This past weekend I made my first annual visit to the fifteenth annual Texas Book Festival in Austin. I ran breathlessly from panel to panel through the Capitol Building. I sat ten feet away from the great Robert Stone, guffawed through a reading by Mr. James Hynes, admitted to myself that I’m totally smitten with Chimamanda Adichie. A few of my favorite writers, many interesting panels, free music, hundreds of books to browse through, hours wandering freely around the beautiful state Capitol. What’s not to love?

Well, I’m glad you asked. What’s not to love is a quote from the Texas Book Festival’s website (emphatic corporatese not my own):

 

The Texas Book Festival allows visitors to bring a maximum of two books that have not been purchased at the Festival. However, in order to have these books signed at least one book must be purchased from the Barnes & Noble book sales tent at the Festival. A receipt from the Barnes & Noble book sales tent must be presented at the book signing tent. Proceeds from book sales at the Festival allow us to keep the weekend event free to the public. Thank you for your support and understanding.

 

First  of all, I’m amused at the presumption that I will toe the corporate line just because I’m thanked in advance. I do not support the policy and the TBF does not have my understanding, therefore I officially reject their unsolicited thanks.

And the word “understanding” is telling, isn’t it? It’s basically a meek, euphemized apology. “We’re sorry that we’ve allowed Barnes & Noble to dictate policy, but … well, you know how it is.” I can almost feel the waves of hot shame shooting from the TBF website.

I’m not against such a policy in general. The Texas Book Festival is a free event, and much of what money it does raise goes to the state library system. Free events need money, money comes from sponsors, and so large, two-day events need lots of money and many sponsors.

With that in mind, here is a partial list of sponsors from whom a receipt proving a book sale did not amount to a puddle of piss as far as the TBF was concerned:

University of Texas Press

Cinco Puntos Press

BookWoman (a local independent bookstore)

The Texas Observer

Ocotillo Press

Badgerdog Literary Publishing

John M. Hardy Publishing

Bright Sky Press

Texas A&M University Press

Texas Christian University Press

University of North Texas Press

Waterloo Press

Gulf Coast: A Journal of Literature and Fine Arts

Love & Courage Publications

Five Star Publications

Shearer Publishing

Javelina Books

Azro Press

Texas Review Press

Light Encore Press

Wings Press

And literally dozens more. Smaller operations fighting for their very existence in a corporatized industry slowly being phased out by the demand for e.

Perhaps that’s a bit dramatic. And yes, the “big box store vs small indie retailer” debate is far from fresh. But that doesn’t mean we should roll over and take it every time a Barnes & Noble starts throwing elbows. Why is a receipt from Barnes & Noble any more meaningful and legitimate than having bought a book from one of the local sellers or small presses? Is it not more noble (if I may) to instead support the little guys?

But it wasn’t just the receipt fiasco that made B&N the dominant bookseller. Geography and comfort played a prominent role, and I can guarantee that when it came time to map the event, the TBF handed the reins over to Barnes & Noble with a coquettish, dimpled smile.

Allow me to set the scene. Imagine if you will a broad street named Congress Avenue that runs directly up to the Capitol Building. It’s the most heavily-trafficked street in downtown Austin, and the three or so blocks of it leading to the Capitol are closed off for the event. Congress Ave. is the obvious outdoor focal point of the Festival. And we’ll come back to it.

Because first we should visit the exhibitor tents for the small presses and indie stores. If we can even find them, a task akin to locating buried treasure without a map. First we must wade through all the action on Congress Ave., the Book Signing Tent, the Lone Star Tent, the Information Booth. We must pass the vendors on 11^th Street selling corn dogs and $3 cans of soda and tacos and cotton candy and the obligatory funnel cakes. We pass the Cooking Tent, we pass the Music Tent. We pass the Medical Tent, which by now we’re almost ready to step inside of.

And then lo and behold, stuffed onto a side street with practically no signage to announce their existence is a group of long, narrow tents languishing in anonymity. The tents are closed on all sides, with flaps on both ends pinned open just wide enough to allow access to two average-sized people, or one Texas-sized person. All we can see inside is dank darkness, but let’s cross our fingers and give it a shot. Because we love books. Hell, that’s why we’re here in the first place, isn’t it? We take a deep breath and venture inside.

The sides of the narrow tents are lined with booths and tables, and us pedestrians are left with an aisle of about three feet in width. As we stop to browse books, we bring to a halt all of the foot traffic in our lane. And when someone else stops at a booth across the aisle at the same time, the entire tent comes to a standstill.

A hot standstill. The 85-degree Austin day couples with the body heat of people stuffed like sausage in casing, and temperatures inside hover around 325 kelvin. The B.O. is so bad that it makes us nostalgic for the smells of the corn dog booth. We can’t see, we can’t move. We’ve read about cattle trains before, but for the first time ever we get a sense of what they might be like. We don’t even know which way is out anymore. All we know is that this is no kind of environment in which to browse and buy books. This is a survival test. This is like being dropped in the middle of a forest with a knife and a shoestring and being told to find our way out in one piece. From nearby we hear someone shouting “Get me out of here!” Over and over and over they scream, but we can’t see the screamer because it’s so dark inside and because we don’t have enough room to turn our head, and it’s so fucking hot and stuffy that we’re gasping for air, and then we realize that nobody is screaming, that what we thought was a vocalized demand was in fact a wordless, but pervasive and animalistic terror given off by every single person inside, including us. And although we love to support our small presses and our local indie retailers, in here we can only do so at the expense of calm, controlled breathing, and we’re just not ready to sacrifice calm, controlled breathing.

And as we attempt to body surf our way to the light at the end of this first of three tunnels of utter Hell, we realize something. We realize that we have brought this on ourselves. We realize that this nation could never have become so corporatized without our compliance. We realize that if we hadn’t shopped so often at so many big box stores, big box stores would never have taken permanent hold. We have allowed ourselves to become slaves to mega, and it is because of this that mega now dictates the policies at the Texas Book Festival. And at most other festivals. And at all levels of government.

And as we step out into the open air again, we put our head between our knees to try to catch some breath, and we understand that this is a most appropriate position, for in this position we can truly focus on our own navel.

Meanwhile, the large, breezy, open-on-all-sides Barnes & Noble tent spans the entire width of Congress Avenue, directly in front of the Capitol. The aisles are wide enough for twin SUVs. Natural sunlight dances off the smooth, glossy finishing of the full-priced trade paperbacks. People called “Associates” wave bamboo fans and are always at the ready to direct us to the new James Patterson. It’s so soothing, so clean and white and welcoming.

Why not just buy a couple of books here in this pristine splendor? It’s as impersonal as a hospital, but what the hell? Nobody else seems to mind.

The only way to miss the Barnes & Noble tent is to intentionally miss it. And the only way to intentionally miss it is to be willing to forfeit the chance to meet a writer you admire, a writer who perhaps you’ve come dozens, maybe even hundreds, of miles to meet.

I’m sure B&N made a major contribution to the TBF. Huzzah. But many people boosted attendance by coming a long way to get their books signed. Can’t we let them do so without making them feed the machine? Book festivals are supposed to be for those who love to read books, not for those who (pretend to) love to sell them.

This is supposed to end with me writing “I’ve made my last purchase from Barnes & Noble,” but to say so would be false. Because next year, if this same policy is in effect, I will be setting up a secret receipt-exchange ring. You give me a receipt from a small press or indie seller, I give you a receipt from a book I bought at B&N. You enter the Signing Tent, meet your favorite writer, return to me the corporate receipt and get back your original.

That way, almost everybody wins. And that’s worth feeding the machine.

And to Barnes & Noble and the Texas Book Festival, thank you in advance for your support and understanding.