Re-brands, Firebrands and Two-man-bands

Having been found guilty of treason in a court convened by the Council of State in the Commonwealth of Hay, Richard Booth, King of Hay, was "sentenced to death", with the date of execution to be announced. Having met to decide on what will undoubtedly prove to be a solemn and momentous occasion, the Council of State can now announce that the prisoner will be led to the scaffold in Hay, on September 12th., 2009. Invitations to the event will be handed out freely during the Hay Festival, but only to those not holding a Sony Reader.

We have sympathy for some of the anti-corporate themes developed by the King over the years, but he seems to have missed a possibly uncalculated gesture of insensitivity from the Festival to second-hand booksellers in giving a paid platform to Sony and its attempts to market an ebook reader at the Festival. With Oxfam's presence at the Festival to accept book donations from the public, and Sony's hawking of electronic readers at the same site, Festivaleers can now forego the pleasure of selling their books to second-hand booksellers in Hay, and simultaneously contemplate not having to buy any more before they leave. What used to be a festival of literature has now become not only a festival of celebrity, but also a market for centralised UK media to support the interests of transnational corporations against a second-hand economy. Peter Florence, director of the Hay Festival, said through the Guardian (the Festival's chief sponsors), "Hay is the world's greatest book town and the Reader from Sony is the most exciting development in years for those who love reading". As a group of booksellers, the Commonwealth of Hay has had much trouble seeing the connexion between the clauses in that statement, and we would welcome any enlightening correspondence from other concerned booksellers, if indeed an explanation is available that way. This is an issue which must travel far and wide past the borders of Hay.

Locally, and in an ill-judged campaign following his trial, Richard Booth has made approaches to the Commonwealth of Hay, proposing that the leading members of the Council of State join a royal party, including Arthur Scargill - two kings for the price of one - and march against Hay Festival on May 23rd. to protest what the Booth sees to be the pernicious influence of Rupert Murdoch's support for the Festival, and to make it known beyond the independent nation of Hay that Sky's 'tactic' to "steal the name of Hay" cannot go unchallenged. The Council of State carefully weighed the King's 'offer', and found it to be wanting in practical respects. Moreover, we find it impossible to deal with the King in this matter, not only because he stands condemned since April, but because we believe there are issues which are equally important: to exclude those issues in another obvious tilt at self-publicity designed to save his tottering crown, the King is doing his Kingdom yet more harm than good. In any event, we certainly would find it difficult to associate the Commonwealth of Hay with the (some would say Stalinist) ex-leader of the National Union of Mineworkers, whose decision to align himself with the King of Hay was once described in the Weekly Worker (a publication of the Communist Party of Great Britain, Provisional Central Committee) as "scraping the barrel". (Issue #279)

A propos of everything, the Council have also noted that Richard Booth has been supporting, through billboard advertising, a fringe "philosophy festival" at the Globe at Hay, held during the Hay Festival. We're certain that had the King checked a little more closely into how things happen in Hay nowadays, he'd have noticed that the fringe event has had a good deal of technical and administrative support from the Hay Festival itself. It's clear that although the King has gained some respect for his opinions about the creeping re-branding of Hay, his information about how this is actually happening is inadequate to the task he appears to be taking on. If the King didn't know of the fringe event's association with Hay Festival, then his organization is clearly not what it used to be; if the King did know of the connexion, then he is guilty not only of treason, but also of hypocrisy. It's no wonder his old fire on the subject of a winter economy for booktowns seems to have died down somewhat.

What we don't need in Hay is yet another monarchy-supported commercial initiative vying for existing customers during the Festival: we need to make it clear that the town is built on the printed word, and survives for the great bulk of the year on the printed word. The second-hand book is indeed a precious international resource, and it's the very vitality of the second-hand book in an international market which is being endangered in a seemingly headlong rush for lifestyle delivery. Perhaps the King has forgotten his own offspring, but we haven't. Other booktowns should take note of the often insidious nature of re-branding, and all booksellers wherever they are should enter into an international debate not only about Sony's marketing, but about Amazon's Kindle - upon which Sony UK, according to the Guardian, "is aiming to steal a march."