Presenting: Prosperity at Prospero's Bookstore

Bookstore Celebrates 11th Anniversary

Story by Kevin Kuzma. Photography by Pete Dulin.

Published: Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Prospero's Books
1800 West 39th Street
Kansas City, Missouri
816.531.WORD
www.prosperosbookstore.com/

oose sheets of poetry have been blown into the bushes and the leaf piles collected behind Prospero’s Books on 39th Street. The area immediately to the store’s rear is filled with the first in a long line of historic houses shaded by 100-foot tall sycamore and cottonwood trees, stunted driveways and flower gardens that snag debris.

On Sunday nights, the bookstore hosts poetry readings that have been known to last well into the night and, on occasion, have even involved a few police calls. So it’s not a complete surprise to see lugubrious verse frothing over from the trash bin out back:

Dark shadows mingle
with musty straw
and grain
and there lies
a single innocence
of childhood slain

More than likely, this poem called The Shelter of Secrets, written by Joni Brown in 1992, was to be used as kindling in the giant black kettle on the building’s east side that is sometimes used to burn books.

prosperos
Left: Will Leathem, co-owner of Prospero's

In 2006, the bookstore’s proprietors, Will Leathem and Tom Wayne, developed book burnings to protest the declining national trend in literary readership. Or perhaps it could be better interpreted as a genius PR move to capitalize on back stock that wasn’t moving. Either way, the event earned both men face time in the national and international spotlights. Roger Ramjet, a Prospero’s customer who was helping toss books on the fire, was spotted on television by his estranged ex-wife while she vacationed in South Africa. She called him to check in.

Everyone seemed to be moved by the event whose underlying point was that books were better off burned if no one was going to read them. The event was covered by about 600 newspapers, incited an estimated 40,000 blogs and landed stories and interviews on CNN, NPR, and other media outlets around the world.

But though this stunt might seem a flash in the pan (pun intended) for the bookstore’s owners, no bookstore can survive on PR alone. Wayne and Leathem use the bookstore as a meeting place to foster and promote local writers, musicians, and artists.

prosperos

On Nov. 9, the bookstore marked a significant milestone: its eleventh year of operation. With a history so colorful and obviously rooted in something much deeper than book selling, Wayne and Leathem felt it necessary to celebrate their business’s longevity by bucking tradition.

“A decade is a hallmark for any small business, but everyone does the 10th anniversary celebration,” Wayne said. “Prospero’s prides itself in not being quite like everyone else.”

Leathem and Wayne have dubbed it their “9-11 anniversary” since Wayne joined the operation nine years ago and Prospero’s has been a center for regional arts since its opening 11 years ago. The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, also provided an impetus to take a more active role in the cultural debates of the times.

Several 2008 events are planned to celebrate the bookstore’s birthday, including: