The Selection Box: Books Edition with Will De Búrca

An Irishman Abroad

Jarlath Regan

Society & Culture, News, Health & Fitness, Society & Culture:personal Journals, Personal Journals, Politics

4.8 • 834 Ratings

🗓️ 21 July 2021

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week, we are joined by Will De Búrca of De Búrca's Rare Books to discuss the fascinating world of book collecting, binding and discovery as an independent rare book store. Will talks about his time in Sotheby's in New York and what he has learned about the spending habits of wealthy collectors. We also get an insight into his extraordinary other life as a music producer. From playing Electric Picnic to bizarre valuation, the stories of Will’s life and the De Búrca family business flow in this one of a kind episode of The Selection Box. To read Will's Irish Times article about book collecting that is referenced in this conversation, click here: https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/a-peek-between-the-covers-of-the-rare-book-world-1.3907253 To hear every episode in full and to gain access to the entire back-catalogue of over 500 Irishman Abroad episodes that are not available on iTunes for just the price of a pint every month visit www.patreon.com/irishmanabroad Supplementary research provided by John Meagher. The Irishman Abroad Liveline is now open. You can now get in touch with us and feature on our shows by sending your WhatsApp voice note to 0044 7543 122 330. Why not pose a running question to Irish Olympic Legend Sonia O'Sullivan or ask our America Correspondent Marion McKeone her thoughts on a current talking point Stateside? Of course, if you have an issue with traffic or elephants on the loose in your area, Jarlath can do his best to sort that out too. Our charity partner is jigsawonline.ie. In these tricky times, Jigsaw provides a range of resources, advice and care for your people to help them strengthen their mental health and the skills needed to navigate life. Please visit their website and consider making a donation. For updates on future episodes and live shows follow @jarlath on Twitter, visit www.jigser.com or email the show directly on [email protected]. Disclaimer: All materials contained within this podcast are copyright protected. Third party reuse and/or quotation in whole or in part is prohibited unless direct credit and/or hyperlink to the Irishman Abroad podcast is clearly and accurately provided.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the penultimate episode in our 10-part mini-series on independent Irish booksellers
0:07.5	for the Irish Man of Broad Arts and Culture Podcast known as the Selection Box. It's fair to say, though,
0:14.3	that this series or any series looking at the uniqueness of Irish book selling and the Irish book selling community.
0:22.5	Just wouldn't be complete without an episode devoted to the rise and rise of rare book buying and selling.
0:30.6	Here to talk to me about his family business is Will de Berka of DeBurca Rare Irish Books. Great to have you here, Will.
0:40.4	Thanks very much for Adam. It's on Gerlitt. Up until this week, well, I basically knew nothing
0:46.0	about collecting of rare books, the community of rare book collectors. It's quite an underground
0:52.9	thing, but you grew up surrounded by it. Your father bought
0:56.9	his first rare book in Castle Bar when he was 16 years old. Thomas Moore's History of Ireland
1:04.6	published in Philadelphia in 1843. Was it just in your life from the very beginning, this concept of the rare book, its value and what made it valuable?
1:18.7	Yeah, it's always been a huge part of our family.
1:22.3	Our upbringing and Ayn generally sold the books through our house starting off in Mayo.
1:28.7	The business started when it was actually started the year I was born in 1981. Originally, I think Ayn's collection
1:35.5	started building up quite extensively. And then Vivian, my mum, she was saying like, you know,
1:41.8	we got another little lad on the way. It's time to kind of reduce to the size of the collection.
1:46.9	And that's when the business kind of started with catalog number one.
1:51.0	We're onto a catalog number one four or five now.
1:54.7	Wow.
1:54.9	But the, yeah, the number one basically was a catalyst for Aymond to really have a go with his passion because originally
2:02.1	he was a builder and he started off on the building sites in in birmingham that's in and in
2:09.9	Birmingham's where he met my mother originally but the business has always been intertwined with
2:14.6	the family and kind of locally the burghers are always known as the book family.
	...

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