Paris sketches-The old bookseller (by Anatole France)

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One of the old witnesses of my youth still lives his miserable life on the quays. He was not especially friendly, neither especially expensive. But I’m always happy when I see him again. It’s the old bookseller, warming his old bones between his boxes in the clear spring sun. He seems to have shrunk with time. He shrinks year after year, together with his pitiful booth looking lighter and unimportant. I have the feeling if death spares my friend a few more years he will fly away with the wind, together with the last pages of his books. Meanwhile he is almost happy. He may be poor, but it doesn’t worry him. He doesn’t’ sell his books, he reads them. He is an artist and a philosopher.

Anatole France, “La Vie Litteraire” (Paris 1888-1894)