Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

On-line

2007; Philosophy Documentation Center; Volume: 11; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/nhr.2007.0000

1534-5815

Gregory Carr,

Publishing and Scholarly Communication

On-line Gregory Carr In the spring of 1981, I had taken a year off from university before commencing my master's degree, to tour Europe. I had a backpack full of books: Fitzgerald and Hemingway, Yeats and Joyce, and I had an aunt, uncle, and three cousins in Germany to return to in times of need (such as when I ran out of clean clothes). I bought a Eurail pass and began my literary tour of Europe, spending much time in Paris seeking out locations associated with the authors in my backpack and other great writers. In Paris, I was enthralled by Shakespeare and Co., and after purchasing a number of books, was offered a bed in an upstairs room in return for work—an offer I always regret not having taken up. Shakespeare and Co. was, and still is, a wonderland, a bookshop filled with charm and character. My Eurail pass allowed me passage on an overnight ferry from France to Ireland; gale weather forced us to anchor for twenty-four hours near the Cliffs of Dover. I was so sick I couldn't even read. Ireland was in the grip of the madness of the Hunger Strikes. Bobby Sands was near death and the country very tense. After a couple of nights in Dublin regaining my land legs, I took the train west to Galway and quickly settled there for a few weeks. Kennys Bookshop was the main reason I stayed so long. Like Shakespeare and Co., Kennys was a warm and inviting bookshop, a browser's paradise, where each room held buried treasures. There were books, and dust, piled everywhere. I spent hours browsing and reading and buying. Unfortunately, my stay ended too quickly: there were no beds upstairs for wannabe writers or aspiring booksellers. I promised myself I would return. Four years later I kept that promise. A friend and I returned on June 2, 1985, more widely remembered as the day Bruce Springsteen played Slane Castle. We flew into Shannon and took a bus to Limerick, where the city was nearly deserted. A few days later we took another bus to Galway, where we immediately went to Kennys and stocked up for the summer. My friend went to the Gaeltacht to learn Irish (which he did, becoming fluent within a month) and I bought a Volkswagen Variant to continue my literary tour, this time focusing on Yeats. I slept in a tent in a field behind Thoor Ballylee. I climbed and camped out on Ben Bulben. My friend and I shared a bottle of Paddy's with WB in the graveyard outside Sligo: one slug for me, one for my friend, one for Willie. We went to Inishfree. We stayed in Coole Park for three nights, communing with the famous swans, until we were discovered and ejected by the groundsman. Throughout the summer, we returned frequently to Galway and to Kennys for fresh reading material. There was always more than we could carry or afford, [End Page 130] even though the dollar was strong and the Variant a capacious car. Kennys seemed to be thriving when the rest of the Irish economy was stagnant. My friend returned to America to commence his doctoral studies, and I cashed in my return ticket. I looked for work in Galway without success; Kennys seemed to be staffed entirely by family members. Every Irish person I met told me I was mad to even consider staying in Ireland. Emigration was rampant. Every person under thirty was heading out, for America, Australia—anywhere but Ireland. I decided to go to Dublin, where I rented a flat in Leeson Park that was owned by the show band superstar Dickie Rock. I had no idea who Dickie Rock was. When I knocked on the door, he and his wife were cleaning the building, wearing rubber gloves and aprons and scuffed-kneed denim. One large square high-ceilinged room for 100 Irish pounds per month. I took it. I parked my car in the drive and started looking for a job. I ran out of money. I used a credit card to buy bread and cheese and milk and briquettes as the...