Pickwick Bookshop - A Literary Treasure.
In front of Pickwick Bookshop, 8 South Broadway in Nyack, on a sweltering Saturday after heavy rain. Books are piled and slung in low stacks outside just barely under the eave of the shop. Passersby stop and pick up one or two. It is the last chance location for these books. Walk past and a paperback from below and to the right will catch your eye. The title, the author or something. It might call to you, it may be its last chance for a home. It’s a bit like a pet rescue in this way.
They are available for sale. John Dunnigan, the shop’s genial owner, says he used to bring them back in at night and put them out again the following day. He no longer does. Technically these books are not free but that is technically. Sometimes someone picks up a book and walks away. Other times he may find cash stuffed through the mail slot. He’s flexible.
Pickwick Bookshop is like no other bookshop you or I have ever visited. Once inside, a voice says hello. It is not clear where the voice is coming from. Look around, Alice Munro sits a few feet to the left of Balzac. Bill O’Reilly is around the corner on the shelf with Robert Kennedy Jr. but none of them are speaking. Its curator, scholar, book collector and owner of the voice and this extraordinary shop is positioned on sort of a dais behind a wall of hard covers and paperback books.
Pickwick Bookshop IS John Dunnigan, he is its beating heart. It is a venerated place at a time when few businesses have operated continuously for 8 months much less for nearly 80 years. John has owned and run it since the 70s. A bespectacled gentleman with an acerbic wit, while I was visiting once, an angular fella in a hat came in and without a word handed John a long white envelope “What are you? A process server?” John demanded. “A poet,” the codger replied “Same thing” said John without a glance.
This bookshop is a vertical experience. Books are stored, stuck and stacked in piles, lined up in a grid of shelves, and in Doric–like columns. In this building dating from 1872, you might wonder, are the walls holding the books or are the books holding up the walls? Faded handwritten signs point to Gardening or Cookbooks. In cookbooks, you will find Ina Garten, but Proust may be loitering nearby in cookie companionship. The children’s corner is vast. Yes, he has Dave Pilkey, but he has everything else too. EVERYTHING ELSE. If you lost a kid, maybe look there.
John can direct you to exactly what you didn’t know you wanted to read but turned out to be just right. A Rockland County native, he is a passionate reader and a local historian. In conversation he may share a few well observed thoughts on local politics too. This bookshop is a treasure of new and gently used titles. In these modern times books can be obtained in many ways. Some people read about a book and order it from Amazon, some go to Barnes and Noble and of course there is streaming. Some bookstores romance customers in a Victoria’s Secret kind of way with collections of books arranged like pretty underwear on a table. This ain’t that. This is a bookshop for a hunter. You should just dig around or have a chat, mention what you’d like to read and see what happens, let serendipity rule. Actually, that is probably the best thing to do.