In other words I should not buy a book because it is fiction, or turn it down for the same reason, any more than I would buy or fail to buy a book because it is biography or travel. I say I should not do this any more in one case than in another; I might want to do it occasionally in both. But I believe that the more we forget the mere issue of fiction versus non-fiction and try instead to draw the line between useful books and harmful ones, wise books and silly ones, books that help and books that hinder, books that exalt and those that depress, books that excite high emotions and books that stir up low ones—the sooner we shall be good librarians.
Following Dr. Bostwick's remarks the subject was thrown open to discussion by members at large.
The chairman said that at his request some very interesting facts had been extracted from the annual published statements in Publishers' Weekly, respecting so-called best books of the year. These statements showed that many of the books which were leading books of particular years, ten, fifteen and eighteen years ago, had absolutely disappeared from the list of books which are now in current favor. Some of these books were found to be unknown to those who are now engaged in book selection.
Replying to the question as to the percentage of fiction of books bought by public libraries in Canada, Mr. W. O. Carson of London, Ont., stated that in his library the percentage of fiction ran from twenty to twenty-five per cent and he thought that was a fair average for other Canadian libraries. Mr. Carson said that the Ontario government bases the government grant on the amount of money expended on books and they give no grant on fiction if it exceed more than forty-five per cent of the amount expended on other books, so in the majority of the small libraries, they do not expend more than thirty per cent on fiction for fear of losing a government grant on anything that exceeds that amount. Replacements are included in this percentage.
Dr. Steiner said that a number of years ago Mr. Ranck and he prepared a paper on replacements and their attention was called to the very large proportion of expenditure for replacements which had to be used for fiction and that this was particularly noticeable in a library of some age, as in the case of the Enoch Pratt Free library of Baltimore. The speaker thought it should be borne in mind in connection with the purchase, whether the amount expended was mostly for current fiction, mostly for replacements, whether a new branch was being stocked or whether a library was being stocked which had not been sufficiently provided previously with standard works. The exact proportion of fiction in any one year should be governed by these three factors, if not by others. Dr. Steiner said that their library last year wore out in round numbers about 7,000 books, of which at a rough guess at least six-sevenths were fiction. They replaced about 5,000 books including most of the non-fiction books, leaving from 1,500 to 2,000 volumes in fiction which were allowed to expire by limitation. In every case where a book wears out, the circulation department reports whether that book is regarded by them as being worthy of replacement and if the book be not a duplicate but is an original copy the recommendation is always brought to the librarian, who occasionally overrules the decision of the circulation department in the case of original copies, but so far as duplicates are concerned, the opinion of the circulation department is absolutely accepted.
Dr. Andrews said he had found it very useful in the work of selection to discriminate between those books the library does not intend to buy at present and those which it will not accept even as a gift, and that in fiction it might be especially valuable to have some line of exclusion. He asked whether the chairman or Miss Bascom could recall what is the proportion of comparison between the recommendation of the Boston book committee as read by Mr. Wadlin and that of the A. L. A. Booklist.
Miss Bascom replied that as she recalled it for 1912 of about 1,000 novels published about 140 were included in the Booklist, adding that she supposed that the greater number of the entire output were read.
The chairman said that from figures which he had caused to be compiled, it was found that in this country and Great Britain something like 80,000 titles belonging to the classification of fiction had been printed since 1882 in this country and 1880 in Great Britain. Mr. Wadlin said that the A. L. A. Booklist contained titles of fiction which the Boston public library had not bought simply because they could not, having bought other things instead. Local conditions govern their book selection to a considerable extent.
The question being raised whether librarians experienced any considerable pressure brought to bear upon them to purchase certain books, the opinion was expressed by Mr. Ranck, Mr. Wadlin and others that this pressure was not nearly so great as one might think would be the case, that those demanding the purchase of a certain book were reminded that the library had a limited income and that the question of selection always had to be very carefully considered and that books not purchased were not necessarily excluded for any other reason than lack of funds.
Representatives of the library schools being asked to what extent the lectures given in library schools were intended to exert an influence either for or against the wide purchase of fiction, Miss Hazeltine of the University of Wisconsin library school, said it was their effort to teach the students to buy the best books with the money at their disposal—those of the best literary value—and to buy many duplicates of the best fiction.