[quote] Libraries lose the classics (Kellyanne Dignan, "Scarborough Country" producer)
Say goodbye to Hemingway and Faulkner, and hello to Potter and Grisham. The Washington Post reports Fairfax County, Va., public libraries are dumping some classic books to make room for DVDs, computers, music and, oh yeah, more popular reading materials. What is this, amazon.com?
Now, I get that libraries have limited space and often very limited budgets to add more space so some culling of the collections will always be necessary. That said, there is something about replacing "Abraham Lincoln: His Speeches and Writings" with a Harry Potter DVD that just doesn't sit right.
Fairfax County librarians defend the decision to stop carrying all classic books at every library branch as necessary to not only save space but give the public what they want. Apparently some of the classics, including works from Emily Dickinson and Marcel Proust, hadn't been checked out in more than two years. ... ... I searched middle school classics like Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird" and J.D. Salinger's "Catcher In The Rye": both produced fewer titles than Cecily Von Ziegesar's popular Gossip Girls series. For those of you not familiar with the "Gossip Girls," earlier this year Naomi Wolf compared them to pornography in The New York Times. [endquote]
A bit more at the link, and probably no surprise to anyone.
Lin checked at her old town library a year or so ago, and found several books with her name in them, most of which hadn't been checked out since she left XXXXXXXX (censored) years ago; but they do have a really good high-speed web link, in a town of <1,000 where the citizens can't even get on by dial-up.