On Librarians and Libraries

I was beginning to wonder about Liberty's library. Would Roose ever mention it? Did he ever go there? The answer to the first question is yes, finally, on page 248. The answer to the second question is: I don't know, after reading the whole book I find his only mention of the library is part of a rant about the anti-intellectual culture found on campus. "You start looking back at Liberty's institutional history and realizing why, for example, the school library wasn't built until a regional accreditation board mandated it." Perhaps, if this is the case, we can forgive him if actually never went there. He also mentions that even among the professors and administrators that too much questioning seems like a bad thing. The professors themselves engage in something we try to discourage at Bridgewater State College among our students: namely "cherry picking" quotes that fit their argument.



Writers do love to use librarians as the "go to" profession when they need to describe a certain "square" look, though. (Do they even realize we can help them with their research, too?) Roose follows in the footsteps of authors Benyamin Cohen and Frances Mayes (see posts on May 22 and July 2) with this illustration of Pastor Rick "...a tall mustachioed sixty-something man, clad in a red cardigan and low-sitting glasses, who looks like he could have been a reference librarian if he hadn't ben called to the ministry."