College and Research Libraries


Charging Systems 
Charging Systems. By Leila H. Kirkwood. 

(The State of the Library Art, Volume II, 
Part 3) New Brunswick, N. J . : Graduate 
School of Library Service, Rutgers, T h e 
State University, 1961. 395p. $8.00. 

This book on charging systems, which fol-
lows the pattern of previous volumes in the 
series, " T h e State of the Library Art", is a 
"survey of the published and unpublished 
literature" of the subject. It contains a 
wealth of material, describing by means of 
quotations from the literature, procedures 
to be followed in the charging, discharging, 
renewing, sending of overdues, etc., as well 
as the advantages and disadvantages of each 
of the systems included. 

However, this book is not a practical guide 
for the librarian seeking help for installing 
a certain system in his library, although this 
information is there if one can find it. T h e 
arrangement of the material—quotations 
from the literature interwoven by connect-
ing and explanatory sentences—has brought 
about a certain amount of confusion which 
makes it impossible to obtain a clear picture 
of each system described. This, plus a lack 
of careful proofreading, no sub-headings 
within the chapters, the absence of a de-
scriptive running title for each chapter 
("circulation systems" is used throughout as 
the running title), and an inadequate index 
quickly leads one to frustration when using 
the book. 

Speaking of the index, it is fantastic! It 
does not include entries which one would 
normally expect to find and which one needs 
for the proper use of the book. Instead, the 
index covers much irrelevant material con-
tained not only in the body of the book but 
in the preface as well. T h e preface, inci-

dentally, is reprinted without change in each 
volume of the series. Entries for specific sub-
jects, such as costs, periodicals, pamphlets, 
renewals, overdues, bookmobiles, and the 
like would have been more helpful, as would 
the inclusive paging of the various systems 
described. 

T h e author, in surveying the literature on 
charging systems, has covered all types of 
systems, from the earliest times down to and 
including the present, for public, college, 
university, and special libraries both in this 
country and in England. She has included 
in her bibliography 414 references taken 
from 698 citations, covering the years 1876 
through 1958, a span of over eighty years. 
These should prove useful to anyone wish-
ing to make a thorough study of the subject. 

T h e chapter on the "Evaluation of Evi-
dence for Statements Made in the Litera-
ture" is particularly good, because it in-
cludes a few cost and time studies for some 
of the systems described. This information 
is hard to find so that it is helpful to have 
it in one place. In the last chapter of the 
book, which is on the token system as used 
in Great Britain, the author concludes with 
material indicating possible future develop-
ments in the field. No mention is made of 
the A L A Library Technology Project, but 
presumably the material for the volume was 
gathered before 1959 when the project was 
started. 

T o sum up, this book gives an excellent 
coverage of the literature on charging sys-
tems, as used in all types of libraries in this 
country and in Great Britain as well. It 
should prove helpful to the student and the 
librarian searching for information on the 
subject. However, an adequate index as 
well as better arrangement of the material 
would have made it more usable.—Helen T. 
Geer, H. W. Wilson Co. 

In books I find the dead as if they were alive; in books I forsee things to come; 
in books warlike affairs are set forth; from books come forth the laws of peace. All 
things are corrupted and decay in time; Saturn ceases not to devour the children 
that he generates; all the glory of the world would be buried in oblivion, un-
less God had provided mortals with the remedy of books.—Richard of Bury's 
Philobiblon ( q u o t e d in Philobiblon or The Love of Books, Being a Publication 
of the Friends of the Colgate University Library. ( H a m i l t o n , N . Y . ; 1 9 6 0 ) . [p. 1]) 

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