Two traits seem forcibly to impress the cultivated foreigner as characteristic of our men and, to a lesser degree, of our women—a hard materialism and a lack of interest in the finer things of life. Is there any relation between this dearth of idealism and the reading habits of the nation? Ideals are the greatest force in life, and what a man's ideals are is largely determined by what he reads. The power of great literature to awaken noble ambitions, to cultivate the imagination, to impart the ability "to see life steadily and see it whole" is undisputed. In face of all this, where does the library of today stand?
It has been pointed out that the modern library movement is of recent growth. We look with amazement at all that has been accomplished in the last quarter-century. There seems little to connect the library of the present with the library of the past. But one link remains—the book. Sometimes it seems as if that was the one thing we were leaving out of our thought—the book, not as a material object, paper, printing, binding, to all of which we pay much attention, but the book as literature. Is the library, too, becoming materialized? As the authorized custodians of the wisdom of the past, we stand in an important and dignified relation to the present. How can we share our treasures with a public that too often fails to appreciate its need for them?
First of all—above all mere schemes and devices however good—must come a real love and enthusiasm for books, and a knowledge of them among library workers. It is impossible to awaken an interest in other people in a subject in which you are not interested yourself. There has been more or less good-natured raillery among librarians over that time-honored recommendation for one who wishes to enter library work, that he is "fond of reading." In the long list of qualifications which, we are told, the library assistant should possess—a list so comprehensive that one is reminded of the old jest about expecting all the virtues for four dollars a week—love of books seems to be ranked very low. It may be questioned if this is not a mistaken policy. After all, books are the basis of all library work and the attitude of the workers toward the books, cannot be unimportant. One of the most scathing indictments ever brought against library assistants was made when Gerald Stanley Lee accused them of being "book chambermaids." We like to judge our profession—if I may be allowed that disputed term—by its leaders; but the public judges us by the people who answer their questions in our delivery rooms and at our information desks and in our reference departments. And it is no use trying to evade the issue, as some libraries do, by requesting people not to ask questions at the delivery desk. Two-thirds of our public never get any farther and, even when referred to some other department, show an inexplicable unwillingness to go there.
A few years ago the following communication appeared in a well-known paper: "Will you kindly inform me through the columns of the Saturday Review of Books where I can find the story of 'Gil Blas'? I inquired at one of the public libraries and the attendant said she had never heard of it." Incidents like this, and we must in all honesty admit that they are liable to occur in any library, may be one reason for the too prevalent impression that the library is merely a place where one can get a new novel. If we wish to promote the reading of the best books in our communities, we must have literary taste and a familiarity with books in the members of our library staffs.
The power of the viva voce, personal opinion is apt to be underestimated. "It's great," says the little cash-girl in the department store, and her word settles the matter for the hesitating purchaser. With the public at large, your recommendation of a book goes farther than a learned review by a real authority. Here is where our opportunity lies, not only inside the library, but outside. A librarian who recently read "Eothen" and found it thoroughly delightful, casually spoke of it among his friends and, as a result, knows of no less than seventeen people who read the book and twelve who bought it. This incident is typical. Why did you choose the last book you read? Even if you are a librarian and in the habit of looking over endless numbers of book reviews, it is more than likely it was because someone spoke of it in a way to arouse your interest.
In our professional capacity we all expect to be called upon for advice in selecting books, but even outside the library we are probably alike in finding that people assume we can help them to discover the "something interesting" for which they are looking. Accordingly, the advantage of a broad range of literary likings is obvious. The world of literature is wide and there is something in it for every taste. If your personal preference happens to be for the moderns, if you enjoy Ibsen and Shaw and Maeterlinck—don't look askance on that other type of mind that finds happiness in Scott and Browning and Tennyson. The mental breadth that can sympathize with a point of view that it does not share, is nowhere more desirable than in library work.
Much effort is being expended by libraries at the present time in promoting the reading of their books. It is being more and more recognized that a smaller number of books more widely read fulfills the real purpose for which the library exists better than a larger number standing on the shelves. This is now so much of a commonplace that we are liable to forget how new the idea is. It was not so long ago that the annual report pointed with pride to the large proportion of income spent on books and the small amount on administration. The whole movement expressed by the term, "publicity," is the growth of a few years. So far most of our work along this line has been devoted to promoting the reading of new books and technical works. Gratifying success has crowned our various schemes. But every library worker knows that the easiest class of books for which to find readers is new books. The reasons for this are so apparent that we need not dwell upon them. To circulate the great books, the classics, the books which constitute literature in the restricted sense is another and a far more difficult undertaking, and on this we have hardly made a beginning. Yet if the library is to stand—and we all believe it should—for the highest, for true culture and refinement, if it is to be a source of ideals, as well as ideas, here is a side of our work which must not be neglected.
We may be inclined at times to underrate the library's ability to secure the reading of specific books. An experiment tried some years ago may serve as an object lesson. Van Vorst's "The woman who toils" and "The souls of black folk," by Du Bois, were selected for this experiment. Under ordinary conditions the first of these books would have enjoyed a fair degree of popularity, while the second would have had a rather small circulation. The library bought a number of copies of each, sent notices to all the papers, had book-notes in its bulletin, put up publishers' advertisements on its bulletin-boards, and (note this last) discussed the books in staff-meeting so that every assistant was able to talk about them intelligently. The results surpassed expectations. For months it was impossible to meet the calls for them, and reserves came in steadily; most remarkable of all, after eight years the circulation of one is eight and the other three times above the average. So much for what a library can do in determining what its constituency shall read.
One reason why the best books are not read is that many people do not know how readable they are. In the vocabulary of the great public the word classic is synonymous with dry. It frightens people. How much the schools are responsible for this through their use of great literary masterpieces as text-books is a disputed question. If we can only succeed in making people understand that the reason these works are classics is because their inherent interest is so great that it has kept them living and vital through the years that have brought oblivion to hordes of weaker writings, we shall have accomplished something truly worth while. But if to many of our patrons the classic is something to be feared and avoided, there are others who really wish the best, but either do not know it or are so busy that they neglect it, taking the book that comes first to hand. Like those daughters of time—the hypocritic days, books too bring diadems and fagots.
"To each they offer gifts after his will,
Bread, kingdoms, stars and sky that holds them all."