Brattlecast #99 - Strand by Me

Today we’re discussing recent news about Covid-19’s impact on the Strand bookstore. The New York City institution received an outpouring of support after its owner, Nancy Bass Wyden, took to social media, detailing the 93-year-old store’s dire financial situation and asking the public for help. The Strand’s story has a happy ending, but many others have not been so lucky: according to the American Booksellers Association, more than one independent bookshop has closed for good each week since the start of the pandemic in March. We’ll talk about why this crisis is especially hard on smaller book stores, many of which rely on city foot traffic and in-store events, and have already been weakened by years of competition with online giants like Amazon. While the Brattle isn’t going anywhere, it functions best as part of a thriving community of fellow booksellers, the diminishment of which is a real loss to literary culture and to the fabrics of our cities and towns.