The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-12-15
SOME WHO LIKE OLD BOOKS.
Customers Still for Secondhand
Dealers Productions of Long Ago.

New York Sun.
A secondhand boOkdealer in one of the
old hooks of New York was rearranging
a lot of broken-back volumes when book
hunter entered and asked for publication
which came into the market only this year.
Haven't got it," said the dealer with
sort of surprise i'm his manner. After
the inquirer departed the dealer spoke
his mind about follows
The idea of anybody coming in here
to buy one of these new books which has
run up into its ninety ninth thousand be-
fore it came from the press! Humpbi
That book may be on these shelves after
/ am dead and gone, but not before.
Il suppose some people read all these
new books that are written and printed
every year. They wouldn't be written and
printed If it were otherwise.
But let me tell you something. You
would be surprised to know how many
people who consider themselves book men
and are quite competent to criticise book
never read any new books.
Il know an editor who once, not so very
long ago either, wrOte to some of these
competent critics asking them to give their
opinions on the new books they had read.
He told me that the replies he received
amazed him.
Eight, out of ten replied that they had
rot read any new books in years. The
writer's gave various reasons. Some said
they had no time to read new books. Some
said they had no desire to do
You would be surprised should / show
you some of the letters | have from people
up the country, and in distant States, ask
ing IL l have certain old books of which
many of the new generation know nothing
Only the ether Cay L had a letter from an
editor m Minnesota asking for two copies
of Ludovic Halevy's The Able Constantin.'
He said he wanted two copies so he
could cut them for the printer, as he
wished to run the story as a serial. L sup
pose that would make some of the new
authors smile. i showed that letter to a
professor in one of our universities, and he
calculated with a warmth which did me
good:
Thank God, there is some hope! A
community that hungers for 1.-THE Able
kingdom of heaven l suppose that there
are people in that community who would
read SCOTS Waverley novelist
Then he asked me IL / had a copy of
Jane Eyre He said he had niece who
had just herad of Charlotte Brontes work
of the human heart. Think of that And
that work was dedicated to Thackerayi
Not long ago woman whose stateii-
ness of manner made my mind shamble
back to the days when my own mother
was one of the queens of a New England
hamlet came in here and said she was look
ing for Wilkie Collinss No Name" of
course I had il. l had had it for years
Il made bod TO ask here who wanted
that book at this time of the world and
she said she wanted a copy to send TO one
of the smart set who had never read one
of Wilkie Collins's books. L made her
present of the only copy l had.
II sometimes sit here on a rainy day like
this Git was last Tuesday,, when business
is quiet and wonder what class of books
will be on the dusty shelves of secondhand
shops like mine fifty years hence 1 could
name some that won't. But they say L am
an old fOgy."