College and Research Libraries


50 I College & Research Libraries • January 1971 

of Library Service, University of California, 
Los Angeles. 

Library Issues: The Sixties. Eric Moon 
and Karl Nyren, eds. New York: R. R. 
Bowker, 1970. 400p. $12.50. 

Eric Moon and Karl Nyren have assem-
bled well over 200 articles, editorials, and 
reports which appeared originally in Li-
brary Journal between 1960 and 1970. All 
of the items were authored by LJ staff 
members. The selection understandably re-
flects the tastes and the judgments of Moon 
and his associates, who have consistently 
espoused social involvement by librarians. 

Their sense of mission and their sympa-
thies for the human side of librarianship im-
part a special flavor to their style and in-
evitably to the things they choose to write 
about. Four articles appear under the head-
ing "Data Processing, Automation, Informa-
tion Science," twenty under "Book Selec-
tion," and sixteen under "Discrimination." 
Clearly, the mechanics of library manage-
ment do not stimulate Mr. Moon and his 
associates to creative effort, except possibly 
when opportunities for mockery arise. 

Computers and L] don't fit quite com-
fortably into the same space. "Cataloging 
and Classification" are of the same ilk as 
computers and rate only two brief notices, 
one of which by Moon commences with the 
confession that "we find it difficult to get 
very passionate or excited about cataloging 
theory." I suppose that it is equally difficult 
to get passionate about Newton's law of 
gravitation or Einstein's theory of relativity. 

Moon, Nyren, Beny, Geller, and all those 
other wonderful L] people who keep kick-
ing the straw out of our stuffed shirts are 
really incurable romantics. They believe 
that libraries are for people and that the 
fewer economic advantages citizens have, 
the more libraries can do for them. The 
predisposition to support the underdog 
tends to draw thes e authors toward politics 
and leads them to look at libraries continu-
ally as social instrumentalities. I point this 
out not in a spirit of disagreement, but 
rather to emphasize that the articles in this 
anthology display a special bias which leads 
to a systematic exclusion of serious exam-

ination of other things which may be hn-
portant, if unexciting. 

The issues of the sixties discussed here 
were significant-federal aid, censorship, 
manpower, and all that. I submit only that 
other things were in the air also-including 
the growth of library systems, the decline 
of juvenile reading, and substantial innova-
tions in building design. 

The prose is lively, the opinions provoca-
tive, and the point of view leftish. But lhe 
anthology is only a sketch, possibly a car-
icature of what librarianship is really all 
about, not only in the sixties, but all the 
time. 

Lib1·ary Issues: The Sixties is good fun , 
but I do not know what to do with it now 
that I've read it. I suspect that the editors 
looked upon it as a kind of Our Times jour-
nalistic review, to be leafed through once 
and laid carefully away with our other trin-
kets and memorabilia. One would hardly 
find a reason to return to it, except perhaps 
to enjoy the sprightly but really rather gen-
tle iconoclasm.-Ervin ]. Gaines, Minne-
apolis Public Library. 

The Economics of Book Storage in Col-
lege and University Libraries. By Ralph 
E. Ellsworth. Metuchen, N.J.: Associa-
tion of College and Research Libraries 
and The Scarecrow Press, 1969. 135p. 
$4.00. 

Most academic libraries find themselves 
caught in a three-way squeeze brought 
about b y rapidly increasing book collec-
tions, escalating prices of libra1y construc-
tion, and faculty demands for immediate 
access to "their" books. Librarians will not 
b e greatly surprised to learn that Ellsworth 
has discovered no universal solution to 
these problems. He has presented a sum-
mary d escription of twelve systems for stor-
ing books in academic libraries, analyzed 
the cost factors for each of the systems, and 
suggested a procedure for determining costs 
in a specific university. You pays your mon-
ey and you takes your choice. But ~rem are 
not likely to be entirely happy with any 
system. 

With a grant from the Educational Fa-
cilities Laboratory and the blessings of th e