Librarians love bookstores, of course, and that affection’s largely returned by booksellers, who’ve long known that thriving libraries inspire readers to buy books.
Last month Publisher’s Weekly had an article about a Library Journal survey showing more than “50 percent of all library users report purchasing books by an author they were introduced to in the library. This debunks the myth that when a library buys a book the publisher loses future sales. Instead, it confirms the public library not only incubates and supports literacy, as is well understood in our culture, but it is an active partner with the publishing industry in building the book market, not to mention the burgeoning e-book market.”
Librarians certainly buy a lot of books for themselves. I spend a little extra to buy new books locally and support our local booksellers. When used books are hard to locate, I turn to BookFinder.com. For example, my friend Leon showed me how engaging his 1938 copy of Judge James Wickersham’s “Old Yukon: Tales, Trails, and Trials” was recently, and I craved my own copy. BookFinder.com revealed a bookstore in Massachusetts would part with theirs for $6.99, after I threw in another $3.99 for shipping. Now, it’s mine.
The Judge’s book has the entire May 1903 issue of the Fairbanks Miner, with an exclusive with Felix Pedro and a tall “Tanana Tale,” about a miner who claims to survive falling in the Tanana River at 70 below, getting lost, and staving off starvation by eating the tail of his lead dog.
“I gave Doughnuts the bone out of his tail,” he explained, “and after gnawing it a while he came on into the Fortymile with me.”
Few events are so pleasing as books in the mail. The pleasure’s heightened when they arrive wrapped in tissue paper. My new “Old Yukon” measured up, and was further wrapped in pages from a New York Times several weeks old. Several eye-catching articles popped out, including one by Jess Bidgood about the Occupy Wall Street Library, also known as the “People’s Library.”
Public libraries are strongly ingrained in the American consciousness; where they’re cherished for the educational, informational, and social benefits they provide that make their communities better, more vibrant, informed, and prosperous. Most American towns have libraries, and those that do not don’t seem complete.
The People’s Library sprang up two weeks after the New York demonstrations began last September and was described by the Library Hotline as, “a 24/7, no-fines, no due-dates library that operates on the honor system.”
By November the library possessed more than 5,000 books grouped into orderly subjects, laptops were available for Internet sessions, and an online catalog was up on LibraryThing.com, largely thanks to some young New York librarians donating their professional talents.
Sadly, the People’s Library was dismantled Nov. 15 when the police cleared Zuccotti Park, destroying four-fifths of the books and all the laptops.
Wanton destruction of books affects most Americans viscerally. Just as Nazi Germany was surprised by the American reaction to their book-burning bonfires, New York Mayor Bloomberg wasn’t prepared for the strong public reaction to the ruined library.
We much prefer seeing books and libraries created. The People’s Library has been reborn as a bookmobile, stocked with some of the hundreds of books that have been donated. One is Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, with its clear reminders of mankind’s enduring foolishness and occasional glories.
My Chaucer’s at home, and I think I’ll follow Sam Pepys’ example from one November night 345 years ago. I’ll leave the library deep in winter’s blast, and “then home to supper, and after supper an hour reading to my wife and brother something in Chaucer with great pleasure, and so to bed.”
Greg Hill is director of Fairbanks North Star Borough libraries.
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