendy; and they read those books, in some part, to be someone “on this planet.” This perception of Williamsburgers is an important factor in how the Bedford book vendors decide their collections. They assume they know their demographics – the young and white and educated – and they assume they know what sells – multiple booksellers told me the most popular author was Hemmingway. In Bed-Stuy, as that blunt Williamsburg vendor said, “[It’s] a different story.” At PrimeTime Books, the most popular author is Deja King, among a sea of gutter-fresh urban fiction. Why? Because, as that manager phrased it, the books are “suitable” for the demographics – the young and black and _______ – I wonder if the manager could fill in the blank.

Then again, maybe book vendors don’t really know their customers. Maybe their understanding of the community is wrong, and their ‘socioeconomic reason’ for selling what they sell, where they sell it, is just erroneous. In Williamsburg the vendors feed off the perception of the neighborhood and hawk littérature to the educated. After all, Atlas Shrugged, Midnight’s Children, Lolita, they all sell on the street, so they must have pinned down their clientele accurately. In Bed-Stuy, PrimeTime too feeds off the perception of the neighborhood, only an entirely inverted one, and the store hawks urban fiction. After all, Bitch Reloaded, Payback is a Motha, Riding Dirty on I-95: A Novel, they all sell in Bed-Stuy, so PrimeTime must’ve read their demographics right. Right? Well stores like Respect For Life and True South demonstrate otherwise, and show how PrimeTime is indeed just peddling smut, or at least misreading and underestimating their clientele.

On 40th and Madison, two book vendors sell directly across from one another. They are two very different sellers. On the Westside is “Madison Avenue Book Man” (he has a business card) who specializes in urban fiction. “A lot of people come by here, traffic all over. You got the McDonald’s, the dollar store, it’s a good location,” he told me one afternoon. “These books are for a specific market; they are geared for African Americans.” Across the street, on the Eastside, the other seller gives a similar explanation for setting up shop. “It’s a good location, plenty of traffic, nice people,” he explained. Only a crosswalk away, these vendors reach the same clientele; yet the Eastsider hawks bestsellers – James Patterson, Nicholas Sparks, Dan Brown. “It’s just what sells around this area,” he explains. With his collection of urban fiction, Madison Avenue Book Man tells a different story.

Of course, New York (especially midtown) is populated enough to cover these ranges of taste and interest; any Barnes and Noble will have a far wider range. Yet when it comes to the reasons for selling certain books in certain locations, these book vendors choose their markets based on, if anything, gut-feelings about the neighborhood rather than some sound socioeconomic reasoning. And maybe that should be obvious.

Less than a block away from these two sellers is a massive branch of the N.Y. Public Library system, and across the street from it, towers the actual New York Public Library itself, lions and columns and all. Vending books on 40th and Madison is a bit like starting a museum on the steps of the MET, or setting up a hotdog cart in front of Gray’s Papaya – it just doesn’t make sense. Perhaps ultimately these booksellers simply don’t know what they are doing; maybe they sell what they sell, where they sell it, based only on either on neighborhood stereotypes or proximity to their mothers’ basements. Who knows?

As one bookseller put it, “I’ve been doing this for a long time, and I’ve never really been able to figure it out. There’s no science to it.”