George Whitman (December 12, 1913 – December 14, 2011) was an American bookseller who lived most of his life in France. He was the founder and proprietor of the second Shakespeare and Company, which was named after Sylvia Beach's celebrated original bookstore of the same name (1919 to 1941) on Paris's Left Bank. He was a contemporary of writers such as Allen Ginsberg, Anaïs Nin, and Lawrence Durrell, as well as a lifelong friend of the poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

In 2006 he was awarded the Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres medal by the French government for his contribution to the arts over the previous fifty years.

Early life and education

Whitman was born in East Orange, New Jersey, and grew up in Salem, Massachusetts. The first book he read was The Light That Failed by Rudyard Kipling. When he was a boy, his family spent two years living in Nanjing, China, where his physics professor father, Walter, had a guest professorship. This early adventure abroad established Whitman's lifelong passion for travel and far-flung places.

He graduated with a degree in journalism from Boston University in 1935.

Travels, military service, and first bookstore

After graduation, Whitman struck out on what he called his "hobo adventures", train-hopping, hitchhiking, and walking on foot through the U.S., Mexico, and Central America. It was the middle of the Great Depression, but he said wherever he went, he was met with kindness and generosity. This experience would form the founding ethos of his bookstore: "Give what you can; take what you need". When it disbanded, he enrolled at the Sorbonne to study French civilisation. He traded his G.I. rations for other veterans' book allowances, quickly amassing a large number of books. He left the door to his tiny room in the Hotel de Suez unlocked, so anyone could come and read the books whether he was home or not.

Death

Whitman died on December 14, 2011, at age 98, at home in the apartment above his bookshop. He is buried in the Père Lachaise Cemetery in the east of Paris.

References

Further reading

  • Shakespeare and Company website
  • George Whitman, Obituary, The New York Times
  • Obituary in The Independent by Marcus Williamson