Bookshop ladders aren’t for the likes of us. Or so I thought

Not to boast but I went up the ladder at Toppings bookshop last week. You know the one: all turned timber rungs and heavy fittings, anchored to the bookshelves with a black iron belt, and rollable with a swish and flick of the wrist. I asked a bookseller if the ladder was a staff thing, health and safety etc. “No,” he replied. “Go ahead.”
So I did. Up I went, step by step, until I reached the novel I wanted to read. The shop looked strange from up high — smaller and more cellular, a honeycomb world. The glass cabinet of first editions glittered under the strip lights. The non-fiction section spanned miles and miles, tiny and gridded as a book of postage stamps. The ascent happened fast and then slow as I got my bearings and leant in.
Someone once told me that reading is the least expensive way to become cleverer. The most comprehensive too. From my vantage point in Toppings, I finally understood what they meant. A bookshop, or a public library, is a bridge between worlds. Think of what would be possible intellectually if you moved in.
I didn’t realise I needed to climb that ladder. I didn’t realise it would be the highlight of my week. It’s been a tricky time and I’ll admit the bar is low. Still, it wouldn’t take much to improve things and the ladder really did.
I’ve always wanted a rolling ladder of my own, to add to my imaginary library room in my imaginary Georgian townhouse. It’d help me reach the set of fabric-bound Penguin classics I’ve always wanted, especially Little Women, with the little pink scissors decorating the hessian cloth cover.
Trouble is, I don’t have a townhouse. I don’t have the cloth-bound classics. I don’t have a library room, just a Billy bookcase with a scratched pane. Last week was an era of didn’t haves — the competition shortlisting I didn’t make and the conference I wasn’t selected for. Then I went to Toppings, climbed a ladder and thought differently.
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I’m not saying it sorted all my troubles. But from up there — a place considered off-limits — the sun came out again. Shinning a shop ladder on a rainy Monday evening was surprisingly thrilling. I pretended to scour the whole shelf just to stay cloudwards a little longer. The “P” authors have never seen so much attention.
Later, I found my partner loitering in the graphic novels section. “I just went up the ladder,” I told him with glee. He knew instantly what I meant. “Were you allowed?” he asked. Thought I was skylarking. The fact that I wasn’t — that this was permissible fun — served as a reminder: the hedonism of my twenties is firmly in the rear-view mirror.
Look, sometimes you just need to climb a ladder on a bad day. I don’t exactly know how to explain it. The touch of the rungs and the fine curve that comes from hours of sanding. Polished timber is soothing, and not only to me. In climbing, I remembered a favourite poem on the pleasure of being in control of your own life, however scant that control is and however your luck has run out in other ways.
“Kings never touch doors,” writes the poet Francis Ponge. “They’re not familiar with this happiness: to push, gently or roughly, before you one of these great, friendly panels, to turn towards it to put it back in place — to hold a door in your arms.” Ponge loves the satisfaction of a porcelain knob, of a well-oiled latch and its click, of the unlikely embrace between corporeal and arboreal.
In fact, it’s not terribly unlikely. There’s no coincidence in its pleasure. A door is pleasing because it was made for you. Its vacancy wants to be moved through. Its handle is designed to be grasped. Books were written to be read. Bridges were built to be crossed. Kings never climb ladders but I’m familiar with this happiness. Thank goodness it wasn’t a staff thing. @palebackwriter
Just out of reach — until it wasn’t. Mrs S, the debut novel of the Isle of Lewis-based writer K Patrick, was worth stretching for (£9.99 HarperCollins). Patrick’s new poetry collection, Three Births, is next on the list. Buy from timesbookshop.co.uk discount for Times+ members.