I found Mercer Street Books and Records, between Bleeker and Houston Streets, alarming when I first stepped inside. A small staircase leads down to a gigantic, overstuffed room, where if one person is looking at a book in an aisle, no one else can get by him. There are black and white postcards on sale for 75 cents at the entrance. Behind them, the walls, shelves, floor, and ceiling are all stark and gray.
But this all matters little; the store has an incredible selection, and makes the most of its space, even if it means giving up on less important things like neatness and feng shui. Fred Cisterna, a Mercer Street Books employee with unruly gray hair and black rimmed glasses, explained to me the different sections of the store.
“I would say it’s a general bookstore,” he said, “but the arts and design section sells well, and we also have a very strong fiction section.” The fiction section spread along most of the right hand wall, and consisted of most every writer I know to be great, plus a whole bunch I’ve never heard of, a combination which I think usually makes a solid selection.
“Our philosophy section also sells incredibly, when we have books, that is,” said Cisterna. “The shelves are like accordions; they get packed and jammed full, only to shrink back down again.”
Mercer Street Books also has a rare books section, in which prices vary from $25 to over a $1000, depending on whether the books are signed or how in demand they are.
“We check internet sites to see what other stores are selling,” said Cisterna, “but we also know our clientele, and we will pay a lot for a book if we know they’ll buy it quickly.”
On the floor in each aisle were crates filled with books, without any particular order or alphabetization, which made walking through the store even more difficult.
“There aren’t very many of us employees,” Fred said. I scanned the room, and realized he was the only one working. This is normal for some of the small bookstores I’ve seen, but definitely not for one this big and voluptuous.
“The owner needs to make a profit after all,” said Cisterna, “so he can only hire so many of us. The crates consist of books that should be on the shelves in any given section, and will be, once we get around to it.”
Cisterna, who was a little intimidating before I approached him, turned out to be kindly and intelligent. He works at the bookstore two days a week, and was vehement about me taking note that he was only an employee, not one of the owners.
“Not many NYU undergrads come in here, you know,” he said. “The professors do, and the graduate students do. Are you a graduate student?”
I told him I was a sophomore undergrad, and then I asked why he thought the store wasn’t popular with undergraduates, especially since it’s across the street from Coles Gym and right next to the Mercer building.
“You tell me,” he said, but I didn’t know what to say.
