All Hail the Charity Shop

There are plenty of bonuses to living in Edinburgh, but the stand out for me is the sea of charity bookshops dotted around the city. As the founder of Trasho Biblio Library, these shops have helped me create a backbone to the books we stock and loan to our 800+ members. I do a weekly ‘run’ of our favourite charity shops in a bid to find the best of their new donations; despite being a weekly routine, I’m always excited for the next ‘run’. Every time, it’s a roll of the dice of what I’ll find amongst the tidal wave of crime novels and kids books that tend to be the staple of most charity shop bookshelves. What I’ve discovered over the years is proof that treasures do exist and aren’t always sold at exuberant prices or sent straight to auction! However, by treasures, I don’t always mean monetary value, as that isn’t my goal when sifting the shelves and stacks. Instead, on these charity shop expeditions I am on a quest to complete a long forgotten collection, discover an esoteric cult collectable or delve into the straight up weird, all of which I know will fascinate the Trasho Biblio Library members.

I hope I’m not alone in this, but do we all have a book we collect different versions of? Please let this not just be me. Mine is Nevil Shute’s On the Beach, of which I have about 4 copies (including a first edition) and all of them were found on the shelves of charity shops. I’ve tried to kick this habit, but this dystopian tale has been a personal favourite for about a decade and I know I’ll cave. Even as I type this, I’m vividly aware that a charity shop close to my flat has an unsold copy, an unabridged version with pictures from the film adaptation, that I currently don’t own. It’s just waiting there knowing that it will soon be my fifth copy of this classic. You can file any book from Carson McCullers or Jane Bowles in this category too.

I love collecting the full back catalogue of publishers. I especially love the search of completing a collection and this is where the charity shop truly becomes my friend. I spent my teenage years (like all my other years) in central belt Scotland in the late 90s and I was afforded a fair bit of escapism reading the releases from cult Edinburgh publisher Rebel Inc. From John Fante to Barry Gifford, this publisher led me on all sorts of literary journeys. A few years ago, a good friend informed me that there were exactly 52 releases, so I set about not only collecting them but reading one a week over a year. Being based in Edinburgh, their home city, meant I was able to collect at least 90% of these books in local charity shops, which I claim as an achievement - CV worthy as far as I’m concerned. Only downside is I think I burnt their logo onto my retina from the exhaustive search and always see their books on shelves before any other title. It was worth it.

Charity shop booksellers are absolute wildcards. Their skillsets are so sporadic and varied I’ve considered making a top trumps card set to document them. Will they help you seek out weird finds? Will they judge you for it? Do they know how to use the till? Will they make you climb into the shop window to fish out a book? No matter what, I love them dearly and over the years of me raiding their peculiar and trashy books from the shelves they’ve become key to me having the collection I do. I’m lucky enough that my weekly runs have gained me some allies amongst these legends and they’ve started to keep books they think I’d like to one side. For those of you who are charity shop regulars, you know this is the dream and I’m living it. The best example I have of this is a copy of legendary Amok - Fifth Dispatch, which is a phone book sized catalogue of books that was once described by John Waters as the “reading list from Hell”. The lovely bookseller who kept it to one side said it was too esoteric for his usual crowd but he knew I’d like it. I left thinking he’d just subtly called me a weirdo and he’d be right. It’s now one of my prized possessions. All hail the charity shop booksellers!

If you take one thing from this monologue it’s this: always check the ephemera section! This seems to be a catch-all shelf, but between the postcards and theatre programmes you can find gems. Over the years I’ve found some of my favourite pieces, from long forgotten 90s indie zines to a 1970 book of fantasy maps based on books from the likes of Conan Doyle, Jules Verne and Ursula K. Le Guin. However, it was during a very recent search of this underrated section, which can be a shelf to a shoe box depending on the shop, that I found a whole batch of greatness. I had spotted the signs that a bigger collection of a former bohemian rebel type had been handed in - Abbie Hoffman books and a few bashed up Timothy Leary books. So I went for a peek in ephemera and found a sea of incredible 60s and 70s zines and pamphlets covering the key aspects of rebel life, from squatters rights and resisting arrest to how to illegally hook up power from the mains (might come in handy soon) and loads of compilations of incredible co-op projects. These were the era's rabble-rousing Instagram posts and they were all beautifully hand drawn with some powerful words. This sort of literature wasn’t widely distributed at the time, so to find a box full was a dream.

My little lending library would be a lesser place to sift through without charity shops. I’m not ashamed to admit that going on the weekly run of charity bookshops is a highlight of my week. That gamble of giving up time to work my way through the shelves and stacks has proven a winner for me more often than not. Leaving with empty hands is rare. Now, I’m off to buy that fifth copy of On the Beach.

I thought I’d highlight a few gems that are currently being sold by Oxfam Books online store. Remember, if you sign up to their newsletter they give you a 10% discount code for your first purchase:-

David Lynch - The Factory Photographs
Absolutely stunning photobook from 2014 which is rare to find at this price (although admittedly still an expensive buy

Watermelon Sugar - Richard Brautigan

One of the great American writers. This is a beautiful paperback release from 69.

Phantoms: The Rise of Deathrock from the LA Punk Scene
Hard to find book covering the early days of the LA Goth scene and the beginnings found from the city’s punk scene.

Punk Press - Vincent Berniere
A compilation and deep dive on the east coast punk zine.

Kathy Acker - Bodies of Works:Essays

Kathy Acker's essays map a wide ranging cultural territory. From art and cinema, through politics, bodybuilding, science fiction and the city, they both reflect and challenge these times of radical change and puzzlement.

We’ll be back soon with our next update.

Trasho Biblio xxxxx