As long as Kirjatalo remains, the older people will feel Helsinki as their own.
Printed ones book sales fell by more than two percent in Finland last year, but the Akateeminen bibkauppa picked up and increased its turnover by three percent. It's good news for those who would mourn if the traditional Kirjatalo ceased operations at the corner of Keskuskatu and Pohjoisesplanadi.
That is, the magnificent creation of Alvar Aalto, which until recently was mocked as the back room of Starbucks.
“The number of visitors to the bookstore was 14 percent more than the previous year,” the new managing director Marjo Tuomikoski rejoices in his announcement. The academic can therefore start its 130th anniversary season with a tailwind.
Still a visit on the spot pulls a little wistfully. The book oasis, which once spread over three floors above ground and also three underground with its warehouses, is still severely shrinking its premises. It's bad to pay rent with just paperwork.
But as long as the central hall remains, the older people will feel Helsinki as their own. There's no need to mourn the fact that the house's book selection seems like a fraction compared to the time before digitalization.
Although the past doesn't return, it can still be vividly sensed, for example, by those who recently piloted the Academy for a long time by Stig-Björn Nyberg of the work In the bookstore: memories from the book industry and a little from elsewhere (Otava, 2017).
My own memories too enough, and when walking around the store, they come to the surface from more than 40 years ago. Now you can get new items from previous seasons for three euros at the bargain tables. Back then, the price per kilo was used as a draw-in attractor.
Saturdays were especially busy, when reading was sought out for the whole family, and the store's doors were closed already in the afternoon, as was the custom of the country.
There was a queue at the checkouts. In shifts of an hour, you could punch prices into the machine and books into the bags while sweating. The academic's own credit cards and those valid in the entire Stockmann department store flashed.
The cheerleaders of one sort of day were the gentlemen who shyly slipped Playboy, Penthouse, or both between the pile of books. Innocently, I always made sure that the little naughty magazine at some point was at the top of the shopping pile for a long time – until I packed everything, smiled and wished you a nice weekend.
Eye contact was somewhat avoided, both ways.
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