Is there somebody out there who can help us figure this guy Ronald Burkle out?

Here’s what’s got us flummoxed: The world’s biggest bookstore chain announces it’s putting itself up for sale.  The press declares the triumph of digital bookselling and even speculates that Amazon will acquire its tottering rival. This observer, who takes pride (perhaps too much) in his appreciation of the evolving nature of the publishing industry, writes an obituary for Barnes & Noble. The company is swirling around the crapper on its way to the Great Brick and Mortar Septic Tank, right?

So go figure why, instead of bailing, the guy who owns the biggest chunk of stock in this horse and buggy chain has stepped up his campaign to take over the company, even threatening to take it to the stockholders in a proxy fight? What does he know that dumb investors like us do not?

There can be only two explanations.  The first is that he is a financial genius who will leverage the struggling company in some super-sophisticated Enron-ish play that will make him billions but leave investors bankrupt, gut the firm’s assets, shutter some 1400 retail and college bookstores and write the epitaph for the once-great civilization that was printed books.

The other is that he is a cockeyed optimist who passionately believes in the future of paper and has a scheme for reviving the faltering retailer with a dose of digital technology and marketing knowhow. Maybe he’s thinking of installing kiosks in those 1400 stores that would enable shoppers to select among a million titles and download their choice into their Nook or print it on an Espresso machine while they wait? Then he can take all that leftover real estate and convert it into condominiums. We wrote about kiosks a while back (See Today DVDs, Tomorrow Books?) and have been wondering when someone would see a way to make them work.

Read Michael J. de la Merced’s New York Times article about Burkle’s bid for B&N and tell us if you have any bright ideas about what he’s up to: Billionaire Investor Nominates 3 Directors in Fight Over Barnes & Noble

Richard Curtis