The Boekehuis, voted one of 50 unique bookshops in the world in 2006, celebrates its 10th anniversary this year.
Kindle, Nook and other e-book readers are redefining the way books are read and sold, which might make it a rather inauspicious time to be running a physical bookshop. But Corina van der Spoel, the founding manager of Boekehuis, in Auckland Park, Johannesburg, is not fazed by the internet onslaught.
“We are a specialist bookshop. Our focus is on good imported fiction. We are also good at getting good South African fiction. Our focus isn’t mass-market books,” says the bibliophile, who is also co-director of the M&G Literary Festival.
Her shop’s collection, she says, serves those “who want more in terms of books and information”.
She is excited about the festival –“I’ve been lobbying for years for a festival” — which, she says, is an extension of our “intellectual bookshop”.
She argues that the future of selling books is going to be contested by bookshops that stock specialist books.
“E-books will be important but the kind of book you won’t get electronically you will be able to get at our bookshop.”
She says she provides an informed book service. “I give out quite a lot guidance,” she says, recalling the bookstores of old stocked by grizzled bibliophiles who, it seemed, had read everything under the sun.
She expects the shop to continue growing. “We have been growing every year since we opened in 2000.”
Even though the shop has an Afrikaans name — indeed, it boasts the biggest collection of Afrikaans titles for sale — it has thousands of books in English on literature, philosophy, design, cultural studies and history.
The bookshop, which also hosts book launches and discussions, is in a century-old property that once belonged to the daughter of anti-apartheid activist Bram Fischer.