Papers and proceedings of the thirty-fifth general meeting of the American Library Association, 1913

. BR

ANDE

T D.

mit

y fire insurance rates which he had found many libraries of the United States

by the chair to investigate the subject of fire insurance for libraries. The ch

ther business the

g of J

n meeting and was attended by many of the members o

on and Samuel H. Ranck for members of the Council for a term of five years each. Upon motion by Dr. Bostwick

sion of "The Quality of fiction," discussion being l

n spoke a

ity of F

e. It only becomes so as related to the much larger question of the general purpose of the public library-what it is supposed

he words of a celebrated writer of it whose wo

of fiction is

e the gentle ra

haps, thri

s, and him that prints and

est in the

t we reach debatable ground and I shall add nothin

question. And I suppose I was selected for the reason that the library for which I am responsible has, through circumstances not entirely within its control, acquired a reputation for ultra-conserva

. But, if you don't love it, it is fortunate that in the general plan of nature the good so surrounds us and hems us in, to s

catalog within reasonable limits, the adequate provision for new books in other departments of literature, the constant increase in our fixed charges due to the expan

c and bitter. I would fain be persuasive and kindly. It is indeed my conviction that no invariable rule is possible on this matter or on other points of library policy. Certain principles hold, but the applicatio

scornful, or pronounce judgment on my neighbor? Any librarian whose hand is thus forced has trouble enough without my adding to it with wild and whirling words. After all, such action is not without precedent-nay, we may go farther and say not without justification. Old Isaac Walton was not the first who angled successfully with a concealed hook,

is today fatal in the discussion of more weighty matters than the one we are now considering. There is, indeed, a form of printed matter even more frequently used than the novel for relaxation and amusement. I allude to that required in the great game of Auction Bridge, and one may gain instruction, perhaps inspiration from that, but public libraries so far igno

social gloom that shrouds the proletariat, by taking him into worlds as unlike his real world as it is possible to make them, and to put a little more vitality into the merchan

in some other way. Mr. Dana some months ago put the reading of the classics into the limbo of out-worn tradition-put them perpetually "on the blink," if I may use language similar to that employed in fiction by Sew

to overwhelm us-the recognized standard novels, quite modern some of them, for the production of good fiction did

ms to be imaginative and romantic, I should need no better broom with which to attempt that forlorn and hopeless task than one made from the strands

t believe, that is, I do not believe them in my present state of

way: The State or the municipality ought to provide any citizen who wants a book with the book he wants when he wants it.-A moment's c

oks of the day, irrespective of merit; or, as a critical journal once put it, "

t as much real value to the average man or woman as was Mrs. A's inquiry after the health of Mrs. B's old man. Not that she cared anything about his health but the inquiry helped conversation. And when the book of the day rises above the plane of mere gossip its interest or value is frequently momentary. Two years ago,

ult enough to supply things which have higher civic promise in them, even in fiction, w

my distinguished predecessor, Dr. Winsor, held that opinion. But, after some thirty years' intimate knowledge of a library (outside of Boston), not too large to permit the study o

talogs nor those of Rev. Silas K. Hocking. These two among the most popular English novelists of our day, may be found on the shelves of the circulating libraries, and with several others almost equally well-known, appear among the miscellaneou

esent what they call "censorship" on the part of public libraries, nevertheless, simply because we are public institu

lf, in my young days a persistent reader of Beadle's dime novels, which were of size to be readily concealed between Euclid and Andrews and Stoddard's Latin Grammar, well out of view of the censor. Oliver Optic was permitted to corrupt my young mind, and since I had an eclectic taste, I absorbed liberal doses of Sylvanus Cobb, Jr., Emerson Bennett, and Mrs. Southworth, writers almost unknown to the present generation. So far, I h

tion should bear to other necessary expenses. The percentage will vary, I should suppose, with different libraries. Speaking for my own, it has by experience been determined at from 20 to 25 per cent of all expe

er than theories. I need not enlarge upon the character of those other departments. They are not for the use of the dilettante or the connoisseur. Contrary to an opinion that seems to prevail in c

f education, of so much importance to our city, could go on without the aid derived from the library. And I need only mention the various special collections which have grown up from the beginning, which are draw

ll known that the demand may be so insistent as to require, without satisfying it, all the money at your command-every dollar beyond this limit is a dollar drawn from students, from readers in courses, from work with the immigrant, if you have that problem, from work with children, from the artisan or mechanic who comes to you for the books that will add to his indus

English that comes from the press, which any public library is likely to buy. Last year, which is perhaps typical, 890 different books in fiction were considered, incl

sede the critical opinion of the librarian or his selected staff officers. It does not even control. It merely aids by an analysis of the books and by such opinions, expressed on blank forms provided for the purpos

ased on complete misconception of its purpose and character. This resulted in creating an impression as different as possible from the actual, but which still persists, as the mother

ic characters. But the committee has no power to "censor" anything, and the Boston public library has no "black list" nor has it in my time ever had to become a censor. It has to choose, and so far as possible within the exercise of fallible human judgment to cho

d lines with Swinburnian fervor spoke of the "books banned in Boston." From the little daily papers, the matter spread to the big ones. The Times Saturday Review pointed out, after scanning some of the titles, that "in some New England minds exquisite pleasure was akin to wickedness," because of the supposed censorship of books not bought. The committee was irreverently alluded to as the "body of spinster censors who since they were themselves virtuous h

they approve of straight fronts? Do hoops still gallop in the East wind?" Drastic comments were received and appeared in print from other librarians. Mr. Legler's predecessor, entirely in good faith, fell with

f severe selection is a blessing to the country, and has leavened its crudeness from ocean to ocean. Puritanism has been more or less a critic of the rest of us, but the criticism has done good. * * * There is doubtless good reason for

lemnly to stupendous critical opinions. We do not even claim that every individual report is actually accurate and unbiased. But we do believe that collected and weighed, they are unbiased and accurate in the bulk. The committee in its membership is subject to frequent changes. It is, as I have said, free from library influence

e not bought. Frequently novels are bought which the committee did not approve. But the experience of several years has shown that nearly all which for various reasons we have found it impossible to buy have failed to demonstrate their right to live for even a few brief months. The demand for some of them was insistent for a short time. Now, their very names are forgotten. If we had purchased a considerable number of them, the money, so far as present demand is concerned, would have been wasted. It may be fairly said, however, that we have bought meantime, so far as our resources permitted, a fair representation of the best ficti

first instance the chances of a borrower getting a copy of any book selected would be much reduced in comparison with his chance of getting one under the more limited range of titles

rate, I hope I have done something to lay the ghost of unreasonable censorship which some of yo

l conditions, within his own resources. He should try to keep a proper proportion in this expenditure, not as measured in Boston or elsewhere b

o with his library. For a library should not be a dead thing. It should have a vital relation to the particular community in which it is placed, and fit it as the glove fits the hand. Through the books we circulate we are directly influencing the men and wome

munity. That sentence, which I quote in spirit if not in exact words from our colleague, Dr. Richardson, expresses the reason for being of the public library

s of which a commercial circulating library in a small city near my home kept in constant circulation for a year, is as good as another in that inert position. B

e circulation per capita without regard to the character of the books circulated, is

yers' money, which comes hard enough at best. It is no heart-breaking matter whether you buy and circulate 50, 60 or 70 per cent of fiction. If you bring your percentage down from 70 to 50, that of itse

arthstones become fashionable in your vicinity. I do not know. But this I know. You should settle that point with your own conscience, and when you have settled it, go on, and do not apologize. In the long run your sins wheth

pon to continue the discu

ity of F

reat basic forms into which all literature is divided. Narrative may be cast in either form and when that narrative is untrue we call it fiction. In the usage of most of us the word is restricted to prose. Fiction, therefore, is not so much a ma

ts, not of the narrative but incidental to it, may be true in the fiction and false in the biography. From the standpoint of the seeker of recreation, the fiction is generally, although not always, more interesting. The writer has the advantage of being able to create the elements of his tale

ion at all, as fiction, in this connection. The reasons for rejecting fiction, when they exist, have nothing whatever to do with its being fiction, and would apply to non-fiction as well. If a biography purporting to relate the events in the life of Oliver Cromwell is full of errors, that is a reason why it should not stand on your library shelves. If a novel, purporting to give a correct idea of life in Chicago, succeeds only in leaving the impression that the city is peopled with silly and immoral persons, that is equally a reason for rejection. If a history of the Italian Renaissance is filled with unsavory details, these might exclude it, just as they might exclude a novel whose scene

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 harm

s the subject was thrown open t

d 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 abso

t 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 am

her 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

ich 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 Bas

novels published about 140 were included in the Booklist, adding tha

sification 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

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 limi

r for or against the wide purchase of fiction, Miss Hazeltine of the University of Wisconsin library school, said it was their effort to teach th

pies. In St. Louis it is the tendency to buy rather a small number of copies of each work of fiction for regular use and put these books as far as possible into duplicate collections. The pay collection of duplicates in St.

pies of a book as those who can afford to pay one or two cents a day. In Brooklyn they give the same number of copies to the free circulating department as to the duplicate pay department. Dr. Hill said

he firm had sold in this country seven million copies of the works of Charles Dickens and four or five million copies of Scott's works, not individual titles, but the complete works of those authors. This means of course that a surprisingly large number of the best novels by these writers must be in the homes of the people who use the public

e of Henry van Dyke: A book of fiction is really worthy to be bought if it has not given an untrue picture of life, if it has not made vice attra

ceives, of course, all the copyrighted fiction and places one copy at least of practically every book of permanent value upon its shelves. Af

him that he had now sold over one and a half million copies of the books in Every

on by the chair, contributed also to the genera

g of J

order by President Anderson immediate

om the Government Documents Round Table an

p. m., when the Special Committee on Resolutions, consisting of Miss E. E. Clarke of Syracuse University, Mr. H. J. Car

and is being done for libraries by the office of the Superintendent of Documents, nevertheless it recognizes the many hampering feature

printing and binding and distribution of Government Publications," now pending before the Sixty-third Congress; strongly recommending, however, that the parenthetical exce

mmendation urging that the text of all public bills upon which co

S. GO

Documents

rews in behalf of the Committee on affiliation with oth

osed and approved by the Council at its meeting in January. They regret that circumstances have pre

presidents of the four affiliat

uld be well to take definite and formal action. The committee propose that hereafter these privileges shall not be extended to other than affiliated societies without formal vote of the council, except that the program committee will be authorized to do so for the first meeting of any newly-formed society. They propose to recommend, also, that the present provision shall be continued,-namely, that each affiliated society shall meet with the Association at least once eve

in the special rai

rooms and meals

f rooms and tim

in the activitie

nts in the Bulletin, and assignme

gs, including editing and distributing, about $1,500.00. Provision of hotel rooms and travel facilities

a flat amount of $15.00 to $25.00, one dependent on the number of members in the society, who

amount of $10.00 or $15.00 and an additional charge of 50 cents or 25 cents for each member attending who is not a member

f your opinion on this subject at y

rs t

) C. W.

n their suggestions as to the proper amount of the contribution to be made and the method by which it is to be computed. The committee desire to consider carefully these suggestions and to reconcile their variations as nearly as possible. They wou

t the foregoing as a

e Comm