I was just in the library, picking up some books, and I thought, “Why even bother?” There are stacks and stacks and stacks … and stacks of those things. It’s really impressive, and then I think about how there’s no chance I will ever get anywhere near reading even 1% (.001%?) of what is out there. It doesn’t help that I’m a slow reader (my finger gets tired easily [sub]kidding[/sub]). I have a good memory, so if I read something once, that’s usually all it takes. I enjoy reading things more than once, but since there’s other things out there that I haven’t read once, then it’s like it’s a waste of time to read the other thing again. Then when it comes to a new book, it’s actually going reading it in the first place that’s the hard part. And with all those books out there, it’s a bit overwhelming, so I don’t read them … you see how it goes.
You’re walking into a treasure room. Find what you like. Waste no time on the horrible books. Life’s too short to read bad books.
No, you will never read all of them. But you hook up with friends and colleagues and they will help you find the good ones, and steer you away from the bad ones.
Don’t look as it as overwhelming. Look at it like a huge buffett of a million different gourmet foods. You may not be able to sample them all, but think of the fun you will have trying what you can!
My Dad just last week built Mrs. Six and I a library in the bonus room of our new house. It was the perfect gift.
We live in the greatest time in history when it comes to mass entertainment media. Virtually every book ever written, movie ever made, and song ever recorded is readily and cheply available to the masses.
If there were a moratorium imposed tomorrow on producing new works or art and entertainment, there would still be so much available that nobody would ever be able to experience more than a fraction of it.
Pick out the good stuff. Hell, looking for the good stuff is half the fun. Reading a book isn’t a task to be accomplished, it’s a pleasant way to invest your time. It’s about the experience, not the accomplishment.
Don’t forget that data, information, knowledge and wisdom are not the same.
If your library is anything like the library that I just started working in, it contains large amounts of data and vast quantities of information. Knowledge is internal- its what you are trying to get by reading the books which contain the information. Wisdom is what comes with experience or what comes when you apply information to life.
Data is incredibly boring unless you actually need it. For example, in the reference collection at my library, there are shelves filled with large books containing spectra. This means that if someone needed to know what the NMR or IR spectra are for compound X, I’d be able to help them find it. (So long as they had a name for compound X that was findable in the index). But just to look at and try to remember? It would be incredibly silly, as well as boring.
Also, in many libraries, there are books which contain almost the same information in them. For example, a few shelves away from the Spectra are Jane’s Book of Fighting Ships. This has been published every year for many years, and there are about ten of them in the reference collection. I suspect that there is not a whole lot of difference between the entries for 1999 and 1998- but I lack sufficient interest in fighting ships to check it out. Or there is the three volume encyclopedia of spectra located near the shelves and shelves of spectra. Not much less boring than the big set, not much less silly to try to read, but containing the most common spectra.
For that matter, your library may well have more than one copy of a book. So the percentage of unique information possesed by your library that you can obtain may be higher than you think.
But really, why is it depressing to know that you can never obtain all the knowledge of humanity? A library is simply a means of permitting access to knowledge obtained by others when it is important.
That said: the library at which I just started working is depressing. It is incredibly ugly and looks like a parking garage. Even on the inside the walls are mostly made out of concrete.
:::eye twitches and that vein right above it starts throbbing:::
Sorry, just a little flashback to my theory class in library school.
Honestly, I can see Dignan’s point. Sure, I spend eight or more hours a day in a library, but I know there’s so much that I don’t know - and so much that sounds good but that I’m not going to have time to read.
It makes no difference, Dignan. Just pick out what sounds good. If you get started and find that something’s not interesting, then don’t keep reading it. After all, getting it from the library is a lot cheaper than wandering into a bookstore and spending money on a book - and then finding that you don’t like it. And re-read whatver you want to re-read. Who cares, if you enjoy it enough to read it again?
Was it built from, oh, the mid sixties to the mid seventies? Yeah, they all look alike. The concrete walls all day make me feel like I’m in a prison sometimes.
A couple of years ago, there was a fuss over a librarian action figure which put its finger to its lips and went “Shush”. The librarians claimed the stereotype of the silence-obsessed librarian was obsolete and demeaning.
Personally, I wish the librarians WOULD go back to shushing the noisier patrons. The library should be a quiet spot where you can read, do research, and think without rude teenagers – and, it must be admitted, rude baby boomers – sharing the details of their date the night before (or worse) with the rest of the world.
I like old huge libraries, because I feel like I can wander around for a few minutes, pick a book at random, and odds are, that book has never been touched or read in years, or decades, if ever.
I visited the library at Middle Tennessee State University, chasing my intrest in folktales.
I found an interesting-looking book on the “witchcraft” themes in Shakespeare.
But the anthropology seemed…dated. And very Politically Incorrect!
Then, I checked the publication date at the front of the book. It was over 120 years old. Based on the checkout slip in the front, it hadn’t been touched since before World War One!!
I took it to the office of the Head Librarian, & gently pointed out that a collector’s item should not be left in the general stacks. It’s safe, in the Special Collection now.
