Libraries: Beyond the Book

There is wonderful line in the movie Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, based on the novel by Patrick O’Brian.  The setting is during the Napoleonic Wars, and the British Captain Jack Aubrey (played superbly by Russell Crowe) is in pursuit of the Asheron, a mighty French war ship. A young sailor presents the Captain with a model of the hull of the Asheron.  Captain Aubrey examines the model and exclaims, “That’s the future!  What a fascinating and marvelous age we live in!”

 I love this moment in the movie, because his observation captures the sentiment and excitement every generation experiences.  Indeed, what a fascinating and marvelous age we live in. What an extraordinary moment in human history, with the almost instantaneous transmission of information, ideas, and dialogue between people from every corner of the globe. Information is flowing like a giant river where everyone can drink; if you have access to the technology.

For almost five thousand years, if we include the clay tablets that filled the libraries of Mesopotamia, books have represented the life of the human mind.  Books have provided the physical record of human knowledge, the noblest ideas, the detailed inventories, our stories, poems, literature, and religious beliefs.  For many of us, books exert a powerful force in our lives.  Books are companions, illuminators, shaping who we are and what we believe.  Theodore Roosevelt once said “I am a part of everything I have read.”

Historically, libraries have been collections of books and materials logically organized to facilitate access.  However, if you go beyond the idea of physical collections of items to the underlying principals; the public library is a civic building constructed for the purpose of allowing every citizen a neutral public place to access knowledge, learn, think, write, create intellectual content, exchange ideas, and engage in a dialog. 

A successful democracy demands an informed and educated citizenry, and the library ensures everyone equal opportunity and access to information, regardless of income or origin.  In a new International City Managers Association survey, with support provided by the Gates Foundation, 22% of Americans surveyed identified public libraries as their “sole source for computers and internet resources.”  Of all the people surveyed, 30% (a projected 77 million), use public library computers and wireless networks. Almost 70% of Americans (169 million) describe themselves as library users. At the Chesapeake Public Library, citizens book over 50,000 one hour computer slots every month and the demand exceeds the supply.

When I think of the writings of Aristotle and Plato, I have an image of men strolling together through the streets of Athens, engaged in lively and reasoned discourse. The Greeks created an intellectual forum which promoted education, dialog, enlightenment, and the exchange of different ideas. Democracy. This ideal is embodied by the modern public library. 

"The School of Athens" by Raphael

Libraries are the public civic place for self actualization, for participating in Aristotle’s metaphorical strolling conversation with his students and colleagues through the streets of Athens.  Collections of materials have been a means to that end, but not really the foundation for the institution as so many of us have assumed.  Books have always been synonymous with libraries, but that doesn’t have to be the case.  If books as we know and love them cease to be published in their traditional format, we still need public libraries.  The delivery and format of ideas may change. The mission of free public access to knowledge, reading, learning, thinking, writing, creating, debating and exchanging ideas must continue.

This month the Library is adding three thousand downloadable e-books to the library catalog.  In July, the Library will begin to add downloadable audio books as well.  Patrons can download these books to their home computers and compatible e-book readers for a two week period before the item is automatically deleted at the end of the checkout period.  Last year, Amazon’s sales of e-books topped the sale of traditional books for the first time.  Downloadable books may be the next major wave as publishing houses and bookstores struggle with the expense of producing, shipping, and housing the increasingly expensive printed volume. I hope that the book as we know and love it will continue, but whatever format knowledge adopts, libraries will adapt.

In a recent interview with Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, he confesses to being a serious bibliophile.  Richards owns so many thousands of books that he has considered “professional training” to learn the Dewey Decimal System to organize his collection. He goes on to say, “When you are growing up there are two institutional places that affect you most powerfully: the church, which belongs to God, and the public library, which belongs to you.  The public library is a great equalizer.”  Rock on Keith.  To paraphrase another musician, Neil Young, rock and roll and libraries are here to stay.