The bookseller at the end of the world
Tucked away in Manapouri, Fiordland, Ruth Shaw has not one but three bookshops.
She’s become known as the ‘bookseller at the end of the world’, and that’s also the title of her book, which details her incredible life so far.
Ruth’s led a life of adventure, trauma, chaos and amazing highs. She’s sailed extensively through the Pacific and South China sea, been held up by pirates, campaigned on environmental issues and owned and operated the yacht ‘Breaksea Girl’ with her husband, Lance.
Selling a few books was Ruth’s attempt at a retirement hobby, but her passion for books soon grew into a cluster of tiny bookshops on her Manapouri property.
“I’ve always had books, my grandmothers and my mother encouraged me to read and I still have some of the books they gave me,” explains Ruth.
“I never actually thought about having a bookshop until Lance and I were running our business, Fiordland Ecology Holidays. We had a little library on board with books on Fiordland natural history, birds, ferns, trees and books on Stewart Island. People would finish their holiday and ask where they could buy a copy of the books (many of them were rare or out of print), so I wanted to get books for our clients to buy.”
Ruth began sourcing these rare books on Fiordland for clients to buy and called the bookshop 45 South and Below. When they retired, Ruth decided to open a tiny bookshop on their Manapouri property. It provided Ruth with a great reason to buy books – they had so many at home, Lance had put in a ‘one book in, one book out’ policy.
“By having a bookshop, you’ve got the excuse to keep on buying books, which is one of the most delightful things you can do in life.
“At my age, I really should be downsizing. So if somebody comes into the bookshop, and I think: oh my god, they would love a book that I’ve got in my library! I run in and get it and I give it to them. So I know that my books are going to good homes.”
Ruth’s own book is punctuated by stories of the people who visit her bookshops. That was the purpose of the original Wee Bookshop: a retirement hobby, somewhere for Ruth to share her passion for books and to listen to others’ stories.
“I absolutely love the people that come into my bookshop. They all have great stories to tell about the books they’re reading.”
Solar-powered and small enough to not need resource consent, word soon got around about the Wee Bookshop in Manapouri. Ruth says the response was amazing, with people queuing to get in and Lance entertaining them with stories and cups of coffee.
She had a few regular young visitors and her growing toy library needed more space, so Ruth built a second Wee Bookshop for children.
The third shop, called The Snug was built especially for local farmers and men.
“Quite a few farmers come into Manapouri to buy lunch and they’re very good readers. But they’re often in their gumboots and they smell like sheep or cows or whatever so if there was anyone in the main bookshop they’d say: oh, it’s alright Ruth, I won’t come in today.
“So I had a chat with a couple of shepherds and I said: how about I build you a special area where you could sit outside and have your lunch, but you could still have access to books?”
She quickly got to work designing an open but sheltered shed out of an old cabinet, filling it with books on farming, hunting and fishing.
“[…] The other thing I noticed is that not many men read books. And women would come into the bookshop and their husbands would be in the car and their wives would feel pressured to find a book quickly. You shouldn’t rush choosing a book. So with The Snug, I can say: come and sit here, you don’t have to buy anything, you can just have a look through and give your wife time to make sure she’s found the right book.”
Now, among the many carefully-chosen titles in her three bookshops, Ruth has her memoir. After being told by many people her life really was worthy of putting on the printed page, The Bookseller at the End of the World has been published by Allen & Unwin and is available in bookshops across the country.
