Genre and Ethnic Collections: : Collected Essays

Citation

Harrison, K.C. (1998), "Genre and Ethnic Collections: : Collected Essays", Library Review, Vol. 47 No. 4, pp. 239-240. https://doi.org/10.1108/lr.1998.47.4.239.3

These two volumes include 17 essays by different authors. The intention is to draw the attention of librarians to the importance of collecting and preserving literature which is too often either ignored or confined to the trashbin unwittingly. It must be freely admitted that many of these ephemeral publications offer valuable raw material to future historians. To give some idea of the coverage, some of the chapter headings in part A include: comic books; detective and mystery fiction; fantasy and horror literature; science fiction, romances and westerns.

Those in part B are wider and perhaps more international in scope, covering government publications, women’s studies, Caribbeana, Hungarian literature and aspects of Jewish and Basque literature. Some of the chapters are lists of titles with linking prose, supported by limited bibliographies. All are concerned entirely with American publications, so one cannot pretend that these two volumes have a great deal of relevance for librarians outside the USA. Certainly few British libraries will want to spend £100 on these books which are so completely American‐oriented.