In January 1969, American writer Helene Hanff Hailian lives in New York. She loves English literature, but 20 years ago, when she was young, her income was limited and she could not buy books in large quantities. She had to read several classic works in her hand repeatedly to satisfy her curiosity. By chance, she came across an ad in a magazine for a second-hand bookstore in England with books she hadn't been able to find anywhere in New York. So she managed to get in touch with Frank, the owner of the bookstore, and kept a correspondence. Slowly, the buyer-seller relationship turned into a personal exchange, in which they expressed literary views in letters, commented on literary works, and later exchanged their living conditions. Frank's letter is restrained, while Heleni's letter is straightforward and humorous. Heleni is determined to meet Frank in London, but the financial constraints make it difficult for her to do so. She finally fulfilled her promise, but it was too late: the bookstore closed immediately after Frank's death and was facing an auction.
84 Charing Cross Road movie plot
2022-04-08 08:01
Extended Reading
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Maxine Stuart: It's a lovely old shop, straight out of Dickens. You would go absolutely out of your mind over it. There are stalls outside and I stopped to leaf through a few things just to establish myself as a browser before wandering in. It's dim inside. You can smell the shop before you see it. It's a lovely smell. I can't articulate it easily, but it combines must and dust and age and walls of wood and floors of wood. Toward the back of the shop, at the left, there's a desk with a work lamp on it. A man was sitting there with a Hogarth nose.
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Maxine Stuart: The shelves go on forever. They go up to the ceiling and they're very old and kind of gray - like old oak that absorbed so much dust over the years they no longer are their true color. There's a print selection - or rather a long print table with Cruikshank, Rackham, and Spy and all those old wonderful English caricaturists and illustrators that I'm not smart enough to know a lot about. And there are some lovely old. old illustrated magazines.