The End Of The Bookshop?

World Crunch: Is This The Final Chapter For World's Iconic Bookshops?

From Madrid to Cork to Shanghai, some of the most revered old bookshops are closing doors as they face pressure from big chains and e-readers. But our bookworm writer found some small signs of hope.

PARIS — A week or so before Christmas, I decided to take advantage of a quick in-and-out visit to Paris to visit one of the city's most iconic expat establishments: The Shakespeare and Company bookstore in the Latin Quarter.

A stormy night had just fallen and the temps weren't too far above freezing as I trudged across the Seine, through wind and rain, to where I expected to find the famous English-language gathering spot. But when I got there, the bookshop — famous among other things for cameos in films like Before Sunset (2004) and Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris (2011) — was nowhere to be found.

That's when it occurred to me that the venerable old locale had perhaps closed down. "Noooo," I lamented. "Say it ain't so." But yes, surely I read something to that effect, I thought. Or did I? Befuddled and very cold, I ducked under an awning and, with numb fingers, fumbled around in my pocket for my phone.

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Bookyards editor: I hope this is not the end of the small bookshop. But high rents and low profit margins is making this business model difficult to survive in Europe and in North America.