If a book is worth reading, it is worth buying.
Wigtown, in a fairly inaccessible spot in Dumfries and Galloway, south-west Scotland, has 900 residents and over a quarter of a million books, housed in over 20 bookshops.
Being a bibliophile and erstwhile secondhand bookshop owner myself, I’ve intended to get there for the past several years, ever since one of those 900 residents came up with a Good Idea and the whole town was cajoled into remodelling itself as Scotland’s National Book Town. Well done that person!
Finally made the trip last Saturday and had a great time, despite the horizontal driving rain which accompanied us all the way from Glasgow and stayed with us throughout the day until ten minutes before we were leaving Wigtown, the bookshops having closed for the day. Then the sun came out.
It’s a very pretty little town, even in the rain. Most of the bookshops look from the outside like doll’s houses, and not much bigger – so it’s a surprise and a delight when you squeeze through a narrow door into what you expect to be a tiny one-room shop, only to find that once inside, room leads on to room after tiny room, through low doorways, up creaking old stairs, tucked under the eaves – and every one of them jam-packed with books.
Books of all shapes, sizes and conditions, some new but most secondhand: tall books, small books, some as big as yer ‘ead; from unassuming paperbacks to beautiful leather-bound gold-tooled tomes; books costing 50 pence or hundreds of pounds – and every price in between; children’s books; ‘adult’ books (even vintage Playboy magazines lovingly protected in their own plastic covers with a health warning prominently displayed over the shelf); science, sci fi, fantasy, literature, art, and on and on, not forgetting the inevitable ‘miscellaneous’…
My two favourite titles discovered on the day were:
When Men Wore Muffs
and
Sheep and their Skin (an ordinary-looking volume, which amazed me when I opened it and found it marked up at £100.)
I came away with three books from three different shops, but wishing for unlimitless funds and bookshelf space.
The good news is that we only managed to see about half a dozen shops – about a quarter of those currently there. I’m just going to have to go back another time!
For more, see www.wigtown-booktown.co.uk/
Being a bibliophile and erstwhile secondhand bookshop owner myself, I’ve intended to get there for the past several years, ever since one of those 900 residents came up with a Good Idea and the whole town was cajoled into remodelling itself as Scotland’s National Book Town. Well done that person!
Finally made the trip last Saturday and had a great time, despite the horizontal driving rain which accompanied us all the way from Glasgow and stayed with us throughout the day until ten minutes before we were leaving Wigtown, the bookshops having closed for the day. Then the sun came out.
It’s a very pretty little town, even in the rain. Most of the bookshops look from the outside like doll’s houses, and not much bigger – so it’s a surprise and a delight when you squeeze through a narrow door into what you expect to be a tiny one-room shop, only to find that once inside, room leads on to room after tiny room, through low doorways, up creaking old stairs, tucked under the eaves – and every one of them jam-packed with books.
Books of all shapes, sizes and conditions, some new but most secondhand: tall books, small books, some as big as yer ‘ead; from unassuming paperbacks to beautiful leather-bound gold-tooled tomes; books costing 50 pence or hundreds of pounds – and every price in between; children’s books; ‘adult’ books (even vintage Playboy magazines lovingly protected in their own plastic covers with a health warning prominently displayed over the shelf); science, sci fi, fantasy, literature, art, and on and on, not forgetting the inevitable ‘miscellaneous’…
My two favourite titles discovered on the day were:
When Men Wore Muffs
and
Sheep and their Skin (an ordinary-looking volume, which amazed me when I opened it and found it marked up at £100.)
I came away with three books from three different shops, but wishing for unlimitless funds and bookshelf space.
The good news is that we only managed to see about half a dozen shops – about a quarter of those currently there. I’m just going to have to go back another time!
For more, see www.wigtown-booktown.co.uk/
posted by Nicki at 2:46 PM
4 Comments:
Sounds like a truly wonderful place. I miss so many of the urban bookshops, which wind through basements and subbasements with shelf after shelf of rare books!
-- david
rockin'- this info is going straight in the travel file for our next trip to Scotland. thanks
Oh it sounds like my kind of heaven. I live in a area with about 90,000 people. The main town has about 40,000 - we have only one main book shop which is useless because its all DVD's and gifts with a few bookd thrown in just to call it a bookstore, and another discount one. And a secondhand shop...thats it...I go crazy if ever I am away and see a different bookshop
Just got to your post on Wigtown; I've been fascinated with the whole international "booktown" movement (California has one as well in Grass Valley near Sacramento). Your depiction helped verify that destinations like Wigtown are just my cup of tea! Thanks!
--Mark
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