拯救巴黎最古老的書店

Nestled between cafés and tour shops on the busy Rue Saint-Honoré, the Librairie Delamain, the oldest bookstore in Paris, strikes an inconspicuous pose. Outside, tourists jostle their way through the stands and shelves on their way from the Louvre to the Comédie Française across the street, rarely pausing to glance under the gray-and-white awning.

The tempo inside the bookstore is slower, as patrons—almost all French—vie for browsing space among the cramped shelves. The president of the Constitutional Council, Jean-Louis Debré, is a regular visitor; so is Comédie-Française actor Denis Podalydès. Over the years, Michel Foucault, Colette, and Jean Cocteau have all passed through its doors.

But Librairie Delamain may now be coming to a close. This month, the Librairie Delamain's lease is up for renewal by the Qatari company Constellation Hotel Holdings, which owns the block-wide property that also houses the soon-to-be-renovated Hôtel du Louvre. The company plans to double the bookstore's rent to 100,000 euros per year—nearly a tenth of their annual revenue. With already slim margins, the shop would be forced to shut down or abandon the storefront where it has been since 1906 (the business itself dates to 1700).

This tale is a familiar one to bibliophiles around the world, as the frail arsenals of independent bookstores surrender to the triple threat of Amazon, e-books, and competition from other media. Here in France, though, the story diverges from the script. Barely had the threat to Delamain been announced when author and journalist Angelo Rinaldi pledged to do all he could to prevent the bookstore's closing. "It's always when grandmother is sick that you realize how much you loved her," he told LeFigaro last week. Rinaldi plans to spread the word among his colleagues at the Académie Française when it reconvenes on September 25.

Rinaldi was joined by the Minister of Culture herself, Fleur Pellerin, who visited the bookstore in person to assure the staff of her full support. The president of the Centre National du Livre, Vincent Monadé, demanded a meeting with Constellation Hotel Holdings. Several days later, the Hôtel du Louvre, feeling the pressure, released a statement saying that the Qatari holding company would take into consideration "the specific activity of its renter as well as the many years in which it has occupied the site."

"I hope, now, that this is going to be translated into action," said Monadé to LeFigaro.

It's difficult to imagine the shuttering of a bookstore causing a similar outcry anywhere else—not to mention direct government involvement in the matter of a private lease. This has something to do with what the French call l'exception culturelle. It doesn't just mean cultural exceptionalism; the phrase refers more precisely to the notion that cultural goods should not be subject to the whims of the free market—and should be protected from the homogenizing onslaught of global, and in particular American, cultural imperialism.

In the U.S., such a policy would smack of protectionism. The French prefer to justify it in terms of maintaining "cultural diversity." L'exception culturelle is the source of production quotas for radio programs made in France. It's the reason the initial arrival of Netflix executives in France was met with a letter from producers bemoaning the "implosion of our cultural model." And in a more general sense, it is part of a conviction in France—albeit one increasingly debated—that cultural heritage is a good with its own internal logic and value system, one that the government has the duty not only to protect but to actively promote. France even entombs its most celebrated literary and cultural figures, among other "great men" (and now women), in the Panthéon in Paris.

In the publishing sphere, l'exception culturellemorphs from a committed ideal into concrete policy. It has allowed the French to mount a challenge to the digital revolution in a way that would be unimaginable in the U.S.

As an independent bookstore, the Librairie Delamain already receives a partial merchandising subsidy—5,000 euros in 2013—from the Centre National du 2013, the Ministry of Culture announced a further injection of 5 million euros into the independent bookstore industry, as well as the creation of a new bureaucratic position (the stereotypical solution to all French problems)—the "book arbitrator"—who could, in cases like this one, intervene in legal disputes without forcing the small businesses to involve themselves in expensive litigation. Booksellers like Delamain are also aided by theloi Lang,a 1981 law named after a former minister of culture, which limits discounts on books to 5 percent of their cover price. Earlier this summer, a so-called "anti-Amazon" amendment extended this limit to online booksellers and prohibits them from offering free shipping on reduced-price books.

In fact, France is far from the only country to require a fixed book price. Germany, Norway, Japan, Mexico, and South Korea all do as well. The U.K. used to require fixed book prices, but no longer does. Today, one can easily see the result: While independent booksellers make up 45 percent of the market in France, they are only 4 percent of the total in the U.K. In 2013, 23 percent of all trade books purchased in the U.S. were e-books (it's 25 percent in the U.K.) – in France the number was a fraction of that, at 3 percent.

巴黎德拉曼書店（Librairie Delamain）是巴黎最古老的書店，它坐落在繁華的聖奧諾雷街（Rue Saint-Honoré），藏於咖啡館和旅遊商店之間，是那樣的不起眼。店外，遊客熙熙攘攘，他們穿過沿路的小攤、貨架，從盧浮宮前往法蘭西劇院（Comédie Française），卻鮮有人駐足片刻，留意到這片灰白色雨篷下的天地。

店內的節奏比店外要慢幾拍，顧客們（幾乎都是法國人）在侷促的書架間爭奪着閱覽空間。法國憲法委員會主席讓－路易·德勃雷（Jean-Louis Debré）時常光顧於此。法蘭西劇院演員德尼·波達利德斯（Denis Podalydès）亦是常客。這些年間，米歇爾·福柯（Michel Foucault）[1]、柯萊特（Colette）[2]、讓·谷克多（Jean Cocteau）[3]都曾踏入這家書店的大門。

但是，德拉曼書店如今可能面臨關門。本月，書店與卡塔爾公司星座酒店集團的租約到期。這家公司擁有本街區的全部物業，包括翻修在即的盧浮宮酒店。公司打算將書店的租金翻番，漲到每年10萬歐元，這幾乎等於書店年收入的一成。本就盈利甚微，書店也許只能被迫關閉或放棄臨街的店面。書店自1906年便在這此經營（其業務則可追溯到1700年）。

脆弱的獨立書店屈服於來自亞馬遜、電子書和其他媒體的三重競爭壓力，這樣的故事對於世界上的愛書之人並不陌生。而在法國，故事的套路卻有所不同。作家兼記者安吉羅·里納爾迪（Angelo Rinaldi）承諾盡全力不讓書店倒閉，因此德拉曼書店幾乎未受到影響。他上週對《費加羅報》（Le Figaro）說道：“總要到祖母生病時你才意識到你有多愛她。”里納爾迪計劃於9月25日法蘭西文學院（Académie Française）復會時在他的同事中宣傳此事。

法國文化部長福樂爾·佩勒林（Fleur Pellerin）也加入到里納爾迪的隊伍中來。她親自訪問了德拉曼書店，並向店員保證她將全力支持他們。法國國家圖書出版中心主任文森特·莫那德（Vincent Monadé）也要求與星座酒店集團面談此事。幾天後，迫於壓力，盧浮宮酒店發表聲明，稱卡塔爾控股公司將會考慮“租客（德拉曼書店）活動的特殊性，以及它已在此經營多年的事實”。

莫那德對《費加羅報》說：“現在，我希望他們付諸行動。”

由一家書店的關張引發強烈抗議，這在其他國家是不可思議的事情，更別提政府直接介入私人租約事務了。這與法國人所謂的“文化例外”有關。此提法不單指文化例外主義，更確切地講，它的涵義是：文化商品不應成爲自由市場一時頭腦發熱的犧牲品，而應受到保護，使之免遭全球（尤其是美國）文化帝國主義的同質化屠戮。

在美國，這樣的政策頗有保護主義之嫌。法國人則更喜歡爲其正名，稱之爲保護“文化多樣性”。“文化例外”是法國電臺節目必不可少的素材。這也解釋了爲什麼網飛公司（Netflix）總裁初訪法國時，迎接他的是來自制片人的一封悲嘆“文化模式崩潰”的信。更廣義上講，這是法國信念的一部分（雖說它已引發越來越多的爭議）。在這種信念裏，文化遺產是具有自身內在邏輯和價值體系的商品，政府不僅有責任保護文化，更應該積極弘揚文化。法國甚至將本國最負盛名的文學和文化名人安葬於“偉人”安息之所—巴黎先賢祠（Panthéon）。

在出版界，“文化例外”從理想承諾轉變爲切實政策，讓法國人向數字革命提出挑戰，而這在美國是無法想象的事。

作爲獨立書店，德拉曼書店得到了來自法國國家圖書出版中心的部分商品補貼（2013年補貼金額爲5000歐元）。2013年，法國文化部長宣佈再向獨立書店行業注資500萬歐元，並新設官方職位（這是解決所有法國問題的老套路）——“圖書仲裁人”，在諸如此類案件中介入法律爭端，使小書店免於陷入昂貴的訴訟。德拉曼書店這樣的書商還受到《朗法》（loi Lang）的支持，該法律以法國前文化部長傑克·朗的名字命名，於1981年頒佈。《朗法》規定，圖書折扣不得超過其標價的5%。今年初夏，所謂的“反亞馬遜”修正法案將這一限定延伸到網絡書店，並禁止其對減價書籍包郵。

事實上，法國絕不是唯一要求實行固定圖書價格[4]的國家。德國、挪威、日本、墨西哥和韓國也是這樣做的。英國也曾有過固定圖書價格的規定，但現已不再執行。如今，後果一目瞭然：法國的獨立書店佔到市場的45%，而英國的這一比例則僅有4%。2013年，美國售出的普通版圖書中23%是電子書（英國爲25%），而法國的這一比例極低，僅爲3%。