What books to lend and what to give

by Charlotte M. Yonge

The corresponding class of girls and young women are for the most part indiscriminate devourers of fiction, and, like the women before mentioned, need to have their appetite rightly directed. But there is more hope of them than of their elders, and their ideal is capable of being raised by high-minded tales, which may refine their notions. The semi-religious novel or novelette is to them moralising put into action, and the most likely way of reaching them.

We must not be too hasty to condemn their frivolous tastes. Whether in business or in service, they are tired, the book is recreation, and they cannot be expected to want to improve themselves when their brains and bodies are alike weary. Still we can supply them with books that will not give them false views of life, and that will foster enthusiasm for courage and truth, make vulgarity disgusting, and show religion as the only true spring of life. Through classes for Sunday teachers, and Communicants’ or Bible classes, some spirit of religious study may be infused.

As to secular self-improvement, the students will always be few and far between, and the experience of most libraries is that there is little or no demand for improving books. So much is taught that there is little inclination to learn. A reaction sometimes comes to men, but seldom to women, whose home industries and occupations necessarily absorb them so that their reading must be either devotional or recreative.

Thus there is very little call for improving books in the lending library, in proportion to those meant for recreation; but I would urge that they should be used for prizes. At present, the usual habit is to choose gay outsides and pretty pictures, with little heed to the contents, but it should be remembered that the lent book is ephemeral, read in a week and passed on, while the prize remains, is exhibited to relatives and friends, is read over and over, becomes a resource in illness, and forms part of the possessions to be handed on to the next generation. Therefore, after the infant period, the reward book should generally be of some worthiness, either religious, improving, or at least standard fiction. Weakness and poverty of thought should be avoided, especially as these books may fall into the hands of clever, ungodly men, and serve to excite their mockery. It should be remembered that the child to whom the book is given will not always remain a child, and therefore that it is better to let the new and cherished possession go beyond its present level of taste or capacity.

The elder lad, whose schooldays are over, sometimes begins to waken to intelligence, and to be ready to seek information, in some cases being glad of really deep reading on scientific, political, or theological subjects, and it is all-important to preoccupy his mind with sound views before he meets with specious trash. Many indeed both of lads and men are absorbed in actual practical life and never read at all, or nothing but newspapers. Yet even these when laid low by illness will accept a book to pass away the weary hours.

Nothing, of course, can equal the effect of personal influence, from schoolmaster, clergyman, or lady, but each of these may find books, lent, recommended, or read aloud, of great assistance.

Some books of advice deprecate reading aloud in Sunday schools. My own experience, now of many years, is that it is of great assistance in impressing the scholars, and gives great pleasure. I have been told of my old pupils mentioning it as one of the enjoyments of their younger days; and when a part of a story has been missed by absence, the connection is eagerly supplied by the listeners who have been present. Moreover, those books in the lending library are always most sought after which have been read aloud, and sometimes elucidated, either at the Sunday school or at the mothers’ meeting.

But books for this purpose must be carefully selected, with a view to the capacities and tastes of the listeners, and be read really well and dramatically, watching the eyes of the hearers—a rapid or monotonous utterance is almost useless, and inattention leads to bad habits.

There is no reason against giving tales about persons in different stations of life from that of those who receive them, and in fact they are often preferred; but it is as well to avoid those that deal with temptations or enjoyments out of reach of the school-child; or which dwell on beauty, finery, dainties, or any variety of pomps or vanities as delights of wealth or rank. The enjoyment that authors have in describing a lovely, beautifully-dressed child in a charming attitude should be sacrificed in writing for children of any rank, unless they are to learn vanity and affectation, or else be set to covet such pleasures.