What's the best use of the public library?
Who knew that the public library was such a hot topic? Yesterday William Wisner鈥檚 op-ed, 鈥�Restore the Noble Purpose of Libraries,鈥� was one of the most-viewed articles on the website of 海角大神.
As a regular library-goer myself, I was struck in particular by one line: 鈥淟ibraries are currently popular only because everything's free.鈥�
The observation rang true. At my local library, most of the tables are occupied by men who seem not to have any other place to go. Many appear unwashed and little fed. They thumb through books and doze. Others are well-dressed but restless. I鈥檝e concluded that they鈥檝e been hit by the recession and are out of jobs. They鈥檙e on laptops, frantically sifting through Web pages.
Wisner is right that for these gentlemen the library isn鈥檛 a place for the patient pursuit of knowledge. It鈥檚 a roof or an office until they can afford one of their own.
Wisner鈥檚 also right that the library isn鈥檛 a quiet place. Mine is full of little kids whose moms and nannies have created an informal play group. If Wisner is irritated that the librarian鈥檚 function has become to change the printer pages, at least he鈥檚 not in charge of maintaining the changing table in the women鈥檚 restroom. 鈥淧lease dispose of dirty diapers!鈥� one note plaintively reads, no doubt penned by a librarian who can quote the Prologue of 鈥�The Canterbury Tales鈥� in Middle English.
Yet, if the library is being used 鈥� or abused 鈥� by people seeking shelter, community, and the relief of a table and chair without having to pay $3.95 for a latte, then that tells me we desperately need free public spaces. Instead, too often commercial spaces serve as our civic spaces. I鈥檓 certainly guilty of taking my young niece and nephew to Wal-Mart to entertain them, and I鈥檓 one of legions of the self-employed who use a Starbucks and a Verizon Internet account to do research I might鈥檝e once done in the stacks. However, each of those trips funds companies that don鈥檛 have a particular obligation to the common good. At the same time, libraries鈥� budgets are plummeting.
I don鈥檛 think the solution is, as Wisner advises, to return libraries to their more genteel, solemn pasts. Instead, we should preserve and promote libraries in their current incarnation 鈥� as one of the few places where an authentically diverse group of people can gather without having to pay anyone anything. The privilege to sit in public at no cost is becoming at least as rare as an early Shakespeare folio.
Of course, if you actually wanted to read the folio in deep silence I don鈥檛 know where you鈥檇 go. A church, I guess. They鈥檙e very quiet and most hardly seem to have anyone in them at all.
Kelly Nuxoll is a freelance writer in Washington, D.C.
