Bookstore owner has trouble selling off his collection, so he decides to have a fire sale. Asshat tries the local libraries and thrift stores then gives up and starts burning his inventory. What’s wrong with contributing books to the military, selling them on E-Bay for the cost of shipping, or even just opening up the warehouse to the public and saying “Come and get it!”?
I’d like to smack the reporter for not asking that exact same question and reporting the answer.
It’s his business, they are his books, he made a good faith effort to give them away … and I still think he’s being a dumbass. Sounds like he got his feelings hurt when he was turned down. I would be over there with a pickup truck if I knew a warehouse full of books was available.
AHHH!!!
I loved Prospero’s books. I was sad they didn’t have the business to make it but their store was huge and I could always find something I wanted.
I should probably go over there today and see what he might be giving away.
Oh, he’s still willing to sell them. Makes me wonder how hard he really tried to give them away. Are most libraries really turning away book contributions?
FWIW, I don’t go to my public library anymore. Actually, it’s not a library, it is now a media center. Lots of homeless folks seeking shelter, kids using the computers while calling each other on their cell phones, etc. The books are sort of shunted off to one side. And forget about finding a quiet place to sit and have a bit of a read. Not gonna happen.
Seems like he has an audience and perhaps buyers now that were lacking before his innovative solution.
I say he is a clever dick with a good marketing mind. 
No incredible sales or give-aways on his web site, either
The E-Bay option sounds like a lot of work for no gain. I like the other two options you mentioned. I imagine the military might find a way to take too long to get the books or expect him to ship it. So the public give away sounds like the easiest and cheapest option.
I wonder how many books he actually burned, it looks like there were a lot of last minutes saves.
There are a lot less independent and used book stores these days. It is sad.
Jim
The guy is a publicity-seeking idiot, and he’s also got a reputation for being one of those nouveau-60’s-ish-fight-teh-power gadflys. I got to see a lengthy bit of video with him arguing with the fire department in circles, and I could almost hear Tommy Chong saying “Doode! Fire wants to be, like, free, man!” So I have no doubt that this is 50% hippie-statementism and 50% cynical publicity stunt.
I think it would depend partly on how much room they have, and God only knows what regulations might apply. I’m on your side in this, though we probably come at it from two different directions. I can only sympathize with two frustrated parties who try to conduct an economic praxis in a constricted market system like ours. But unless there’s something buried really deep in those millions of rules, I know of nothing to prevent a man from giving away what he owns. Certainly, he has the right to burn them if he wants, and even our tyranical system will allow it with a permit.
But quite often, a civic obligation and a moral obligation do not coincide. And that’s what happened in this case. The good thing to do — the aesthetically valuable thing — is to give the books away. How about homeless shelters? How about battered women’s centers? How about houses of worship? How about hospitals? Prisons? Homes in poor neighborhoods? Hell, why not just hand them out to passers-by instead of tossing them into the fire?
I agree, yet I still find myself angry and sad at the site of the barbequed books! :eek: 
:mad:
It’s not like the public libraries would actually keep the books. Okay, maybe the rare ones that they didn’t have a copy of and people might be interested in reading. Maybe. If a professional librarian had the time to sort them out.
The rest of them they’d sell themselves. So if he hadnt been able to sell them I don’t see how the libraries could.
He could have Craiglisted them, given them to a charity that helps people who have been through things like Katrina (or those recent tornados) or donated them to a program encouraging adult literacy. He even could have donated them to some kind of “Library on Wheels”.
I read your post Lib and agreed wholeheartedly, and then I thought about food funnily enough.
In times when harvests are great farmers are encouraged to dump surpluses to avoid flooding the market and thus artificially keeping prices (to consumers) higher than they would be otherwise. On a national and international scale the regulating bodies keep the market tight rather than donate excesses to LDC’s, only ‘donating’ it during times of crisis and then with stringent conditions attached.
As with the books, the good thing to do would be to give the food stocks away instead of the current practice of dumping. I dunno what the actual percentage is, but say 30% of the globe at any given time are hungry. Surely the ethical thing to do is to feed them, just hand out the food instead of tossing it into the ditches?
Hey, you can even give them a book to read while they’re munching away. Win-Win all 'round!!
This jackass probably isn’t even aware that people can buy books on the intarwub.
I like Una Persson’s answer the best, so I’m going with that.
Plus Tommy Chong makes me laugh.
This sort of situation sounds familiar. 
Yes, it can be incredibly hard to get rid of books.
But if all else fails, you don’t have to burn them. You can RECYCLE the damn things!
“This is the funeral pyre for thought in America today,” Wayne told spectators outside his bookstore as he lit the first batch of books."
:dubious: I doubt it.
Maybe a funeral pyre for someone who collected books indiscriminately, didn’t research the market, doesn’t know that readers can get books for the cost of shipping at Amazon and for pennies at library sales, and that there are too many Grisham books in the world as it is.