Librarian Think

I think about Libraries pretty much all the time, somehow.

One of the Gods in my cult is Ranganathan.

I am going to lift the hood and show you some of the working parts of a library in hopes of signing up more recruits in my cult.

Here is a David Senior text on Ranganathan that puts it all so well.

Then there is Charles A. Cutter, Rules for a Dictionary Catalogue, which you can read in the digital library of University North Texas. Cutter's formula for alphabetizing names is still employed widely. The alpha-numerical designations in our library are "Cutter numbers."

What used to be a specialization is way more part of the culture nowadays. I regularly discuss cataloging with bankers and art patrons, to my astonishment. In spite of my passion, I never have adequate time to work on my own catalog.

A juicy read on everything beautiful is Alberto Manguel's The Library at Night.

Equally evocative, but different, is Audrey Niffenegger's "The Night Bookmobile," about the relationship between every library and its patron[s]:

Graphic version from The Guardian

Christina Pickles read it on Selected Shorts

Francis Ford Coppola's literary magazine All-Story published it

The ten best songs about libraries and librarians.

Bibliography:

Manguel, Alberto. The Library at Night. New Haven CT: Yale University Press, c2006.