When I am in any great city I search out the bookstores and in them spend what are hours of pure pleasure. Such time should have no ending. The great libraries of the world in which long ago I spent so much reading time have become too soullessly computerized for my liking and I studiously avoid them. A good friend recently described his experiences of a University Library as follows:
“The University Library here is now, so far as the average user is concerned, simply a vast room filled with rows of cubicles and/or tables equipped with hundreds of computers. This excrescence is still referred to as the Library. I want to campaign for the substitution of the word “Computery”…… When one wants to consult the library catalogue first the computer screen will not revert to the neutral position in which it will absorb a request. When that problem is solved, usually by an attendant who is muttering about how this thing is always “playing up,” the next experience is a prolonged wait while nothing happens and one wonders if one has done something wrong. At this point I recall that when there was a card catalogue if one had a prolonged wait one always knew what was wrong because one’s fingers were in action seeking the right card. Next there is a stylized response, “No exact match; try again being less specific”. Eventually one gives up and does without the book.”
