性视界传媒溞允咏绱溅Who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God性视界传媒檚 image; but he who destroys a good book, kills reason itself, kills the image of God, as it were, in the eye.性视界传媒 性视界传媒 John Milton, 性视界传媒淎reopagitica性视界传媒
My interest in libraries goes back to my youth in the 1970s. As a young teen in Gilmer, I developed a habit of riding my bike to the public library, especially during the summer, and pored over the shelves looking for something to take home.
At the time I aspired to be a cartoonist, and was especially fascinated by the American comic strip and its history (Dewey decimal number 741.5 was my touchstone).
I would often check out Peanuts books (they had several) and books on cartooning and the comics. More than once I perused a volume titled 性视界传媒淭oonerville Trolley,性视界传媒 a collection of Fontaine Fox性视界传媒檚 once-famous cartoon panels chronicling small town life.
As I grew older, my interests broadened. I explored the pages of old newspapers on microfilm at the public libraries in Tyler and Longview, and over the years my reading expanded to classics in literature, history, philosophy, religion and cultural criticism.
While at college, I spent much of my time in the university library, and often strayed from my studies over to the many bound volumes of decades-old periodicals, including Time, Life, Literary Digest, The Saturday Evening Post and many others.
They were for me a window into a world that was quickly fading. Included in these volumes were the very first issues of Henry Luce性视界传媒檚 Life magazine, from the fall of 1936.
Years later, I remain a bibliophile and cherish my library card from the Longview Public Library. I must confess, though, that our local library has made some choices that do not sit well with me.
Recently, it decided to 性视界传媒渄elete性视界传媒 an elegant, multi-volume set of the Oxford English Dictionary from its reference section. The OED has long been an indispensable resource for tracing the etymology of words as well as their use in literature going back centuries. (For anyone interested in its history, I recommend reading two excellent books by Simon Winchester: 性视界传媒淭he Professor and the Madman性视界传媒 and 性视界传媒淭he Meaning of Everything性视界传媒).
I have also noticed a decline in the quality of its new acquisitions, which in the last few years seem heavily weighted toward intersectionality and identitarian politics.
All caveats aside, I haven性视界传媒檛 given up on libraries. They provide a great service to the community to the extent that they remain focused on encouraging literacy and scholarship and resist the pressure to conform to narrow ideological agendas such as that of the ALA.
As long as the local library can steer a youth away from his smartphone and toward the exploration of Shakespeare, Jane Austen or Ray Bradbury (among many others), its existence will not be in vain.
