Walking into a bookstore or a library is an experience filled with immense possibilities. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of books to choose from, and there is something to learn from each of them. There is a joy like no other that’s found in reading a book and discovering new perspectives between the pages.
The connection to books can come from their physicality. To Yellow Dog Bookshop co-owner Joe Chevalier and his customers, walking into a used bookstore is a different experience.
“People come in here, and often the first thing they do is take a deep breath because the air is different,” Chevalier said. “You’ve got the smell of the slowly aging book, which is a smell like nothing else.”
He also notes the feeling of flipping the yellowed pages between your fingers and the satisfaction of lining up your books on a shelf, creating a visually appealing collection.
“It’s just like a full physical experience that you don’t get if you’re scrolling through a screen,” Chevalier said.
Whether it’s a historical fiction set in World War II or a memoir delving into someone’s life lessons, books teach about different perspectives and situations in the world. Readers can connect to books by finding representation between their pages.
“The real, uber reason is to build empathy — to have understanding of other people,” Chevalier said. “Reading about someone else’s experiences, whoever that person is, you’re going to be better able to have empathy for people you don’t know. Because you can imagine, ‘Oh, what is it like to be that person?’”
Candace Hulsizer owns Black Tea Bookshop, a store dedicated to highlighting Black authors and literature.
“When we just present one perspective, that is just a very small sliver of the story,” Hulsizer said. “It’s not only unfair to people who aren’t being represented — it’s also doing a disservice to the larger populations who are repeatedly represented because they don’t get to see the diversity.”
Most of the books in Hulsizer’s store are written by Black authors, but she says people should remember that “Black folks are not a monolith.” Hulsizer hopes to encourage people to keep learning about the nuances in perspectives.
In addition to local bookstores, one of the most available resources for readers is the public library. Joseph Facteau, Daniel Boone Regional Library’s development manager, works on several literacy expansion programs. The expands into local communities outside Columbia through bookmobiles, which are mobile libraries that provide people in small towns access to books.
“For a lot of those communities, if they don’t go to Columbia, that’s their library,” Facteau said.
Expanding literacy means opening doors to a new hobby and source of knowledge. Facteau hopes to continue to bring that to his community.
“There really are books written for everyone, regardless of what you’re interested in,” Facteau said. “That ability to read lets you have that enjoyment of being able to read those subjects.”
For Chevalier, Facteau and Hulsizer, learning is one of the biggest reasons they encourage reading. Whether readers in Columbia get their books from bookstores, the library or even online, they always get one thing out of reading: the knowledge of new perspectives and different walks of life that they wouldn’t otherwise have.
“My hope is that people find joy in reading and that they discover new stories, and that makes them curious,” Hulsizer said. “That they want to continue to be curious to learn more about people’s real stories, and not just stereotypes of things that they see on TV.”
