BRITISH LIBRARIES.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 966, 5 November 1910, Page 9

BRITISH LIBRARIES.

At the annual meeting of the Library Association held in/London last month, a very interesting address was delivered by the president, Mr. Frederick George ICenyon, who is Principal Librarian of the. British Museum.

Mr. Kenyon classified books in three categories—the literature of the imagination, the literature of . knowledge, and tho literature of pastime. The Reading Room of the British Museum subserved almost exclusively the literature of knowledge, but the librarians of free libraries were ill a happier position, for they not only served the purposes of the literature of knowledge, but also dealt largely in the literature, of pastime, and they were only too glad to guide a reader's steps towards the literature of imagination. The free libraries and local libraries in general were, in cooperation with our universities and religious organisations, the main factor in the intellectual culture of the nation, and stood in the forefront of the agencies for good on which the future of the nation depended. How far were the libraries of tho present day , fulfilling tliis groat task P Tho common complaint was that .the literary educatiou of the country in a vast number of cases led only to the reading, of tho halfpenny newspaper, the trashy weekly of tho "snippet" description or tho monthly magazine, and colourless and worthless fiction. It was said that the free libraries largely conduced to this washy state of intellectual anaemia by being to a predominating extent simply purveyors of fiction to those who would be better without it. Statistics, however, refuted this accusation. There were 610 places which had adopted the Public Libraries Acts, and 560 in wliioh they had been actually put into operation. It was estimated that through theso libraries sixty million volumes were circulated annually in the homes of the people. Of these 32 millions were fiction, including children's books, and 28 millions were not fiction. If account was taken .■ also of the eleven million: volumes' issued by tho reference libraries and of the volumes consulted in the libraries themselves, it was calculated that the proportion of fiction issued to readers was. not more than 24 per cent of the whole. Further, this fiction consisted almost wholly of standard works and writings of acknowledged merit, which were not merely an admissible, but a desirable form of intellectual nutriment. A far larger proportion of the issues of free libraries belonged to the class of the literature of knowledge. It was true that' not all knowledge was desirable. For example, he had an application for a reader's ticket from a working man who thought that out of the riches of the British Museum he could obtain information which would assist him in the backing of horses. Butj broadly speaking, tho knowledge that was sought in the free libraries was mainly scientific and technical knowledge, that' which a man needed for the cultivation of his own trade. Or it was historical, political, or sociological—the knowledge which a man needed to fit him for his duties as a citizen. The public libraries were performing a function of vital importance to the country how far they contributed to the spread of higher literary culture could not be estimated, but in many cases they endeavoured by means of lectures, exhibitions, museums, and art galleries to encourage all who were willing to , cultivate their intelligence. What was wanted was not so much an increase in the number of libraries as an increase in the number of persons using them. They did not want the working man's studies to be confined to racing tips and football reports; they wanted him to go to. the literature which gave refreshment and knowledge, which gave ideas and expanded the mind.