My summer course started on Monday, which necessitated a trip to the bookstore yesterday to pick up my new textbooks. We have two: The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction (7th ed.), edited by Richard Bausch, and Reader-Response Criticism: From Formalism to Post-Structuralism, by Jane P. Tompkins.
I went to the university bookstore and so was nicely overcharged — which I’ve come to expect there since it’s the campus bookstore. But pricing aside, boy, do I love hanging around there. I love bookstores.
On this particular trip, I got to the store at maybe quarter after five, and found my books after wandering around for a while, syllabus in hand. This took a bit longer than usual because I kept forgetting that Ba- comes before Br-, not after it. Good job there, self. But I located the two texts in time enough, and then happily wandered for a while. Eventually I ended up in a convenient chair, reading the second half of Persepolis, by Marjane Satrapi. Have you read Persepolis? I’d only read the first half, and so I sat down and had a read for a while. I was surrounded by books, Radio 2 was playing, and I was reading a wonderful graphic novel … it was quite nice.
Eventually I snapped out of it. My stomach reminded me that I still needed to get home to dinner, and I still had to buy the textbooks I had picked out. I put Persepolis back on the shelf, and, seventy dollars later, wended my way home. But it was really nice while it lasted.
(Not so nice: hearing a fellow classmate announce tonight that the Norton is buyable at another store near campus for $30 less — and I can’t return the one I have because I took the shrink-wrap off already. Bah!)
In this Ordinary Time 
Oh, do I know this bookstore problem! When I was studying for my Masters my supervisor would take my credit card off me before I was allowed anywhere near the campus store. I could spend what cash I had in my purse but not start in on the credit card. She knew me very well. In fact this was prompted not so much by her concern for my bank manager's blood pressure but by her worry that I would buy material only tangentially related to my thesis and then try to link it all in. These days, when I can indulge my love of information about anything and everything so long as it's well written, I could really do with her around again.
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Campus bookstores are always so overpriced. I always try to order my books online, but sometimes I need the book right away, so I had to pay whatever ridiculous amount they decide…sigh.I loved Persepolis đŸ™‚ I think I liked part II even better than part I.
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That's the thing, isn't it — you need to get the book for the next day, the store is convenient and you know they have it … and sure enough, you pay too much (but at least you have the book).
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