A Smorgasbord of Bookstores With Personalities

Helene Hanff never did get to meet her bookseller pen pal, Frank Doel. But she did immortalize him in her book “84 Charing Cross Road.”

To fans of her memoir and of its recent movie version, the London address of the Marks & Co. shop where Doel worked is a shrine to the civilized joys of reading.

So it is unsettling for them to learn that the site of the legendary bookstore is now occupied by a record shop. That is a sad discovery made with some frequency.

However, if visitors look around, they will find consolations close at hand. First, the large Marks & Co. street sign hangs inside the record store, its spiffy black and gold letters conjuring the past.

Second, Hanff’s book is on sale there amid the rock CDs. Third, and most important, Marks & Co. may be gone but Charing Cross Road is still paradise for book lovers.

Within the five blocks south of No. 84, scores of bookstores beckon, each with its own character and characters, specialties and bargains. For a devoted reader from the New World, the browsing experience is exhilarating.

After all, where else can you find a shop devoted to Islamic literature three doors away from one specializing in lesbian themes? With a wonderful art book shop and the outlet for the Oxford University Press in between?

Yet, be warned--the experience can also be depressing. A visitor can be forced to confront how many good books there are to read, and how little time--or money--there is. That is compounded when one realizes that Charing Cross is only one of several book areas of London, along with Bloomsbury, Mayfair and suburban Hampstead.

Expert as Guide

I am a book lover. However, my friend and travel companion, Michael Blatty, is a self-described bibliomaniac. He parlayed an interest in collecting rare editions of Shelley and Byron into opening a secondhand bookstore on Ventura Boulevard in Sherman Oaks, Calif.

The shop’s name, not surprisingly, is Charing Cross Books. So under Mike’s professional eye, I prowled the namesake street recently.

Charing Cross Road and the picturesque, auto-free Cecil Court at its bottom prove the urban planner’s axiom that proximity and competition is good for merchants and shoppers.

Even the well-known Zwemmer’s chain has four stores near the intersection of Litchfield Street. The one at 80 Charing Cross specializes in theater and movie books, another at 24 Litchfield has art books, 26 Litchfield is music, and the fourth, at 74 Charing Cross, has the classics and scholarly works published by Oxford University Press.

Next door, like a challenge to the British imperialism often bred at Oxford, is Al Hoda, a newish shop of Islamic literature and political tracts.

And at 68 Charing Cross Road, like a challenge to Islam’s traditional treatment of women, is Silver Moon Women’s Bookshop, a collection of feminist and often lesbian themes. At No. 52, Books for a Change stocks titles about nuclear disarmament, ecology and human rights.

Visit those if they interest you, but do not miss Shipley Art Booksellers at No. 70 and Quinto Books at No. 48. Both reminded me of what a girlfriend of Hanff’s once wrote to her about a visit to Marks & Co.: “You smell the shop before you see it. It’s a lovely smell. I can’t articulate it easily, but it combines must and dust and age, and walls of wood and floors of wood.”

The Flavor of Shipley

On a cool day, throw in the odor of a wood-burning fireplace and you have the flavor of Shipley. An eclectic used and new collection ranged from “The Lithographic Works of Toulouse-Lautrec” for only about $7.50 to a glossy book about the jewelry from Van Cleef & Arpels for about $100. And in case you were wondering about “Military Architecture and Siege Warfare in 16th Century Siena,” that was $32.

Quinto has the look and feel of the 1920s, down to its old glass windows and green painted wood. It has many first editions in fiction and history, and an enormous section on travel and exploration. The first edition of D. H. Lawrence’s “The Virgin and the Gypsy” (1930) was selling for $52 and the original 1857 edition of David Livingstone’s “Travels” through Africa was $67.

Browse down the street, past the Leicester Square tube station, and turn left onto Cecil Court, a lovely, stone-paved alley with gas-style street lamps; the atmosphere is distinctly Dickensian.

Cecil Court is a smorgasbord of 11 little book and print shops, often topical: one for the occult, another for nutrition and acupuncture, yet others for music, ballet and modern fiction.

Don’t miss Pleasures of Past Times, at No. 11, a cheery collection of children’s and show-business books, along with antique-style greeting cards and masks. It is a wonderful place to shop for gifts and chat about theater with owner David Drummond. A 1917 edition of Robert Louis Stevenson’s “A Child’s Garden of Verses,” with woodblock prints, caught my eye at $15.

At 4 Cecil Court is Bell, Book & Radmall Ltd., two tiny stories of American and English modern first editions. The rare 1892 version of “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes” by A. Conan Doyle was $750, albeit slightly ink-stained. The original 1929 printing of Ernest Hemingway’s “A Farewell to Arms” listed for about $200; as proof of its worth, search for a typographical error in the word “serious” on page 66.

Thousands of Books

If those prices scare you, rush to Holborn Books at 14 Charing Cross. Crammed into a tiny shop reverberating with rock music you will find thousands of books, all selling for 2 (about $3.20 U.S.) and under.

After the sometimes prissy atmosphere elsewhere, this is a delightful change. Fans of spy novels rejoice in the piles of first editions of Ian Fleming and John LeCarre.

A 20-minute walk (or a five-minute tube ride) away is Bloomsbury, home of the British Museum, the University of London and another enormous pile of book shops. The emphasis is on the Orient, philosophy and the occult. Stroll along Museum Street and Great Russell Street and look for bargains at the outdoor stalls.

Also, take the Northern Line to suburban Hampstead where Keats lived, and stroll to Flask Walk, another book alley. Stop at Stanley Smith and Keith Fawkes, a delightfully crowded shop where we found a gorgeous, first-European edition of Washington Irving’s “Abbotsford and Newstead Abbey” from 1835 for $15.

Across the way, check out the Flask Bookshop and its bearded owner Joseph Connolly, who writes his own books about modern first editions and P. G. Wodehouse.

Booksellers in London are a varied and often eccentric lot. Some are chatty and some officious; some are friendly fussbudgets happy to have you roam freely, while others are suspicious guardians, giving you the fisheye until you exit. Some take well to bargaining, others are offended. But most appear to be very knowledgeable.

The high-end antiquarian book shops are worth a visit just to marvel at the courtliness and erudition of their staffs, as well as at their luxurious decors and rich stocks.

As Elegant as Ever

Maggs Brothers at 50 Berkeley Square in Mayfair is nearly 140 years old and elegant as ever. The thick green carpeting, Indian miniatures and rare maps make one feel that the British Empire is still expanding.

Maggs’ main rival is Henry Sotheran’s, at 2-5 Sachville Street, near Piccadilly. Sotheran’s was founded in York in 1761 and moved to London in 1815. It counted Dickens among its faithful customers and has an intimidating collection on ornithology and botany.

For a slightly less posh but still rarefied book experience, drop in at Bertram Rota at 30-31 Lon Acre, near Covent Garden.

Founded in 1926, this house of modern first editions moved to its new, chic home 10 years ago. It is a quiet, spacious shop, bright with skylights. Some books are in locked cases that the staff will open on request. Rota’s has a lot of German, French and Italian books and a nice collection of poetry and drama. Stephen Spender’s 1933 “Poems” was priced at $68, and the 1968 uncorrected proof of Tom Stoppard’s “The Real Inspector Hound” was $150.

You may not be a bibliomaniac or even a regular book buyer in America, but it is hard to resist browsing and buying something in London.

There is no import duty on books. And even if your wallet forces you to resist, you may still be able to take home some free souvenirs. Most stores give away jaunty bookmarks and terrific mail-order catalogues. After all, Helene Hanff did all her shopping by mail.