Wendy Kaufman over at The Happy Booker (via City Desk) alerts us to the sad news that Candida’s World of Books, the 14th Street independent bookstore that focused primarily on travel and international titles, will soon be shutting its doors after only four years in business.
Candida’s had a niche, and its niche was “travel,” for want of a better word. But referring to Candida’s as a “travel” bookstore didn’t really do justice to what it offered. Sure, you could go there and pick up the latest Fodor’s or Lonely Planet guide, or maps and other travel necessities (such as journals or empty scrapbooks that invited your filling them with your observations or artifacts you discovered).
But it’s also where you could find a knowledgeable staff that knew the difference between mere “guidebooks” and travel books, and who could in turn direct you to some of the best travel narratives on whatever region you were planning to visit or wanting to know more about. Candida’s was where you could discover the writing of Peter Fleming — brother of Ian, author of the James Bond spy novels — who was not only an experienced traveler but whose travel narratives demonstrated that he was perhaps a better prose stylist than his brother; it’s where you could find Paul Fussell’s Abroad: British Literary Traveling Between The Wars, one of the most influential surveys of the genre and one that perhaps single-handedly resurrected it from obscurity. It’s where you could easily pick up a copy of Bruce Chatwin’s In Patagonia or Robert Byron’s The Road to Oxiana, so brilliant a travel narrative that it’s been described as “the Ulysses of travel books.”
The store is closed on Mondays, so we haven’t been able to reach them today to find out all the details yet. According to Kaufman, “all Candida’s stock is now 20% off, if not discounted even more heavily — some books on sale at $3.00, $5.00, $10.00….Everything, including bookshelves, kiddie reading house, rolling ladders, must go!”
Bargains, to be sure. But still too high a price. Candida’s will be missed.
Photo by Rob Goodspeed
