City Lights Chief Book Buyer Paul Yamazaki on a Half Century Spent “Reading the Room”

KQED's Forum

KQED

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 656 Ratings

🗓️ 29 April 2024

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

When you walk into the historic, beloved City Lights in San Francisco’s North Beach, it’s easy to get lost in the winding shelves packed with thousands of titles from classic literature, poetry and philosophy to contemporary fiction. There’s a legendary man behind the careful curation. Chief book buyer Paul Yamazaki has worked at City Lights since the 1970’s and has dedicated his career to filling the shelves with titles that spark conversations between books and readers. “Any single book has a constellation of conversations, consequences, and causes,” Yamazaki says in his new book “Reading the Room: A Bookseller’s Tale.” We’ll talk to Yamazaki about independent bookstores and what he sees for the future of books. Guests: Paul Yamazaki, chief book buyer, City Lights Bookstore - In 2023, Paul won the National Book Foundation's Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community Melinda Powers, head book buyer, Book Shop Santa Cruz; president, California Independent Booksellers Alliance Stephen Sparks, owner, Point Reyes Books and Wayfinder Bookshop Hannah Oliver Depp, owner, Loyalty bookstore Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Support for KGBD podcasts comes from Landmark College, offering a fully online graduate level certificate in learning differences in neurodiversity program.
0:09.8	Visit landmark.edu slash certificate to learn more.
0:13.9	Greetings boomtown.
0:15.3	The Xfinity Wi-Fi is booming.
0:17.6	Xfinity combines the power of internet and mobile.
0:20.8	So we've all got lightning fast speeds at home
0:22.8	and on the go!
0:24.3	Learn more at Xfinity.com.
0:26.2	Restrictions apply. Xfinity, Internet required.
0:28.0	Actual speeds vary.
0:30.3	From KQD in San Francisco, I'm Alexis Madrigal.
0:46.3	Paul Yamazaki is a legend of modern literature, a real, if you know, you know figure.
0:51.3	But he's not a writer, editor, or publisher.
0:53.3	Instead, he's the head book buyer at City Lights, a. But he's not a writer, editor, or publisher. Instead, he's the
0:54.3	head book buyer at City Lights, a position that he's held for decades. Now in a new slim volume,
1:00.0	reading the room of bookseller's tale, we get to hear directly from Yamazaki about how he
1:04.8	sees the role of a bookseller in our culture. It's a book about building an institution,
1:09.4	about how to read a bookstore, and about how
1:11.8	a countercultural North Beach scene became something much longer lasting. That's all coming up next,
1:17.4	after this news. Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal. There's something inspiring about Paul Yamazaki's new book, reading the room of bookseller's tale. At a time when it feels like our culture takes random turns built from
1:45.2	10-second video clips, Yamazaki's story is really about one person's 50-year effort to direct
1:52.2	and even change what people read. His life is an argument that the world of letters is still
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from KQED, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of KQED and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.