St. Mark's Bookshop Reopens

The last of the old shop

Since 1977 St. Mark's Bookshop has been a cornerstone independent bookseller in the East Village. The global economic crisis in 2008, coupled with a dizzying rent increase (to $23,500 per month) by its landlord, The Cooper Union (embroiled in its own institutional dramas), imperiled its existence at its two-decades-old home at 3rd Avenue between 8th and 9th Streets, leading to several online campaigns to keep the store afloat and, most recently, to ensure it could find a new location in Manhattan. After a hunt the owners found that new location, signing a lease in May for a storefront space at 3rd St. and Avenue A, just a few blocks south of Tompkins Square Park and so, as of this past weekend, St. Mark's Bookshop has reopened.

The new location, under construction

A few weeks ago I met up with a friend, Tisa B., who was visiting from California, and we dropped by the old St. Mark's, which was in the process of being dismantled, shelf by shelf. I stood and watched for a while, wistfully, remembering how often I'd visited the store over the years. It was, I can recall, the first store to stock copies of my first book. It also became, along with the now shuttered Nikos', an indispensable spot to find unusual journals and zines. Though I never read there, I attended a number of readings and talks there over the years, and more often than not would run into friends and acquaintances I hadn't seen in some time. Tisa and I thought the new location had already opened, but instead we found them still under constructed. We were too early, but it was clear the new space would be inviting.

The new location's façade

On E. 3rd Street

The new St. Mark's is considerably smaller (by half), though with a cleaner, airy design. The size is deceptive, though, because there's more room than I expected in the back. White, curving shelves beneath a black ceiling line the shop, a modular unit in the front of the store holds journals, and the book sections are all easier to find by sight. The stock, however, remains on the leaner side (except, strangely enough, for works by Karl Ove Knausgaard), though nowhere near as threadbare as several years ago, when St. Mark's barren appearance suggested the store might not survive. I've never found the staff particularly friendly, and this has carried over into the new store, but the one of the owners was in the day I dropped in, and we had a pleasant chat about St. Mark's carrying the Hilst translations (not there), among other things. Other books I was looking for were not in stock either, but I bought several books I did not already have, and look forward to returning later this year, when they're more fully up and running.

The new space

The front of the store

What Next for St. Mark's Bookshop?

Almost two weeks ago, St. Mark's Bookshop, the 35-year-old independent East Village and New York City treasure that was nearly ousted from its home last year, met its crowd-sourcing goal on Lucky Ant, and raised the $23,000 it was seeking to show potential landlords that it did have the money for a down-payment on a new lease. (According to the Lucky Ant page, the store has now raised about $28,000.) It will be vacating its old home, no matter what.

The current landlord, The Cooper Union, has joined the ranks of Manhattan's rapacious speculators, and will be raising the bookshop's monthly rent to that outrageous $23,000 level, meaning the store would have to generate $276,000 in yearly sales just to pay the rent, all other costs--payroll and benefits, book orders, utilities, insurance, etc.--notwithstanding.  That a private, not-for-profit educational institution would be doing this to a long-time cultural landmark that benefits not only general readers but its own faculty and students is appalling, but appeals to The Cooper Union apparently have gone nowhere, and so St. Mark's must find a new home, lest it suffer the fate of so many other local independent booksellers, like The Gotham Book Mart, Christopher Street Books, A Different Light, and University Place Bookstore, to name just a few, that exist now as bookmarks in a future literary history of the city.

All of the communication I've received from St. Mark's has been quite appreciative of patrons' and the larger community's support, and suggested to me, at least, that things perhaps weren't so bleak. This past weekend and then again earlier in the week I had to grab some books for my classes, and what I saw in the store contradicted this somewhat, or at least complicated the picture. When I stopped in on the weekend, there was some traffic, but nothing close to what I imagined given the enthusiasm I'd seen online for the store. Rows of shelves stood stripped bare of books, some sections, like fiction, critical studies, and philosophy particularly denuded. Then when I met up with a friend there before lunch this week, it was equally sepulchral, which led me to ask one of the staff members about the move, and she politely told me that the situation was "up in the air," she didn't know what was coming, and that the store would be in contact with its supporters.

I snapped a few pictures of the moribund space. I hope the owners can find a new, affordable spot and long-term lease soon, though I know it will be very--no, extremely--difficult given the realities of Manhattan real estate these days. But the St. Mark's Bookshop has long been a vital repository and a cultural icon, and its loss would be a serious blow to the intellectual and creative ecology of New York; Manhattan may be able to thrive economically on luxury condo buildings and hotels, ultra-elite boutiques and boîtes, and a service industry catering to the 1%, but it will be a drastically different place from what it has been for the preceding 300 years, becoming an overstuffed Dubai with the memory of its once vibrantly diverse intellectual and creative past but a waning fragrance for those passing through. If you haven't already offered financial support to St. Mark's, please consider doing so at the Lucky Ant link above, or sending them moral support via stmarksbooks@mindspring.com.

In the front door

Where once stood full shelves of critical studies books

Part of the fiction section