Bay Area Bookstores for the Purist

By AARON LATHAM

MANY people take vacations in and around San Francisco to see such physical landmarks as the Golden Gate Bridge, Coit Tower, Alcatraz, Nob Hill or the bumps and grinds at the famous bars on Broadway. But another type of vacationer visits the Bay area to seek out intellectual landmarks such as the novels of Mark Twain, first editions by Jack Kerouac, collectible comics by R. Crumb, scholarly volumes, detective novels, biographies, autobiographies -- books about everything from cabbages to kings.

"People come here on book-buying vacations," said Bob Brown of Black Oak Books in Berkeley.

"There are 50 bookstores in the East Bay alone," said Peter B. Howard of Serendipity Books, also in Berkeley.

"For the size of the area, the concentration is amazing," said Don Pretari of Black Oak (who looks like Friar Tuck). "There isn't any other place like it in the United States. This really is about as good as it gets. In Berkeley alone we have a great used bookstore, Moe's. There's a great new bookstore, Cody's. There's a great scholarly bookstore, us. A great first-editions bookstore, Serendipity. A great Judaica bookstore, Afikomen. And Shambhala, a great Eastern-religions bookstore."

Have these people come down with a severe case of civic bookstore boosterism? Of course they have, but they really do have a lot to be immodest about.

[...]

In Berkeley's gourmet ghetto, with neighbors like Chez Panisse, Black Oak Books, at 1491 Shattuck Avenue, is about as a big as a fair-sized restaurant, offering more than 150,000 books. It sells new books, used books and rare books. But its specialty is concentrated in a large back room: scholarly books. Because my daughter was taking a Greek drama course, I asked to see the classics section. It turned out to cover most of a wall, much of it in Greek and Latin. I bought "Aristophanes' Old-and-New Comedy" by Kenneth J. Reckford ($30), which turned out to be a fine book. I also picked up a first edition of Mark Twain's "Life on the Mississippi," my only purchase in three figures -- it cost about the same as a case of that Napa Valley pinot noir.

[...]

Where to browse, from cover to cover

These are the stores I visited in the Bay area [list edited]:

Black Oak Books, 1491 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley; (510) 486-0698. New and used books. General interest, fiction, poetry, classics, antiquarian.

Cody's Books, 2454 Telegraph Avenue, Berkeley; (510) 845-7852. On the Internet: www.codysbooks.com. General interest, computer, psychology, fiction.

Moe's Books, 2476 Telegraph Avenue, Berkeley; (510) 849-2087. On the Internet: moesbooks.com. New and used books. General interest, art, fiction.

Serendipity Books, 1201 University Avenue, Berkeley; (510) 841-7455. On the Internet: www.serendipitybooks.com. Antiquarian books.

Many of the following stores, which I did not visit, were also recommended to me.

Afikomen Jewish Books, Gifts and Arts, 3042 Claremont Avenue, Berkeley; (510) 655-1977.

Shambhala Booksellers, 2482 Telegraph Avenue, Berkeley; (510) 848-8443. New and used books. Metaphysics, religion, philosophy.



From the New York Times


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