29 October 2004

Bestselling means nothing

Statistics on best selling books are easy to find, but how do we know which books are the best loved? I suspect they aren’t the ones that sell the most copies. People buy books as gifts, as symbols, as coffee-table decorations; they buy hard covers that way especially, but even paperbacks are bought by people who intend to read them but never do. We could look at what gets checked out of the library the most, but I think even that would skew towards what people think they should read rather than what they want to (and I for one sure don’t read everything I check out).

The publishing industry doesn’t care so much about what people love, it just wants people to buy its books – once again, the process that gets books into people’s hands isn’t only about actually reading and enjoying it, and people who love to read are relying on an industry that doesn’t necessarily want to please them. We need pretty covers and magazine ads and talk show appearances to draw our attention to the books that are out there, but time and tastes will eventually filter out the chaff and people will find their way to the books they love to read. A book might get attention for the wrong reasons and sell well, but with so much being published today, I believe every book has a chance to land a copy in the library or used book store, where someone, led by a tip from a friend, will find it and love it. Witness the revival of Paula Fox’s career, thanks to book-lover and minor celebrity Jonathan Franzen.

Perhaps the purest form of library is the University library, where the covers are removed and every book is equal, bound in solid color cloth, with its title stamped in white on the spine. A book might feel good to look at and hold (we’re all counting on that so that books survive the digital age), but you can keep it in your head and heart forever.