I am so pleased to be able to be here for the opening of the Selfoss Booktown in Iceland, and would like to thank you all very much for your warm hospitality.
Booktowns are a new International Economy for a New International World, based on the fact that the New International World is certain to be an International Cocktail …. A Chinaman might fall in love with an Icelandic girl and visa versa ….1
Hay, therefore, drew its inspiration from the International Cocktail of American where we discovered that as the perfect symbol of a Nation’s Culture the Book was the perfect partner of the Tourist Industry and that re-use being ecologically more desirable than re-cycling, so the world’s largest economy was the world’s largest green economy …2
Buying, therefore, the contents of Stechert-Hafner, the largest reference bookshop, and best bookshop in New York, it became obvious that the de-institutionalisation of the Book was vital for its revitalisation. LACAP and infinite other of their programmes failed and millions of books were thrown away … 3
Travelling down from Toronto and then from Buffalo to Boston through New York, numerous farmers, in despair during the agricultural depression of the 1930s had filled their barns with books, which were then universally known as Bookbarns … this created the link with the Rural Economy which I have strongly linked with the Rural tradition of the National Library of Wales … we are the only country to have our National Library in a rural location. Bookselling became aTourist Economy and numerous new Holiday inns sprang up along the route….4
My greatest mistake was to spend too much time on the New York Thruway, rather than the Pennsylvian Turnpike and which was therefore a far longer route into the extra-ordinary ethnic diversity of the Mid-West which was created largely in the Twentieth Century and was therefore much more suitable for Booktowns …. With, however, the best Booktown in America now in Nebraska I hope to remedy that shortly…5
The passion of every immigrant was, of course, the culture of his home country, therefore when they came to America they brought their books with them…..6
I think that the Mouth is more important as an Entrance Point for Food than as an Exit Point for Words and I have said that the end of the Roman Empire was full of Festivals as is now the end of the British Empire….7
My worst attack on the Establishment was when I wrote a Pamphlet called ‘Abolish the Wales Tourist Board’ because living in the Age of the Mass Media, there was a basic conflict of interest between the politician whose future depended on National Media Exposure and a Tourist Policy which could not save Rural Areas, either ecologically or economically, unless we worked towards an International World. They didn’t understand the concept of how important Booktowns could be to International Tourism…8
Thus, I believe a whole Tourist Policy should begin again at the beginning without the pseudo-democracy of enormous wealth Mass Media brings with it ….9
Once we have escaped the horrors of English Language Democracy, I believe that there will be hundreds or even thousands, of Booktowns worldwide….10
Thus, I hope that the billions spent on International Tourist Advertising, which were aimed more at big commercial mass media concepts like Theme Parks which don’t have a real economy, can be more profitably applied in Booktowns. …11
In a New International World a Renaissance of the Book and a Reformation of the Tourist Economy is better than the debasement of information for commercial self-interest which currently rules us through the Mass Media…..12
Thank you for listening, and I wish all enormous success for the future.
Booktowns are a new International Economy for a New International World, based on the fact that the New International World is certain to be an International Cocktail …. A Chinaman might fall in love with an Icelandic girl and visa versa ….1
Hay, therefore, drew its inspiration from the International Cocktail of American where we discovered that as the perfect symbol of a Nation’s Culture the Book was the perfect partner of the Tourist Industry and that re-use being ecologically more desirable than re-cycling, so the world’s largest economy was the world’s largest green economy …2
Buying, therefore, the contents of Stechert-Hafner, the largest reference bookshop, and best bookshop in New York, it became obvious that the de-institutionalisation of the Book was vital for its revitalisation. LACAP and infinite other of their programmes failed and millions of books were thrown away … 3
Travelling down from Toronto and then from Buffalo to Boston through New York, numerous farmers, in despair during the agricultural depression of the 1930s had filled their barns with books, which were then universally known as Bookbarns … this created the link with the Rural Economy which I have strongly linked with the Rural tradition of the National Library of Wales … we are the only country to have our National Library in a rural location. Bookselling became aTourist Economy and numerous new Holiday inns sprang up along the route….4
My greatest mistake was to spend too much time on the New York Thruway, rather than the Pennsylvian Turnpike and which was therefore a far longer route into the extra-ordinary ethnic diversity of the Mid-West which was created largely in the Twentieth Century and was therefore much more suitable for Booktowns …. With, however, the best Booktown in America now in Nebraska I hope to remedy that shortly…5
The passion of every immigrant was, of course, the culture of his home country, therefore when they came to America they brought their books with them…..6
I think that the Mouth is more important as an Entrance Point for Food than as an Exit Point for Words and I have said that the end of the Roman Empire was full of Festivals as is now the end of the British Empire….7
My worst attack on the Establishment was when I wrote a Pamphlet called ‘Abolish the Wales Tourist Board’ because living in the Age of the Mass Media, there was a basic conflict of interest between the politician whose future depended on National Media Exposure and a Tourist Policy which could not save Rural Areas, either ecologically or economically, unless we worked towards an International World. They didn’t understand the concept of how important Booktowns could be to International Tourism…8
Thus, I believe a whole Tourist Policy should begin again at the beginning without the pseudo-democracy of enormous wealth Mass Media brings with it ….9
Once we have escaped the horrors of English Language Democracy, I believe that there will be hundreds or even thousands, of Booktowns worldwide….10
Thus, I hope that the billions spent on International Tourist Advertising, which were aimed more at big commercial mass media concepts like Theme Parks which don’t have a real economy, can be more profitably applied in Booktowns. …11
In a New International World a Renaissance of the Book and a Reformation of the Tourist Economy is better than the debasement of information for commercial self-interest which currently rules us through the Mass Media…..12
Thank you for listening, and I wish all enormous success for the future.