Poetry Among the Antiquarians by John Lane

Today
at the South Carolina Book Festival I decided to descend the antiquarian alley
where poetry books live extended lives alongside their more popular cousins in
prose.


 
As I
walked under the antiquarian banner I thought about the fate of poetry books,
how a few end up in libraries, more in private collections, and how some end their
bookish lives thrown in a dumpster, or sold by the pound at estate sales.  
Sometimes the books are very lucky, or the poet is well-known, and they’re
acquired by a dealer and peddled like stamps or coins at these antiquarian
gatherings.
 
I
thought about all this as I strolled for a few minutes among the work of lucky writers who live on in Mylar covers in orderly calculated rows.
 

In the
first booth I asked a serious dealer about poetry and he pointed to a glass
case and a slim volume, A Green Bough, a poetry book by William Faulkner
published in 1933. The book was worth $1500. “It’s not one of his more
desirable titles,” the dealer said as he opened the case and flipped to an
interior poem. “Everybody wants the novels.”  Across
from “Faulkner Under Glass” I entered a booth that was much more inviting. I
strolled in and struck up a conversation: “What’s the most expensive poetry
book you’ve ever sold?” I asked the proprietor, someone I’d bought books from
at past festivals.  
He
thought for a moment. “An early collection by Australian Les Murray. Oxford
bought it. You know, the real Oxford.”
 
His
wife heard us talking, added, “Don’t forget we’ve got a $950 Derek Walcott over
here— Last time I checked he was still a poet.”  
They showed
me the Walcott, then an impressive running foot of Billy Collins collections on
a high shelf. The dealer pulled one down and opened it. “He’s very popular and
sells well.” The books were $50 to $100.
 
“And
by the way, you might write down we’re not antiquarians. We sell collectibles
mostly—like these Billy Collins books. The thing for me is hearing the poet
read. Then I collect their books and get them signed. That signature. That
makes them collectible.”  “But
what about that sign?” I said, pointing up. “It says antiquarian.”
 
He laughs.
“Oh, we sometimes get some old ones. I even sold a Robert Burns today. It had a
leatherette binding. Got $60 for it. It’s not that I don’t like antiquarian
poetry. I do. I’m a sucker for a pretty old poetry book, a sucker for a leather
binding.”
 
I
wander on down the alley.
 
I
think for a flashing moment of all those tables full of poetry books every year
at AWP, of all those slender volumes someday soon abandoned and forgotten like
all the volumes of the past.  
My
books will most likely be there, joined by most of the poetry ever published. Most poetry books
don’t make it to a collector’s shelf. What was it Pound said, write like you
can produce one poem that might last 100 years? The antiquarian alley sure makes
that real.
 
But
just when I’d lost hope for poetry, on one shelf further down I found a
complete set of E.A. Robinson. His books have made it 100 years, and he has at
least one poem people still read.  But to
balance that, on another shelf I found the collected poems of Archibald
Rutledge, a former poet laureate of South Carolina, now almost entirely
forgotten except by collectors. Few read him today, though his books often sell
for hundreds of dollars.  Then
at the end of alley I found some slender hardback volumes by James Dickey.
Dickey’s been dead now over a decade. He’s one of my favorite poets and I have all
his books in ragged, well-read paperback editions.  
The
clerk came over and pointed out that these books are very collectible, in good
shape. He’s a local
favorite since he taught for over 30 years at the University of South Carolina.
 
That last
booth had as many James Dickey books as the earlier booth had Billy Collins
collections. It's interesting to consider how in 1970 Dickey was as popular as Collins is today. Time has a way of
shelving us all.  
I
passed on the Faulkner, Robinson, Rutledge, Collins, and Dickey. All I bought today was a little pamphlet
of Appalachian folk tales for $5. I thought about the coyote tales out west and
wondered if anyone had ever done the same thing with mountain tales. Maybe I’d
give it a try. Ironically, I found the treasure tucked between two old poetry books. It was
a real find, called “I Bought Me a Dog Once and Other Tales.”