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Article
Publication date: 1 June 1934

ONE or two questions raised by the writer of “Letters on our Affairs” this month are of some urgency. The first, the physical condition of books, is one that is long over‐due for…

47

Abstract

ONE or two questions raised by the writer of “Letters on our Affairs” this month are of some urgency. The first, the physical condition of books, is one that is long over‐due for full discussion with a view to complete revision of our method. The increased book fund of post‐war years, and the unexpected success of the twopenny library, have brought us to the point when we should concentrate upon beautiful and clean editions of good books, and encourage the public to use them. “Euripides” is quite right in his contention that there is too much dependence upon the outcasts of the circulating library for replenishing the stocks of public lending libraries. We say this gravely and advisedly. Many librarians depend almost entirely upon the off‐scourings of commercial libraries for their fiction. The result, of course, is contempt of that stock from all readers who are not without knowledge of books. It is the business of the public library now to scrap all books that are stained, unpleasant to the sight, in bad print, and otherwise unattractive. Of old, it was necessary for us to work hard, and by careful conservation of sometimes quite dirty books, in order to get enough books to serve our readers. To‐day this is no longer the case, except in quite backward areas. The average well‐supported public library—and there are many now in that category—should aim at a reduction of stock to proportions which are really useful, which are good and which are ultimately attractive if not beautiful. The time has arrived when a dirty book, or a poorly printed book, or a book which has no artistic appeal, should be regarded as a reproach to the library preserving it.

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New Library World, vol. 37 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Article
Publication date: 1 February 1954

THE year 1954 opened more brightly, in some respects, than most previous years. Salaries are better than they used to be, staffs are larger, and hours are shorter. But there is…

26

Abstract

THE year 1954 opened more brightly, in some respects, than most previous years. Salaries are better than they used to be, staffs are larger, and hours are shorter. But there is even less room for complacency or even bare satisfaction than there was forty years ago. Then, however poor was the pay and however long the hours, there was every indication that librarianship was gradually becoming recognized as a profession which in time would rank with the great professions. Principles and objectives were clear and were never lost sight of, but librarians and assistants of that day realized that the great professions were dependant, not only on principles but upon absolute mastery of technique; that no lawyer could survive who merely talked grandiloquently about the principles and objectives of his calling; that the medical man endured—and in many instances enjoyed—a severe and lengthy training in technique and practice, and that even when he became a specialist his prime need and principal qualification was absolute mastery and up to date knowledge of technique and practice in his field of specialisation. In the light of that fad a detailed study of library technique became accepted as essential, and a mass of practical and technical literature was studied and mastered by more than one generation. For examination purposes, perhaps more than for any other reason, the present generation of assistants continues that study, but there has been a change of weight. Today we hear frequently that technique is relatively unimportant and that principles and objectives are the vital essentials.

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New Library World, vol. 55 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Publication date: 1 April 1954

THE occasional moving of stock in open‐shelf libraries creates a sense of novelty in the reader. We experienced this recently in entering a library familiar to us where we found…

21

Abstract

THE occasional moving of stock in open‐shelf libraries creates a sense of novelty in the reader. We experienced this recently in entering a library familiar to us where we found the Literature section had been moved and reduced in order to make space for the increase in the Applied Arts class. Further the librarian declared that there was no excessive demand for much of modern poetry, but although the library has the poems of T. S. Eliot in several copies, none was on the shelves or at the moment available. One wonders if poetry that is “modern” has been read by the majority in the past half‐century; it is an art form, often lacking substance and therefore caviare to the ordinary reader. The poets of today with such exceptions as Walter de la Mare and Alfred Noyes, neither of whom is young, have not increased their chances by their deliberate or unconscious obscurity. Even the said‐to‐be most influential of the modern, T. S. Eliot, in such a work as Ash Wednesday, topical this month of course, is completely unintelligible, in spite of the almost divine music of some of its lines, to many quite intelligent and habitual readers. Our librarian declared that readers remain for Coleridge, Keats, Shelley, Tennyson, Browning and even for Longfellow, in short for the real classics. This conclusion is borne out by the examination of a day's borrowings a year ago at Manchester. “Modern poetry,” its Report tells us, “seems to be departing from the range of the general reader into some esoteric mystery of its own,” and while the older classics, Browning, Chaucer, Donne and Tennyson were borrowed to the extent of four copies each, other poets were less in demand. Altogether 21 works of individual poets and 16 anthologies went out that day. A small array but, if continued through the year, it meant 11,100 works which are not a negligible number.

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New Library World, vol. 55 no. 9
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Article
Publication date: 1 October 1955

IT is heartening to librarians who begin a winter's work to read more personally a few recent conference utterances. In the changing pattern of contemporary life the library has…

20

Abstract

IT is heartening to librarians who begin a winter's work to read more personally a few recent conference utterances. In the changing pattern of contemporary life the library has become an indispensable ingredient and not merely an ornament or an amenity, although it may also be that. Such a phrase, uttered fifty years ago, would have been met with a curl of contempt upon the lip of most hearers—so we are told. But that was the effect of Sir Philip Morris's conference address, to which we have turned again with profit. Yet before our complacency grows we may also note his view that, while modern life without libraries is impossible, our tendencies hitherto have been unplanned and this is a source of strength not without its dangers. When such statements are made there seems a certain vagueness about them. We recall that young librarians were not admitted to the special abbreviated matriculation that was available to others after the first World War because they “were not an organized profession.” With our Association, Charter, Examinations, and Diplomas, which such a decision then ignored, many were left wondering what the word organized meant. If we are unplanned, or have been, in what way are we so? Every year, indeed, increases the appropriateness of our training and testing systems, and their difficulty. Every year sees the recognition of the unity in librarianship in spite of the superficial differences we deal with below; every year sees the development of library research, intercommunication and almost universal co‐operation. As for differences, Mr. F. C. Francis in his eloquent address stressed the need for a flexible, genial individualism in libraries. Probably our President was leading us to contemplate the views the Council advanced in its motion to the Annual General Meeting which, in the interests of efficiency, would transfer the responsibility for libraries to larger local government authorities. The postal ballot on the Council resolution demanded at Southport has now been declared. 8,502 members were entitled to vote, about 3,340 were excluded for non‐payment of their current subscriptions, and 3,538 returned correct ballot papers. The majority for the Council was 1,150. Such ballots are necessarily secret and no inferences can be drawn from the figures, except that the Council has a modest mandate to go ahead. We are sure that discretion will be observed in the choice of time and manner of doing that.

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New Library World, vol. 57 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Article
Publication date: 1 September 1971

THE PUBLIC LIBRARIES CONFERENCE in Blackpool will be opened on 7 September by the President of the Library Association Dr George Chandler, who will also award three honorary…

15

Abstract

THE PUBLIC LIBRARIES CONFERENCE in Blackpool will be opened on 7 September by the President of the Library Association Dr George Chandler, who will also award three honorary fellowships. The recipients are to be Miss Eileen Colwell, doyenne of British children's libraries and formerly a lecturer at Loughborough library school, W. S. Haugh, librarian of Bristol, and S H Horrocks, formerly librarian of Reading.

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New Library World, vol. 73 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Publication date: 1 August 1963

SINCE the year 1940, there have appeared two major reports on the Public Library system in Great Britain. The first, “The public library system of Great Britain: a report on its…

31

Abstract

SINCE the year 1940, there have appeared two major reports on the Public Library system in Great Britain. The first, “The public library system of Great Britain: a report on its present condition, with proposals for post‐war re‐organisation” by Lionel R. McColvin, appeared in 1942. It suggested sweeping changes in the organisation of the public library system, more radical and far‐reaching than those embodied in the recent recommendations of the Library Association for local government reform. On library co‐operation, the report was equally radical, though certain similarities with the recommendations of the second report are apparent.

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New Library World, vol. 65 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Publication date: 1 February 1967

I HAVE sometimes been asked whether I am conscious, as the present editor of THE LIBRARY WORLD, of the spirit and influence of its founder, James Duff Brown, and of his editorial…

85

Abstract

I HAVE sometimes been asked whether I am conscious, as the present editor of THE LIBRARY WORLD, of the spirit and influence of its founder, James Duff Brown, and of his editorial successors, who included J. D. Stewart and W. C. Berwick Sayers. The answer is that of course I am—how could it be otherwise?

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New Library World, vol. 68 no. 8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Article
Publication date: 1 December 1964

THIS was my first experience in my home country of a conference in a university campus, and an impressive experience it was too. Away from the attractions and allurements of sea…

42

Abstract

THIS was my first experience in my home country of a conference in a university campus, and an impressive experience it was too. Away from the attractions and allurements of sea and coast, I found it particularly conducive to study and reflection, for the atmosphere of learning was all around us in this red‐brick university, the prototype of a civic university, founded in 1900 and with a student population of nearly 5,000.

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New Library World, vol. 66 no. 9
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Article
Publication date: 1 September 1964

This was my first experience in my home country of a conference in a university campus, and an impressive experience it was too. Away from the attractions and allurements of sea…

31

Abstract

This was my first experience in my home country of a conference in a university campus, and an impressive experience it was too. Away from the attractions and allurements of sea and coast, I found it particularly conducive to study and reflection, for the atmosphere of learning was all around us in this red‐brick university, the prototype of a civic university, founded in 1900 and with a student population of nearly 5,000.

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New Library World, vol. 66 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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Article
Publication date: 1 November 1966

A SPLENDID conference, I thought. True, there were those who complained, those who thought some of the papers were elementary and those who thought that we had come a long way to…

58

Abstract

A SPLENDID conference, I thought. True, there were those who complained, those who thought some of the papers were elementary and those who thought that we had come a long way to learn very little. I don't agree at all. Some of the papers did, I admit, deal with basic considerations but it does nothing but good to re‐examine the framework of our services from time to time. In any case other papers were erudite, and for the first time I have seen an audience of librarians and authority members stunned, almost, into silence.

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New Library World, vol. 68 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0307-4803

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