[Marxism] The death of Cody's bookstore

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

NY TImes, June 18, 2006
In Berkeley, a Store's End Clouds a Street's Future
By JESSE McKINLEY

BERKELEY, Calif., June 13 ? Depending on whom you ask, the reason Cody's 
Books is going out of business is either because of the City of Berkeley, 
the homeless, the University of California, the war in Iraq, Ronald Reagan, 
the Internet or the lack of short-term parking.

Or, of course, all of the above.

What is certain is that come next month, Cody's ? the famed independent 
bookseller where Allen Ginsberg once howled, Mario Savio once clerked and 
Salman Rushdie defied a fatwa ? will close its doors after a half century. 
The store's owner, Andy Ross, said his decision was painfully simple.

"We've been losing money for a number of years," said Mr. Ross, who bought 
the store from Fred and Pat Cody in 1977. "We just didn't have any other 
choice."

In recent years, independent bookstores nationwide have struggled in the 
wake of superstores like Barnes & Noble and Web outlets like Amazon.com, 
and Mr. Ross said that type of competition played a large part in the 
decline of Cody's. But this being Berkeley, home of the Free Speech 
Movement and countless doctoral candidates, almost everyone in town has a 
thesis (or a conspiracy thesis) about what really happened to Cody's and 
what it means for a city where bookstores are more common than banks.

In particular, Berkeley city officials are especially worried about 
Telegraph Avenue, which has long been the city's main commercial drag, a 
stretch of quirky shops and cheap restaurants and bars that has drawn 
generations of students, tourists and tie-dye aficionados. Nearly $100 
million is spent every year along Telegraph, a figure that Mayor Tom Bates 
said "most places in the United States would be delighted with."

Over the last decade, however, sales have slipped and several small 
businesses have closed, a development that has alarmed city officials also 
distressed over deteriorating conditions on Telegraph Avenue. That concern 
blossomed into full-blown panic with the news of Cody's closing.

"There's fear and horror at the thought of Cody's not being there," said 
Kriss Worthington, a city councilman who called a "Save Telegraph" town 
hall meeting on June 8 to address concerns about safety and sales along the 
avenue. "And unless the city reverses course, you can expect a deluge of 
other small stores leaving."

Indeed, just days after Cody's announced that it would close on July 10, 
the city hurriedly put together a supplementary budget package to pay for 
more police, a mental health worker and a general cleanup campaign for the 
strip.

"I think it was a shock that an institution like Cody's was closing," Mr. 
Bates said. "But as terrible and horrible as it is, I think it gives us the 
impetus to make these changes."

Part of Telegraph's appeal has always been its mix of freedom and 
unpredictable grit, and much of that spirit is still in evidence, with the 
homeless with worn eyes and dingy bedrolls regularly begging for change. In 
front of Cody's, some locals openly drink and smoke what is more than 
likely marijuana in the middle of the day.

But even in this famously liberal enclave, locals say that sort of behavior 
gets tired fast.

"You've got the homeless, derelicts and drunks and other behavior that 
wouldn't be permitted anywhere else," said Gene Barone, a manager at Moe's 
Books, a store next door to Cody's that has also seen its sales dip.

Other merchants say there has also been a demographic shift as baby boomers 
and free-lovers abandon the 1960's and head into their actual 60's.

"There's all kind of factors, including the extent to which the entire 
community has changed over the last 10 years," said Marc Weinstein, a 
co-owner of Amoeba Music, a store across the street from Cody's that has 
lost a third of its business in recent years. "I mean, you can't buy a 
house for less than $1 million near the university. And if you're rich, you 
don't want to be on Telegraph."

Still, the rich and the poor are not the only ones getting blamed. Mr. 
Weinstein said the attitudes of the university and its students had also 
changed.

"We have a completely different kind of student body than used to go to 
Berkeley," he said. "What used to be a much more kind of social and 
politically orientated and active group is now much more 
business-orientated. There really isn't a passion for art and music the way 
there used to be."

University officials agree that as college admissions ? and the waiting job 
market ? have gotten more competitive, so have the students. But they also 
say that nostalgia has its limits.

"Students have changed over the years, and some of the shops haven't kept 
up," said Irene Hegarty, the university's director of community relations. 
"I mean, how many tattoo shops can one street have?"

Mr. Ross admits that students' tastes may have changed. "If people are not 
interested in reading Kant's 'Critique of Pure Reason,' I can't make them 
do it," he said, adding that two other smaller branches of Cody's Books ? 
one in Berkeley and another in San Francisco ? have adapted their catalogs 
to make them more reader-friendly.

The original Cody's, which was founded in 1956, was considered a business 
innovator for years, adding readings, talkbacks and kaffeeklatschen to the 
book-buying experience long before Barnes & Noble supersized the concept. 
In the 1960's, the Free Speech Movement leader Mario Savio worked behind 
the counter at Cody's, and tear gas was known to waft in occasionally when 
Vietnam War protesters clashed with police. With a mix of obscure and 
scholarly texts and superstar writers ? Mr. Rushdie dropped in unannounced 
in the mid-1990's, as did Mr. Ginsberg ? Cody's was a must-see stop on 
college tours and in guide books.

That symbiotic relationship between the university and the street, however, 
is showing signs of strain. At the town hall meeting called by Mr. 
Worthington, there seemed to be palpable anger at the university for 
diverting business away from local merchants to large companies like 
OfficeMax, which recently secured a contract to supply the school with 
paper. Students were also not especially popular at the meeting, 
particularly after Mr. Worthington invited all of the school's student 
senators to speak and only one ? 19-year-old Van Nguyen ? showed up. (In 
their defense, school's out for summer.)

Mr. Nguyen said students did care. "I think that there's something to be 
done to revitalize the economic vitality of Telegraph," he said. "And 
students should play a big part in the process."

The city does not seem to want to wait, however, and it is pushing forward 
with its plan to add money to the budget and crack down on drug-dealing in 
People's Park, the university-owned civic green near Telegraph where the 
homeless and diploma-bound share space.

Mr. Bates said he was also looking to add parking, which has been a 
constant complaint in the city. "The irony is that before Cody's went 
under, we were addressing all these problems," he said. "It's too valuable 
a street not to thrive."

But as much as things may have changed along Berkeley's main street, the 
song often remains the same, including its denizens' penchant for finding 
larger plots (and often larger conservative plots) in local affairs.

Take Steven David Lewis (a k a Screwy Lewie), a longtime Berkeley resident 
and guitar player who busks in front of Cody's. A Vietnam veteran, Mr. 
Lewis lays the blame for the store's closing on Ronald Reagan (for adding 
to the homeless problem) and the current President Bush.

"The war in Iraq is sapping all the little economies across the country, 
and Cody's was hit by that, too," Mr. Lewis said. "It's sad. This corner 
was part of the Free Speech Movement. I just hope they don't take that 
away, too."


________________________________________________
YOU MUST clip all extraneous text before replying to a message.
Send list submissions to: Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism