Collection Development and

Management for 21st Century Library

Collections An Introduction 2nd Edition
Vicki L. Gregory (Author)
Visit to download the full and correct content document:
https://textbookfull.com/product/collection-development-and-management-for-21st-ce
ntury-library-collections-an-introduction-2nd-edition-vicki-l-gregory-author/
More products digital (pdf, epub, mobi) instant
download maybe you interests ...

Rural People and Communities in the 21st Century

Resilience and Transformation 2nd Edition David L.
Brown

https://textbookfull.com/product/rural-people-and-communities-in-
the-21st-century-resilience-and-transformation-2nd-edition-david-
l-brown/

Developing a 21st Century Global Library for

Mathematics Research 1st Edition Committee On Planning
A Global Library Of The Mathematical Sciences

https://textbookfull.com/product/developing-a-21st-century-
global-library-for-mathematics-research-1st-edition-committee-on-
planning-a-global-library-of-the-mathematical-sciences/

An Introduction to Children with Language Disorders

Vicki A. Reed

https://textbookfull.com/product/an-introduction-to-children-
with-language-disorders-vicki-a-reed/

Work in the 21st Century An Introduction to Industrial

and Organizational Psychology 6th Edition Jeffrey M.
Conte

https://textbookfull.com/product/work-in-the-21st-century-an-
introduction-to-industrial-and-organizational-psychology-6th-
edition-jeffrey-m-conte/
River Science Research and Management for the 21st
Century 1st Edition David J. Gilvear

https://textbookfull.com/product/river-science-research-and-
management-for-the-21st-century-1st-edition-david-j-gilvear/

Library Management 101 A Practical Guide 2nd Edition

Lisa K Hussey Diane L Velasquez Eds

https://textbookfull.com/product/library-
management-101-a-practical-guide-2nd-edition-lisa-k-hussey-diane-
l-velasquez-eds/

Health Sciences Collection Management for the Twenty

First Century 1st Edition Susan K. Kendall

https://textbookfull.com/product/health-sciences-collection-
management-for-the-twenty-first-century-1st-edition-susan-k-
kendall/

Marketing the 21st Century Library The Time Is Now 1st

Edition Debra Lucas-Alfieri

https://textbookfull.com/product/marketing-the-21st-century-
library-the-time-is-now-1st-edition-debra-lucas-alfieri/

Fundamentals of Collection Development and Management

4th Edition Peggy Johnson

https://textbookfull.com/product/fundamentals-of-collection-
development-and-management-4th-edition-peggy-johnson/
ALA Neal-Schuman purchases fund advocacy, awareness, and accreditation
programs for library professionals worldwide.
 VICKI L. GREGORY has both an MLS degree and an MA in
history from the University of Alabama, and a PhD in
communication, information, and library studies from Rutgers,
The State University of New Jersey. She is currently a professor
in the School of Information at the University of South Florida,
where she teaches collection development, digital librarianship,
and library administration. She was previously head of Systems
and Operations (which included collection development,
acquisitions, cataloging, serials, and computer technology) at
Auburn University at Montgomery, Montgomery, Alabama. She
has written five previous books and numerous journal articles,
and she has delivered conference presentations both nationally
and internationally. This is her fourth year on the ALA RUSA
Notable Books Council.

© 2019 by the American Library Association

Extensive effort has gone into ensuring the reliability of the information in this
book; however, the publisher makes no warranty, express or implied, with respect
to the material contained herein.

ISBNs
978-0-8389-1712-1 (paper)
978-0-8389-1761-9 (PDF)
978-0-8389-1760-2 (ePub)
978-0-8389-1762-6 (Kindle)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Gregory, Vicki L., 1950– author. | American Library Association, issuing
body.
Title: Collection development and management for 21st century library collections
: an introduction / Vicki L. Gregory.
Other titles: Collection development and management for twenty-first century
library collections
Description: Second edition. | Chicago : ALA Neal-Schuman, an imprint of the
American Library Association, 2019. | Includes bibliographical references and
 index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018010395 | ISBN 9780838917121 (print ; alk. paper) | ISBN
9780838917602 (epub) | ISBN 9780838917619 (pdf) | ISBN 9780838917626
(kindle)
Subjects: LCSH: Collection management (Libraries) | Collection management
(Libraries)—United States. | Collection development (Libraries) | Collection
development (Libraries)—United States.
Classification: LCC Z687 .G68 2018 | DDC 025.2/1—dc23
LC record available at https://​lccn.loc.gov/​2018010395

Cover image © peshkova.

 CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

1 The Impact of New Technologies on Collection

Development and Management
Overview
E-Books and Libraries
Self-Publishing and Libraries
The “Long Tail”
Web 2.0 and Social Networking
The Information Commons, Open Access Serials, and Open Source Software
Globalization
Discussion Questions
References and Selected Readings

2 Assessing User Needs and Marketing the Collection to

Those Users
Overview
Who and What Will Be Studied?
Where Are Data Collected?
When Should the Data Be Collected?
How Are the Data Interpreted?
Tips for a Good Study
Marketing Your Collection
Summary
Activities
Discussion Questions
 References
Selected Readings

3 Collection Development Policies

Overview
Purpose of Collection Development Policies
Basic Elements of a Collection Development Policy
Activities
Discussion Questions
References
Selected Readings

4 Selection Sources and Processes

Overview
Considerations in the Selection Process
Selection Criteria
Selection Teams
Selection Differences for Internet Resources
Tools for Acquiring and Selecting Materials
General-Review Sources Online
Other Selection Means
Open Access Movement
Summary
Activity
Discussion Questions
References
Selected Readings

5 Acquisitions
Overview
The Principal Goal of Library Acquisitions
The Nature of Library Resources
Methods of Acquiring Materials
Sources of Library Materials
Out-of-Print Purchasing
 Gifts and Exchanges
A Word on Formats
Summary
Discussion Questions
References
Selected Readings

6 Budgeting and Fiscal Management

Overview
Accountability
Fiscal Year
Types of Budgets
Budget Scenarios
Setting Budget Priorities
Gathering Information for a Library Materials Budget Request
Consortium Purchases
Bookkeeping Terminology 101
Activity
References
Selected Readings

7 Assessment and Evaluation of the Collection, Including

Deselection (Weeding)
Overview
Evaluating or Assessing the Collection
Deselection or Weeding the Collection
Summary
Discussion Questions
Activity
References
Selected Readings

8 Cooperative Collection Development and Resource-

Sharing
Overview
 Library Consortia
Cooperative Collection Development Defined
Benefits and Challenges of Cooperative Collection Development
Consortial and Access Relationships
Interlibrary Loan
Summary
Case Study
Discussion Questions
References
Selected Readings

9 Legal Issues in Collection Development

Overview
Copyright and Licensing
Digital Rights Management
Donations: Legal and Tax Issues
Diversity Issues
Americans with Disabilities Act Issues
Activities
Discussion Questions
References
Selected Readings

10 Professional Ethics and Intellectual Freedom

Overview
Professional Ethics
Intellectual Freedom and Censorship
Self-Censorship
Summary
Discussion Questions
Activity
References
Selected Readings

11 Preservation
 Overview
Preservation of Books and Other Physical Objects
Preservation Microfilming
Disaster Plans
Preservation of Digital Objects
Is Digitized Information Preserved (or Preservable)?
Who Should Archive an Electronic Resource?
Who Should Be Concerned with Preservation Issues?
Summary
Activity
Discussion Questions
References
Selected Readings

12 The Future of Collection Development and Management

Overview
Views on the Future of Collection Development
By Type of Library
Summary
Discussion Questions
References
Selected Readings

BIBLIOGRAPHY
APPENDIX
List of Library Vendors: Publishers, Wholesalers, and Vendors

INDEX
 FIGURES

FIGURE 1.1 Normal distribution of popular titles in a subject area

FIGURE 3.1 Hard versus soft science

FIGURE 3.2 Conspectus-like example using Dewey Decimal

Classification (large academic library): Sea (naval)
forces and warfare

FIGURE 3.3 Conspectus-like example using Dewey Decimal System

(small- to medium-size public library): Public
administration and military science

FIGURE 3.4 Conspectus-like example for a library using Library of

Congress classification: Books (general, writing,
paleography)

FIGURE 3.5 Subject descriptions of a senior high school collection

FIGURE 3.6 Example from a senior high school collection mapping

FIGURE 3.7 Sample challenge form

FIGURE 5.1 Major library vendors

FIGURE 5.2 Representative pricing samples for electronic serials

FIGURE 6.1 Typical public library materials budget ($)

FIGURE 7.1 Shelves in need of weeding

FIGURE 9.1 Sample digital rights management process

FIGURE 9.2 OCLC FirstSearch DRM, periodical owned by local

library

FIGURE 9.3 Sample InfoTrack DRM document delivery option for

periodical not owned by local library
 PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION

This second edition of Collection Development and Management

for 21st Century Library Collections: An Introduction describes
how librarians select, acquire, and maintain resources in all formats.
Unlike previous textbooks in this area, the approach used here is
not strictly based on formats per se, but rather on the processes that
librarians need to use in evaluating, gathering, maintaining, and
preserving materials. In other words, there are no separate chapters
dedicated to books, serials, and electronic resources; instead, each
conceptual chapter covers multiple formats. As has always been the
case, but especially as witnessed over the last forty years spanning
my professional career, the formats of the materials collected and
used by libraries have changed, but the overall processes used to
select and evaluate those materials have tended to remain the same.
In the pages that follow, I will describe the synergy and drive behind
planning, developing, licensing, acquiring, and managing collections
that are both physical and virtual, used in-house and remotely, and
constantly changing.
Although collection development, the acquisitions process, and
collection maintenance issues are universal concerns for all types of
libraries, differences in emphasis on the various elements of
collection development and maintenance become quickly apparent in
different library settings such as public libraries, academic libraries,
and school library media centers. Issues of ethics, intellectual
freedom, copyright, and licensing are impacting all areas of
collection development like never before. Therefore, while it is
important to take an overarching view of collection development and
management processes, differences engendered by the type of
library will be brought out where appropriate.
 The primary audience for this book will naturally be students in
graduate programs of library and information science. However,
librarians changing professional assignments into collection
development and maintenance or those needing to catch up on, for
example, electronic materials should also find this book useful.
In many schools of library and information science, collection
development is included within a broader picture of collection
management or maintenance and is often folded into those courses.
Many classes will actually emphasize, in such cases, not collection
development itself but collection management, sometimes with only
a week or a single instructional unit given over to acquisitions. Thus,
it is important to make clear distinctions among these three major
elements:

• Collection management may be best defined as the process

of information-gathering, communication, coordination,
policy formulation, evaluation, and planning that results in
decisions about the acquisition, retention, and provision of
access to information sources in support of the intellectual
needs of a given library community.
• Collection development is the subpart of collection
management that has primarily to do with decisions that
will result in the acquisition of materials.
• Acquisition is the process of actually securing materials for
the library’s collection, whether by purchase, as gifts, or
through loan or exchange programs.

THE ORGANIZATION OF THIS BOOK

Collection Development and Management for 21st Century Library
Collections begins with a comprehensive overview of the field, then
moves into individual chapters covering each step of the collection
life cycle, and ends with a chapter looking at the future.
 Chapter 1 takes a look at how new elements are influencing library
collections today: it has new sections on e-books and libraries, self-
publishing, and additional materials on open access, Web 2.0, the
“long tail,” and globalization. Each of these elements affects how and
what the library owns, leases, or uses.
Chapter 2 looks at needs assessment from a collection
development standpoint, and at marketing the collection. A needs
assessment is similar to market research, but in this case with a
library emphasis. Marketing plans are discussed and examples of
marketing activities are drawn from different types of libraries.
Chapter 3 concerns the purpose and component parts of a good
collection development policy.
Chapter 4 covers the selection of library resources, and provides
an overview of sources for reviews, selection criteria, and variables
in the process among different types of libraries. New online sources
for selection have been added, and older ones have been updated.
Chapter 5 concerns all aspects of the acquisition of print,
electronic (digital databases and e-books), and audiovisual
resources, along with a discussion of gifts to libraries and the
exchange programs in which some libraries participate. Exchange
programs can be local, national, or international.
Chapter 6 discusses the budget and fiscal management of
collection development and acquisitions departments. A short
introduction to bookkeeping is included, with most of the
terminology that a new acquisitions librarian will need to know.
Chapter 7 is about the evaluation and assessment plus the
weeding of a collection. Differences in procedures among different
types of libraries are discussed.
Chapter 8 looks at cooperative collection development and how
resource-sharing facilitates a good cooperative collection
development program.
Chapter 9 examines the legal issues that concern collection
development librarians, such as copyright and the licensing of
electronic resources. This chapter is not intended to make lawyers
out of librarians, but it will introduce you to a number of important
concepts in order to better inform you about how to recognize legal
issues and how best to proceed when you are confronted with them.
In addition, legal obligations related to issues of diversity and the
Americans with Disabilities Act are also discussed. Because chapter 4
covers some diversity issues as well, this chapter focuses on the
issues not discussed there, along with issues of special needs users.
Chapter 10 concerns ethics and intellectual freedom as they affect
acquisitions and collection development librarians, particularly
because these librarians may be wined and dined by vendors. A
section on self-censorship has been added, since this is an area of
concern of which all librarians must be aware. Intellectual freedom is
one of the core values of librarianship, and since it is often tied to
censorship, it can also be viewed as a professional ethics area.
Chapter 11 addresses the preservation of both print and electronic
materials. This is an area of great concern because electronic
materials can be quite ephemeral, unless libraries or other
organizations specifically target them for preservation.
Chapter 12 is a look into the future of collection development and
collection development librarians as viewed by several authors. One
predicted difference from these librarians’ current role concerns their
more active involvement in the creation and maintenance of locally
produced digital materials. Another has to do with assuring the
quality of materials that users find on the Web, particularly when
they are searching in the library or on its website. Naive users may
view these materials as being just as much a part of the collection as
the carefully selected materials on the library’s shelves.
The text of each chapter ends with references and selected
readings, and many of the chapters include activities and discussion
questions. At the end of the book, there is a carefully selected
bibliography for each part of the collection management life cycle,
arranged by subject, as well as an Appendix that lists library
vendors.
 As with all areas of library work, continuing education,
involvement with professional associations, and reading the newly
published library literature will be important to maintain your
professional skills if you intend to become a collections librarian. I
hope you will keep reading, keep learning, and keep building better
collections that meet the needs of your users.
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Iwish to thank my graduate assistants Bridgette Woodley and Arlen

Benson who assisted with bibliographic searches and with the
library vendor listings for the first edition, and Zoe Leonarczyk, who
updated the appendix “List of Library Vendors.” Thanks also to
Rachel Chance at ALA Neal-Schuman for all her assistance in the
final editing and production of this book. Others have helped along
the way, and I thank them as well. You know who you are!
 CHAPTER 1

The Impact of New Technologies on Collection

Development and Management

Welcome to one of the most interesting subjects in library and

information science: collection development and management.
Selecting and managing library resources is at the heart of the
library and information science (LIS) profession, alongside cataloging
and classification. We will leave cataloging and classification to
another day, since this book will concentrate on the collection itself—
selecting, acquiring, assessing, weeding, and preserving the library’s
collections are the main focus here.
This chapter looks at some of the new technologies and issues
that are currently influencing and effecting changes in library
services as well as collection development and maintenance, such as
open access, self-publishing, and e-books. This chapter is intended
just as an introduction to these issues, since they will be explored in
greater depth in later chapters dealing with specific aspects of
collection development and maintenance. Instead of bringing up
these issues in this chapter as a nod to the future (they are too
important for that), they are being discussed at the beginning of this
text and then sprinkled throughout other chapters as appropriate.

OVERVIEW
The process of selecting the materials for and adequately
maintaining the currency and relevance of virtually any library’s
collection of materials, in whatever format, has always required a
high level of tolerance for continuous change with regard to newly
available materials, as well as a clear-headed recognition of the need
for constant evaluation and reevaluation of those items already in
hand. As libraries became more widespread and thus more available
to the general public in the late nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries, fairly standardized processes for collecting print materials
came to be developed, and these processes were refined and
disseminated by library schools and handed down by librarians to
their successors.
But these standard processes for selecting and evaluating
materials necessarily had to evolve as conditions, user needs, and
resources changed. Thus, today, the problem has altered
significantly. Libraries must now also include significant electronic
resources in their collections or otherwise make them available, and
most importantly, they must purchase and maintain the necessary
hardware and software to enable the effective use of these
resources. With libraries today also being called upon to provide the
means for users to access library collections remotely from their
home or office, and to make available and participate in various
online social networks in order to go where their users are, the focus
of collection development, and indeed the concept of what
constitutes a collection, is changing. Even the library’s organization
and management of the selection of materials has evolved.
Although automated and electronic records were initially the
exclusive domain of library technical services divisions, with
cataloging and then circulation and then acquisitions using the
services of electronic vendors and electronic services such as OCLC,
the use of electronic records has become one of the standard
services, and in many cases a central focus, of the reference
department. And user demand for all types of electronic resources
and records has brought collection development into the electronic
age.
Open access (OA) is becoming an increasingly important topic in
journal literature as increasing numbers of books and monographs in
library collections are being held in OA form. OA refers to online
materials that are free of all restrictions on access (e.g., access or
subscription fees) and are also free of many restrictions on use (e.g.,
certain copyright and license restrictions). OA can be applied to all
forms of published output, including academic journal articles,
conference papers, theses and dissertations, book chapters, and
monographs. Although open access journals save the library
subscription fees, they still require selection and examination for
quality, since easy access to them on the Web has opened up yet
another avenue for fraudulent practices where these types of
materials are concerned. The open access movement was
strengthened as government grants began requiring that the
findings resulting from federally funded research be published in OA
publications. (More information about open access can be found
later in this chapter. See also chapter 4 for information on predatory
journals and open access.)
The fast-growing user preference for electronic resources has
severely affected the collection development budgets of most
libraries. Contrary to the promise of reductions in the cost of the
availability of information implicit in the electronic format, the new
electronic resources do not usually supplant and rarely completely
replace existing materials. Viewed from this angle, electronic
materials therefore represent still another format that must be
collected if the library is to keep up with the times and meet the
demands of its patrons. Unfortunately, more than subject-matter
expertise is needed to select these materials; the selector must also
possess sufficient technical expertise (or have access to those with
technical expertise) in order to both evaluate what equipment may
be needed to access any new product and analyze how well the
product performs. In the case of social networking, there are also
considerations of security for the library’s network and computer
stations.

E-BOOKS AND LIBRARIES

Although e-books are now purchased in all types of library
environments, many academic libraries in particular are rapidly
reducing their print collections and changing their emphasis to e-
books and electronic services for users. Librarians are reclaiming
shelf space by weeding print books and replacing them with e-books
in order to put in “makerspaces” and labs where students can
collaborate on projects (McAlister and Scherlen 2017).
Conventional library wisdom today asks the following question:
since reading an e-journal, given the ease of document printing, is
generally considered by students to be a superior alternative to
going to the library to read the original print copy, why won’t e-
books become more popular than print books? But e-book sales
lately tell quite a different story. In November 2016, the American
Association of Publishers released a report showing that in the first
half of 2016, e-book sales were down 20 percent: “Ebook sales
continued to decline in 2016. That’s good news (for those who
advocate free reading)” (No Shelf Required 2016). Along with this, a
recent Pew study showed that e-book usage is down significantly in
public libraries where print book circulation far exceeds that of e-
books (Horrigan 2016). Even in academic libraries, the most recent
statistics indicate that the usage of e-books is at best flat (Ennis
2016). Based on survey research, a 2016 report on e-books in
academic libraries found that “print-books are still firmly ensconced
in academic libraries, and are preferred by library users—students
and faculty—for most kinds of content, although ebooks are favored
for reference titles” (Library Journal 2016, 3).
Many recent articles about e-books in libraries conclude that while
at the outset, patrons were fascinated with the new e-reading
technologies, after their initial checkout of e-books, many returned
to reading hard-copy print materials, and e-book checkouts dropped
correspondingly and significantly. Research by multiple authors has
pinpointed many variables for this, but all have identified one
specific rationale: transient fascination with the new. Readers were
intrigued by the idea of e-books, and so they bought e-readers and
checked out e-books right away. But as the fascination with the new
wore off, readers went back to checking out paper books, and so e-
book circulation dropped significantly (Rosenwald 2015). This is
further evidence that the need to keep up with your users’
preferences dynamically as those preferences change is a key aspect
of collection development, not only with regard to titles but also in
respect of the selection of formats.
The fast-developing phenomena of open access, the information
commons, self-publishing, Web 2.0 and social networking, the “long
tail” (as described by Chris Anderson), and globalization are all
impacting the way librarians and information specialists must view
the collection development process and collection issues for their
libraries. While libraries have for many years been purchasing access
to databases that are not housed at or in their local facilities, it is
only of late that they have begun purchasing access to streaming
video, etc. for the benefit of their users. The focus is turning, and
probably will accelerate, on obtaining access rather than ownership.
Let’s look at several of these phenomena.

SELF-PUBLISHING AND LIBRARIES

Self-publishing, particularly in e-book formats but also in print on
demand, has certainly taken off recently. For those libraries that
have tended to automatically dismiss self-published books as
ephemeral or vanity material and therefore have not added them to
their collections, think again! A number of factors are leading to
more self-publishing: the Web, open access, and changes in the
commercial publishing industry, as well as authors’ desire to be read
even if this means that they don’t make money on the publishing of
their books. According to recent issues of the Bowker Annual, self-
published titles are on the way to becoming the majority of the titles
published in the United States (Bowker 2014). Once your awareness
of the self-published book is raised, they seem to be all around you.
Since all library budgets are constrained these days, wouldn’t it be
advantageous if you could get to that content before it was
necessary to spend larger sums to acquire it from a publisher? What
if you could help a local author make his or her name and work
known to the reading public? With so many academic libraries
focused, if not obsessed, with open access, why not make at least
local material available without purchasing it from a publishing
house?
As noted above, many librarians have considered self-published or
“indie” titles to be nothing more than the latest manifestations of
vanity press publications—those titles that authors paid to have
printed, only to let them sit in their basements or garages, since
bookstores would not carry them and libraries usually turned them
down, even as gifts. All of this has changed with e-books and print
on demand, as well as the rise of Amazon and other web-based
sales outlets. In fact, an entire industry has grown up to support
these authors.
Self-published books can serve many purposes in a library. In
some cases, they may serve as primary source material, particularly
for local history. They can help document popular culture before it
makes its way into mainstream publishing. Public libraries are
discovering that self-published novels and memoirs are an
inexpensive way to supply the materials desired by public library
users. With the growing popularity of open access publishing, self-
published works may include the work of independent scholars or
the faculty of colleges and universities. Self-published textbooks are
being encouraged in many colleges and universities, and these
provide a much less expensive option for textbooks and other
required reading. For universities, self-publishing may support
scholars conducting research in such a narrow field that traditional
university presses or mainstream publishers may not find it
profitable to publish their work (Holley 2015).
The key is having the right software and processes in place to
allow review and corrections to be made to self-published items,
which helps to make them, if not fully comparable to those titles
published by mainstream publishers, at least worthy of their
placement in a library’s collection.
Public libraries are themselves becoming involved in providing the
platform to assist local authors in the publication of their own
materials. One such initiative is SELF-e, which is a partnership
between Library Journal and BiblioLabs, a Charleston, South
Carolina-based company. BiblioBoard, a BiblioLabs product, is a
software platform designed to bring self-published works into the
library world. The Cuyahoga County Library in Parma, Ohio, served
as the pilot project for the platform after that library indicated it was
looking for a software platform to support local authors. The process
works something like this:

• An author goes to the library’s website and uploads an

EPUB or PDF file.
• BiblioBoard staff review the content of the file to ensure
that it is not illegal (such as child pornography) or
plagiarized.
• Authors indicate whether they want Library Journal
curation, which will make their work available to a national
audience, or whether they only want their work to be
available locally.
• The plan is for BiblioBoard to provide MARC records for the
book in the future.
• The author’s agreement with BiblioBoard distribution is not
an exclusive one, so if the book becomes popular and a
commercial publisher becomes interested, the author can
withdraw his or her work from BiblioBoard.

The main advantage to authors of using this approach is to get their

work out into the library environment, and for libraries the
advantage is bringing a new area of content to their collections
(LaRue 2015b, 53).
ONEBOOKAZ is another example of a library project (of the
Arizona State Library, Archives, and Public Records) that encourages
the writing and sharing of self-published or unpublished e-books, in
this case by means of a contest. There are three categories: adult,
teens, and kids. For this contest, the books have to be by Arizona
authors, but not necessarily about Arizona. Downloads are available
in any Arizona location through the BiblioBoard SELF-e platform. The
award-winning authors were scheduled to appear in public libraries
around Arizona, thus giving them even greater visibility, and reading
guides were created for each of the winners (LaRue 2015a, 41).

THE “LONG TAIL”

Chris Anderson, who was then editor in chief of Wired magazine, in
his book The Long Tail (2006) assessed the future of consumer
buying, suggesting that industries and businesses will be serving
consumers needing a greater number of things, but satisfying the
needs of readers, music lovers, and so on is going to be a thing of
the past. A wide array of choices is becoming increasingly important,
as evidenced by cable television with 200–300 channels, and movie
multiplexes with 10 or more screens. Anderson concentrates on the
increasing importance of the “niche market” (p. 5). If he is correct,
then the public library will increasingly feel the pressure to provide
more and different books, serials, and materials in electronic
formats. Anderson further states that “many of our assumptions
about popular taste are actually artifacts of poor supply-and-demand
matching—a market response to inefficient distribution” (p. 16). The
distribution of materials over the Web gives the consumer an almost
unlimited array of goods that a business or organization which is
limited by inventory space can never satisfy. It is the difference
between buying a book through Amazon.com and searching local
bookstores for an out-of-print book or an academic title. While in the
past readers or researchers may have been satisfied by what was
locally available, now that the Web has opened up so many other
means of acquiring materials, such as streaming media and online
video, what is desired, and indeed expected, is expanding.

In 2005, Barnes & Noble sold 20 percent more unique titles

than it sold in 2004, something its CEO, Steve Riggs, attributes
to three forces: (1) the efficiencies of print-on-demand, which
keeps more books in print; (2) the increase in the number of
 smaller and independent publishers; and (3) self-publishing.
(Anderson 2006, 77)

The same trend that is affecting the market for booksellers must also
naturally be reflected in the changing demands that users make on
their public library. If Amazon.com can supply the unusual book they
want, why can’t the local public library? (In chapter 2, ways to
assess the needs of users will be discussed in more detail.) Of
course, libraries do have inventory and shelf space issues, unlike
many of the web businesses with which the library will be
competing. Libraries, and certainly public libraries in particular, which
concentrate their collecting efforts on materials with broad appeal,
may in the future need to focus on developing bigger selections of
unique titles to meet the narrower demand for more different works.
The Web and other electronic sources are creating new types of
both adult and child users of the public library who are deeply
familiar with computers and using them to acquire online information
and products. Library users’ familiarity with a large array of
electronic resources will likely quickly change the need for public
libraries to move away from best sellers and hit novels to more niche
resources out on the “long tail.” And can libraries be more like online
retailers that have virtually no limitations of space?
Figure 1.1 below is a simple graphic representation of the normal
distribution of titles for an average topic. In the past, libraries and
booksellers have typically carried the titles represented in the area
covered by plus or minus one standard deviation on the graph,
which together account for 68 percent of all titles. However, with the
use of the Web and online bookstores, the true demand for titles
now stretches way beyond the normal 68 percent of the titles. To
have a balanced collection, library selectors must now consider a
wider range of titles than they have in the past if they are to meet
user demand.
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
with her handkerchief before starting. She had not adjusted the
music-stool. She had not pushed back the music-rest as far as it
would go. She had not played the chord and arpeggio inversions of
A flat major and paused dramatically before beginning the
composition of Liszt. All these things she had forgotten. People
would think she was an inexperienced player. Anyhow, she made up
as well as she could for her initial deficiencies during the progress of
the piece. She “swanked,” according to the popular expression. She
was very conscious of the effect her hair was or ought to be
producing....
As a matter of fact, nobody was either looking at her or listening
to her with any particular interest or eagerness.
She was awakened from her egoistic dreams by the half-hearted
applause of those people who by divine instinct know when a piece
is coming to an end several bars ahead, and start their applause at
the last bar but one.... She bowed graciously in front of the piano,
and tripped lightly behind the scenes. The applause did not justify an
encore.... She had made up her mind as she played the concluding
chords of the Concert Study: If I am given an encore, I will do all
those things I omitted to do before: I will polish my hands, adjust the
stool, push back the music-rest, have the sound-board lifted, run up
with arpeggios on the tonic....
But she was not given an encore.
In the artists’ room behind the scenes nobody took much notice
of her. Fred Hitchcock, a local tenor with baritone leanings, was
giving final frenzied directions to his accompanist, a large-featured
female with an excessively low and powdered neck.
“Go slow over that twiddly bit,” he whispered, catching hold of her
to lead her on to the platform. “And don’t forget to give me the
leading note in the adagio.” His hoarse voice merged into the buzz of
sound that came down the corridor leading to the platform.
She overheard a conversation.
“What was that thing that girl played?”
“What girl?”
 “The girl with the red hair.”
“Oh, I don’t know—some Liszt thing, I think.”
“Classical?”
“S’pose so ... of course, nobody listens to pianoforte solos
nowadays....”
“They’re too common, that’s what it is. Everybody strums on the
piano, more or less.”
“I suppose you went to hear Razounov?”
“No, I couldn’t get a seat. The Hippodrome was full of people who
went to see him do something eccentric.”
“Did he?”
“No, as it happened. A friend told me he just came on the
platform, played like an angel for two hours, and went off again. Of
course everybody was greatly disappointed.”
“Naturally....”
“Bockley isn’t a musical suburb. It doesn’t even think it is.
Whereas Upton Rising thinks it is and isn’t.... I wish that pianoforte
player of ours wouldn’t show so much of her red hair and try to look
like a female Beethoven....”
“Oh, shut up—she’s probably somewhere about, she’ll hear
you....”
Catherine put on her hat and cloak and went out by the side door.
She was not angry, but she was suffering from one of those
periodical fits of disillusionment which were the aftermath of her
dreaming. She walked out into the Ridgeway, where the gas lamps
glowed amongst the sprouting trees. Far away she could hear the
clang of trams along the High Road. She passed the corner house
where, it seemed now an age ago, she had discovered her soul in
the murmur of a grand piano. Swiftly she walked along the tarred
asphalt, thinking to reach Gifford Road and have supper. She felt
disappointed. The evening had been lacking in that species of
adventure it had seemed to promise. She had not seen George
Trant. That, she told herself, had nothing to do with it.
Down the Ridgeway a newsboy came running bearing a placard-
sheet in front of him.
“Suicide of a Bockley Schoolmaster,” it said. An awful excitement
seized her. Eagerly she bought a paper and searched the front page.
It took some moments to discover the announcement. It was only
a small paragraph on an inside page: the placard had evidently been
printed to stimulate local circulation.
“Mr. Weston,” she read, “of 24, Kitchener Road, Bockley, an
elementary school teacher at the Downsland Road Council School ...
throat cut....”
She leaned up against the iron railing round a tree. Then,
discovering that she was attracting the attention of passers-by, she
walked on more swiftly than before. In her excitement she took the
opposite direction, towards the Bockley High Street....

§3
Half-way down the Ridgeway she met George Trant. They were
both walking excessively fast and in opposite directions: they almost
cannoned into each other.
“Just looking for you,” he said, stopping her. He wore evening
dress beneath an overcoat. It was peculiar that her eyes should glue
themselves upon an ivory solitaire that he wore. She was half dazed.
“Looking for me?” she echoed, vaguely.
“Yes. Thought you’d gone back to your digs. I was coming to
fetch you. What I want to say is——” (That was one of his
mannerisms of speech. In his letters he had constantly written,
“What I want to say is——”) “we’re having a little supper at the
Forest Hotel after the concert’s over. Just ourselves—the
performers, I mean. Of course you’ll join us.... I didn’t think you’d be
running off so early, or I should have mentioned it before....”
 She was still staring monotonously at that ivory solitaire of his.
“Well—er—you see ... er....”
“Of course if you’re engaged for somewhere else——”
“No, I’m not engaged for anywhere else.” She paused, as if
weighing things in the balance. Then a change came over her. It was
as if she were suddenly electrified. Her eyes lifted and were found
shining with peculiar brilliance. Her body, too, which had been tiredly
swaying, jerked all at once into challenging rigidity. “All right,” she
said, and even in her voice there was a new note, “I’ll come.”
“Good.” He looked a little queerly at this transformation of her.
“Then we’ll go now.”
“But it’s not half-past nine yet. The concert won’t be over till after
ten.”
“That doesn’t matter. I’ve got to go to the hotel to fix up
arrangements. You’d better come with me.”
“Right.” The promptitude of her reply had something in it of
riotous abandon.
“We’ll go by bus to High Wood and walk the rest. It’s sooner....”
Again she acquiesced, this time by a nod that seemed to indicate
an eagerness too great to be put into words.
At the corner of the Bockley High Street they took a bus. They
occupied the front seat on the top. The night was moonless, but
stars were shining over the whole sky. In front and behind stretched
the high road with arc lights gleaming like a chain of pearls. She
thought of that other evening when she had ridden with Helen along
this very road on the top of a crowded tram-car. She remembered
how in the passing glare of the arc-lamps she had read the note
which George Trant had enclosed for her. She remembered it all as
clearly as if it had happened yesterday, though in point of time it
seemed to belong to another age. She remembered the purr of the
quickly-moving car, the hiss of the trolley-wheel along the overhead
wires, the buzz of talk all round her, and the sharp, sickly sensation
of reading a few words in spasms and fitting them into their context
when the pale light merged into the darkness.
But even while she thought of these things she became greatly
joyous. She took off her hat and stuffed it into her pocket (it was of
the kind that yields to such treatment). Her hair blew in soft spray
about her head and shoulders, and her eyes were wet with the tears
that the cool wind brought. She remembered that once he had said
“My God! ... your hair! ...” He might not say it again, but perhaps he
would think it.
“I liked your playing,” he said.
“You did?”
“Rather.... I’m not much of a judge, but I can always tell a real
musician from a false one. The real musician throws his whole soul
into his music....”
“Did I?”
“Yes. I know you did. You played almost unconsciously. I believe
you forgot all about your audience. You were just playing for the
sheer love of playing....”
“Are you sure?”
“Quite sure.”
“Well, you’re wrong, anyway,” She laughed defiantly. “I didn’t
forget about my audience a bit: I kept on remembering them the
whole time. I kept on thinking: !Did they notice that little bit? ... I
polished off that arpeggio rather nicely; I wonder if anybody noticed
it....’ And as for throwing my whole soul into my music, I’m not so
sure—whether—even—whether——”
“Yes?”
She tossed back her head so that her hair danced like flame. The
bus jerked to a standstill.
“Whether I’ve got a soul,” she said very quickly. “Come on, we’re
at High Wood.”
 They clambered down the steps.
“I’m sure you have,” he said, as he helped her off the conductor’s
platform.
“Oh, you don’t know anything about me,” she snapped, as they
entered the footpath through the Forest.
“I believe I know a very great deal about you,” he said quietly.
“Of course you believe so. Well, I don’t mind you telling me.”
He stroked his chin reflectively.
“Well, to begin with,” he said, “you’re passionate.”
She burst into sudden, uncontrollable, crackling laughter. In the
empty spaces of the Forest it sounded like musketry.
“I knew you’d say that.... I knew you would. And for the life of me
I don’t know whether you’re right or wrong. Every woman likes to
think she’s passionate. And nobody knows whether she’s any more
passionate than anybody else.... Pass on to the next point. You may
be right or you may be wrong about the last.”
“You’re impulsive—but good-natured.”
“Oh, rather. A kind heart beneath a rough exterior, eh?”
“I’m quite serious.”
“Are you? I’m not.”
She frisked along in front of him, revelling in the rustle of last
autumn’s leaves.
“Do you know what I should do if I were serious?” she asked
suddenly, when he had caught up to her.
“No.”
She walked a little way in silence, kicking up the dried leaves with
her toes.
“What would you do?” he said.
 Her voice became fierce. “I should——” she began, and stopped.
She walked a few steps as if pondering, then she laughed airily and
tossed her head. “I really don’t know what I should do. Only I’m
certain of one thing: I shouldn’t be with you here.”
She could almost feel the extent to which her conversation was
mystifying him.
Then she became quiet and submissive, nestling like a stray
kitten at his side. She took his arm.
“I’m going to lean on you,” she said; “I nearly fell over a tree root
just there.”
He looked gratified. For three or four minutes they walked on in
silence. He had plenty he wished to say, but as a matter of fact he
thought this particular silence, coming when it did, rather impressive,
and he was unwilling to curtail it by a remark unworthy of its
profundity. He was engaged in thinking of that remark, a remark that
should not so much break the silence as guide it into still more
profound depths. He had almost decided on what he should say
when quickly and without any warning she snatched her arm from
his and scampered a few paces ahead.
“Oh, George,” she cried, with an extraordinary mingling of
passion and irritation, “do say something! For God’s sake keep up
the conversation! We’ve been a quarter of an hour without a word.
Say something, anything you like—only I can’t stand this mooning
about under the trees saying nothing!”
“You’re in a very extraordinary mood to-night,” he said
deliberately. He was genuinely disappointed.
“I am, or I shouldn’t have come with you,” she replied bluntly.
“Do you dislike me, then?” he asked, with a kind of injured dignity.
“Oh no—oh, don’t let’s talk seriously. I tell you I don’t feel serious
to-night.”
“Well, you won’t need to be. We’re going to have a very jolly
evening.”
 “I hope so. That’s why I came. I feel like having a jolly evening.”
The Forest Hotel occupied a fine position on the crest of a thickly-
wooded hill overlooking one of the prettiest spots in Epping Forest. A
large balcony opened on to the dining-room, which was on the first
floor, and Chinese lanterns swung loosely from the ornamental
pilasters. As Catherine caught sight of the table, a vista of white and
silver and gleaming glass, she clapped her hands ecstatically. She
was as a little child in her enthusiasm.
“Oh, fine—fine!” she cried, clutching George once more by the
arm.
The table was on the balcony, and inside the dining-room the
floor had been cleared, presumably for dancing. A sleek grand piano
sprawled across one corner. Catherine rushed up to it and
immediately plunged into some rapid, noisy piece. It was a splendid
instrument, and the dim light (only the swaying lanterns on the
balcony were lit) threw her into rapture. George came to her side,
watching in admiration. Watching rather than listening, because, as
he had himself admitted, he was no judge of music. And also
because the red glow from the swinging lanterns kindled her hair like
a puff of wind on smouldering charcoal.
“There!” she cried, triumphant, as she executed something
difficult with her left hand. She swung into a dirge-like melody, tired
of it seemingly, and broke into energetic ragtime. George felt it was
in some way inappropriate to play ragtime at such a moment.
“Let’s come out on to the balcony,” he suggested, “we’ve only got
a quarter of an hour or so before the others come.”
“Well, we’ve nothing particular to do, have we?”
“It’s cooler.... Come on....”
They walked through the French windows and sat on the parapet
overlooking the gravel courtyard and the blurred panorama of the
Forest.
“It ought to be moonlight,” he exclaimed rapturously.
 “No, it oughtn’t,” she contradicted. “I’m glad it isn’t. Starlight is
much better.”
It was not an encouraging beginning for him.
“Do you mind if I talk to you seriously?” he asked.
She laughed a little unsympathetically.
“Not at all, only I don’t suppose I shall talk to you seriously.”
“Then it’s not much good, is it?” he remarked, crest-fallen.
“No. Much better to talk nonsense. Let’s talk nonsense. Does one
eat oysters with a spoon or a fork?”
“I can’t——”
“But I want to know. I noticed we begin with oysters, and I’m not
sure what tools to use. Surely you don’t want me to make a fool of
myself. Come, tell me, how does one masticate oysters?”
“A fork is customary, I believe.”
“Thank you. That is what I wanted to know.”
There was a pause, during which the distant sound of voices
reached them from the dim Forest background.
“They’re just coming,” she said. “They must have come by bus,
like we did.”
He ground his heel into the carpet-matting.
“What I want to say——” he started suddenly. “It’s like this. I
believe there was a—a sort of—er—misunderstanding between us at
one time. Now I’m not prepared to say that I was altogether right. In
fact——”
“I don’t remember any misunderstanding. I think I at any rate
understood you perfectly. I really don’t know what you’re talking
about.”
“Well, to put it bluntly, what happened was——”
“Excuse me. I must let them hear the piano as they come out of
the Forest. Sorry to cut short our argument, but I don’t feel
metaphysical.... What shall I play? Something appropriate....
Suggest something!”
He sat rather gracelessly on the parapet watching her as she
skipped over to the piano. The expression on his face was one of
bafflement.
“I really don’t——” he called ineffectually.
For answer she began the pianoforte accompaniment of Landon
Ronald’s “Down in the Forest.”
A moment later over the fringe of Forest still untraversed came
the voice of the soprano singer, clear and tremulous, but not
particularly musical. “Down in the Forest something stirred,” she
sang, and Catherine laughed as she caught the sound....

§4
About twenty minutes to midnight the tenor singer (with baritone
leanings) whispered to George Trant: “I say, ol’ chap. You’d better
l’kafter tha’ l’l gaerl of yours.”
“What d’you mean?”
“Wha’ I say. She’s had too much.”
“But really, I don’t think——”
“Two glasses sherry, one hock, three champagne, two port ... I’ve
took notice.”
“She’s a bit noisy, I’ll admit.... But she was quite lively enough as
we came along. It’s her mood, I think, mostly.”
The party had left the table and split up into groups of twos and
threes. Some lingered sentimentally on the balcony; the violinist,
who was just a shade fuddled, lay sprawled across a couch with his
eyes closed. Catherine was at the piano, making the most
extraordinary din imaginable. Surrounding her were a group of young
men in evening dress, singers and comedians and monologuists and
what not. George Trant and the tenor singer stood at the French
windows, smoking cigars and listening to the sounds that proceeded
from the piano.
“We shall have the manager up,” said George, nervously.
“He’ll say we’re damaging the instrument.... I wish she’d quieten
down a bit. The whole place must be being kept awake....”
Catherine’s voice, shrill and challenging, pierced the din.
“Impressions of Bockley High Street—nine p.m. Saturday night,”
she yelled, and pandemonium raged over the keyboard. It was really
quite a creditable piece of musical post-impressionism. But the noise
was terrific. Glissandos in the treble, octave chromatics in the bass,
terrible futurist chords and bewildering rhythms, all combined to
make the performance somewhat painful. Her select audience
applauded enthusiastically.
George Trant moved rather nervously towards the piano.
“I shouldn’t make quite so much noise,” he began, but nobody
heard him. Catherine was crying out “Marbl’arch, Benk, L’pol Street,”
in the approved jargon of the omnibus conductor, and was
simultaneously making motor-bus noises on the piano. Everybody
was laughing, because the mimicry of her voice was really excellent.
George felt himself unable to raise his voice above the din. He
paused a moment immediately behind her back and then touched
her lightly on the shoulder. She did not heed. He touched her again
somewhat more violently than before. She stopped abruptly both her
instrumental and vocal effects, and swung round suddenly on the
revolving music-stool so as to face him. Her eyes were
preternaturally bright.
“Excuse me,” he began, and something in her eyes as she
looked up at him made him doubly nervous, “but perhaps it would be
better if you didn’t make quite such a noise.... You see, the other
people ...” he added vaguely.
There was absolute silence now. The last echo of the piano had
died away, and the select audience waited rather breathlessly for
what might happen.
 Catherine rose. There was that greenish-brown glint in her eyes
that made fierce harmony with her hair. For a moment she looked at
him unflinchingly. There was certainly defiance, perhaps contempt in
her eyes.
“Who are you?” she said, with quiet insolence.
Somebody tittered.
George Trant looked and felt uncomfortable. For answer he
turned slowly on his heel and walked away. It seemed on the whole
the most dignified thing to do. Catherine flushed fiercely. Like a
tigress she bounded to his side and made him stop.
“For God’s sake, don’t sulk!” she cried wildly. “Wake up and say
something! Don’t stand there like a stone sphinx! Wake up!”
With a quick leap she sprang upwards and ran her two hands
backwards and forwards through his hair. His hair was long and lank
and well plastered. After she had finished with it it stood bolt upright
on his head like a donkey fringe. Everyone roared with laughter.
During the progress of this operation the interior door had been
opened and a man had entered. In the noise and excitement of the
mêlée he was not noticed. He was tall, severe-looking and in
evening dress. When the excitement subsided they found him
standing a little awkwardly on the edge of the scuffle.
Catherine thought he was at least an underwaiter, come to
complain of the noise they were making.
He bowed very slightly, and immediately everybody felt sure he
was a waiter. Only a professional could have bowed so chillingly.
Catherine, with flushed face and dishevelled hair, leaned against
a chair, panting from her exertion.
“I do not wish to interrupt,” began the stranger, and there might
have been sarcasm in his voice, “but I have been commissioned to
deliver a message to Miss Weston. Which is Miss Weston?”
“I am Miss Weston,” gasped Catherine. Then, to everyone’s
amazement, she proceeded furiously: “I know it—I know it. You
needn’t tell me! I saw it in the papers ... I suppose they’ll say it’s all
my fault.... Do they want me? ... if so, I’ll come. I’ll come with you
now if you like....”
The stranger raised his eyebrows slightly.
“I have no desire for you to come anywhere with me.... I don’t
know what you are talking about, either. My message is contained in
this note, and there is no immediate necessity to reply to it.”
Somebody said, rather in the spirit of a heckler at a political
meeting: “Who sent it?” The stranger turned and said: “I should think
Miss Weston and not I should be asked that.” The questioner
subsided ignominiously.
Catherine took the envelope that the stranger offered her. She
put it unread into her pocket. The stranger bowed and walked out.
Silence.... Then a chatter of conversation.
“Admirer of yours,” said the violinist, thickly, from his couch.
Everybody thought he had been asleep.
“Didn’t exactly get you at a good moment,” remarked the tenor
singer, flicking away his cigar-ash.
“Looked like an undertaker,” said the soprano.
“Or the ‘salary-doubled-in-a-fortnight’ man in the efficiency
advertisements,” put in the monologuist.
Catherine started to arrange her hair.
“I’m going,” she said, and walked towards the balcony (there was
no exit that way). Near the French windows she staggered and fell,
fortunately upon the cushions of a couch. They all crowded round
her. She did not attempt to rise.
“She’s drunk,” muttered the violinist.
“Possibly ...” said George Trant, bending down to her. “Fetch
some water. I think she’s fainted....”
 CHAPTER VII
TRAGEDY
§1
ON the first of May the weather was very sultry. Downsland Road,
running past the front of the Council School, was both blazingly hot
and distressingly conscious that it was Friday afternoon. The road
was bursting out in little gouts of soft tar: costermongers were
arranging their wares for the evening’s marketing, spitting
contemplatively on the apples and polishing them afterwards on their
coat-sleeves. Children with clanking iron hoops converged from all
directions upon the four entrance gates of the Downsland Road
Council School, respectively those of the boys’, girls’, infants’ and
junior mixed departments. There they either carried or dragged them
surreptitiously along, for the trundling of hoops was forbidden in the
schoolyard.
At five minutes to two, threading his way past the groups of boys
and girls that littered the pavements and roadways, came the short,
stumpy form of Mr. Weston. He was shabbily dressed as usual, yet it
might have been said that he carried his umbrella somewhat more
jauntily than was his wont. In fact, people had lately been saying that
he was beginning to get over the loss of his wife.... At any rate he
passed the costermongers and their stalls in a slouch that was not
quite so much a slouch as usual, smiled pleasantly as he caught
sight of the announcement of a Conservative Club soirée, and had
just reached the edifice known as the Duke Street Methodist Chapel
when his attention was arrested by an awful spectacle.
The Duke Street Methodist Chapel, it may here be remarked,
was a structure of appalling ugliness situate in the very midst of
some of the worst slums in Bockley. Its architecture was that of a
continental railway station, and its offertories between a pound and
thirty shillings a Sunday. Inside the hideous building, with her back to
the blue-distempered wall of the choir, the late Mrs. Weston had for
many years yelled the hymns at the top of her voice.... And along the
brown matting of the left-hand aisle Mr. Weston, suave and supple,
collection-plate in hand, had in his time paced many miles.... Once,
when the church steward was ill, his voice had been heard aloft in
the reading of the notices. And at the left-hand door, while the
organist played the “War March of the Priests,” he had stood with
outstretched hand, saying:
“Good evening, Mrs. Lawson.... Good evening, Ethel.... ’Night,
Miss Picksley ... see you at the Band of Hope on Tuesday, I
suppose? ...”
He did not do that sort of thing now. In the chapel he was little
seen, and the Temperance Society knew him not. Only the Guild and
Mutual Improvement Society still counted him as a member, and that
was solely because they had not worried him into resigning.... At the
Guild and Mutual Improvement Society Mr. Weston’s carefully read
papers, once a session, on “Milton,” “John Wycliff, Scholar and
Saint,” “The Lake Poets,” etc., had been a well-known, but
unfortunately not always well-attended feature.
For over a year the fixture-card had lacked the name of Mr.
Weston.
And then, a fortnight ago—to be precise, on April 14th—Mr.
Weston had been stopped in the street by Miss Picksley, the
secretary of the Guild and Mutual Improvement Society. She had
said:
“Oh, Mr. Weston, do give us one of your literary evenings, will
you?”
Perhaps it was the subtle compliment contained in the phrase
“literary evenings” that caused Mr. Weston not to say “I am sorry, but,
etc., etc....” as quickly as he had intended.
Miss Picksley exploited the delay brilliantly.
 “Good!” she cried, whipping out a pencil and notebook, “I’ll get
your name down for May 1st.... What’ll be your subject?”
“But, er ... I don’t ... er——”
“Something about literature, eh? ... Oh, do, please!” purred Miss
Picksley, making eyes at him. (She was really anxious for him to
accept, because she had canvassed in vain seven other speakers.)
“Tell me your subject, then it can go down on the fixture-cards.”
Mr. Weston, to his astonishment, lost his head and struck blindly
at the first literary name that came into his disordered mind.
“Shakespeare,” he gasped.
Miss Picksley departed, calling blessing upon his head.

§2
Now, as Mr. Weston passed the scene of so many of his former
labours, he felt not altogether sorry that to-night, in the schoolroom
adjoining the chapel, he would address a small but certainly select
gathering on the subject of “Shakespeare.” ... He would have liked to
have expanded the title of his paper into “Shakespeare, Man or
Superman?” after the fashion of a certain Methodist preacher who
occasionally visited Bockley. However....
Mr. Weston, it may be remarked, was feeling in quite a tolerably
good humour. He was beaming genially at the world in general when
a horrible sight met his eyes. Then his brow darkened into a frown.
The smile left his face; his lips tightened ominously. He stopped,
swung down his umbrella from its jaunty attitude, and stared. His
eyes flamed. The slope of his nose became full of menace.
For there, before his eyes, chalked up in scrawly writing on the
foundation-stone of the Duke Street Methodist Chapel, was an
inscription that excited his horrified attention. “This stone was laid ...
to the glory of God ... the Rev. Samuel Smalljohn ...” he read, and
“Let your light so shine....” And underneath that, in a space that
made it most conspicuous, the brutal legend: “Daddy Weston is a
Soppy Fool....”
Entering the Downsland Road Council School in a white heat of
indignation, Mr. Weston was just able to hear the sound of
suppressed laughter and scurrying feet as he entered the classroom.
The conviction forced itself upon him that somebody had been
watching at the keyhole....

§3
Mr. Weston was not normally a hot-tempered man. He was by
nature placid, servile, lymphatic. It was solely as a measure of self-
protection that he had trained himself to lose his temper on
appropriate occasions. It was part of his disciplinary outfit.
He stood glowering fiercely behind his desk.
“I want all boys who were concerned in the chalking up of those
offensive remarks outside the school to stand up.”
Pause. No result.
“I may say that I have already a very fair idea of who they are,
and I shall be most severe with those who do not acknowledge
themselves.”
(A lie, but Mr. Weston’s disciplinary system condoned it.)
“I may also say that for every half-minute I am kept waiting I shall
keep the class in half an hour after school hours. I have already
decided to keep the class in till five for keeping me waiting so long.”
Here Mr. Weston pulled out his watch and placed it prominently
on the desk before him. (This was mere theatricalism, as the watch
did not go.)
Pause. Then a warning shuffle and seven small boys raised
themselves.
Mr. Weston dived into his desk and produced seven coloured
dusters for cleaning blackboards.
 “Come here,” he said to the seven.
The seven came.
“You will each take one of these dusters and go out into the street
and obliterate every one of the marks you have made. Then you will
return.”
It was Mr. Weston’s own invention, this disciplinary method.

§4
Slowly, ever so slowly, the afternoon crept by, and Mr. Weston
was just beginning to congratulate himself upon having proved equal
to the occasion, when an awkward but all-important fact occurred to
him. If you keep your class in you have to stay in with it. Mr. Weston,
of all people, ought to have learnt this lesson, yet somehow amidst
the heat and sultriness of the afternoon it had escaped him. For he
was tired, dead tired. And also hot. The sweat was rolling down his
forehead. Oh, how he wished he had said half-past four, and not five!
Confound it, why had he said five? Half-past four would really have
done just as well. Only, having said five, he was bound (by that
disciplinary code of his) to keep his word.
He took a sheaf of notes from his inside pockets and perused
them diffidently. “William Shakespeare.” It was to last about half an
hour, and as yet Mr. Weston had thought about William Shakespeare
only sufficiently for it to last twenty or twenty-five minutes. It would
have to be padded out. Something about the “immortal bard of
Avon....” On such a fine evening, thought Mr. Weston, the audience
would be small. Possibly about fifteen or twenty. There would be
Miss Picksley, the secretary, to receive subscriptions for the coming
session. Mrs. Hollockshaw would be there to play the hymn on the
American harmonium, and Mr. Sly would open with a word of prayer.
The Gunter girls would sit on the back row and flirt with the Merridge
boys. Possibly old Mrs. Cowburn would turn up. (Or was she dead
by this time?) ... After he had read his paper there would be a few
minutes for discussion. That would merely mean votes of thanks,
because he would take care not to say anything controversial.
Nothing about the Shakespeare-Bacon business. Then the
benediction given out by Mr. Sly. With luck the whole business would
be over by nine, and there would be time for a stroll through the
Forest at dusk. Or perhaps, though, it would be quite dark. Heavens
I Only twenty-five to five. Old Clotters was locking up in his room....
A ray of tawdry sunlight penetrated the dust and murkiness of the
atmosphere, bringing into prominence the rather obvious fact that
Mr. Weston was combining reverie with the observation of his class
through the interstices of his fingers. (This was an integral part of Mr.
Weston’s disciplinary system.) Ever and anon his eyes would focus
themselves upon a particular boy in the hope that if he were watched
long enough he would do something amiss. This happy
consummation was not long in coming. There was that boy Jones!
Jones was doing something. Surely, surely! ... Well, well, perhaps he
would do it again. There, he had done it.... His jaws had moved
perpendicularly twice within ten seconds. There could be no further
doubt about it. Jones was eating!
“Jones.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Are you eating?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then I will report you to Mr. Clotters on Monday morning. I will
not have this sort of thing going on in my class. Your manners are
those of the lower animals. Come up here and put what you are
eating into the waste-paper basket!”

§5
Punctually at five Mr. Weston locked his desk and prepared to
observe the solemn ritual of dismissal. It was in three movements.
“Attention!” called Mr. Weston, and the class looked at him
eagerly.
 “Stand!” called Mr. Weston, and the class stood. But there must
have been some flaw in the standing, for Mr. Weston immediately
said, “Sit down again!” They sat down again.
“Now stand!” cried Mr. Weston, after a suitable pause, and this
time the manœuvre met with his approval.
“Three!” continued Mr. Weston, and at this mysterious direction
the class took a side-step into its respective gangways.
“First row—forward!”
“Second.”
“Third.”
When the last row had dissolved into the disintegrating chaos of
the corridor, Mr. Weston took up his hat and umbrella and walked
through the masters’ gateway into the frowsiness of Downsland
Road....

§6
In the hot kitchen of No. 24, Kitchener Road, Mr. Weston made
himself some tea and cut some bread and butter. He had not much
time to spare. He must add a few pages to his paper. Then he must
wash and shave and make himself respectable. During his meal he
thought once or twice of those old days when Laura, his wife, had
been there to get his tea ready for him, to fuss round the books and
papers he brought home, and to say: “Going out to-night, are you?
Because if not, there’s your slippers. And let’s ’ave your dirty
boots....” He thought, too, of Catherine: a little child, asking him
absurd questions, messing about with his exercise books, begging
him for half-used sheets to scribble on. But there was nothing
regretful in his thoughts of those past days. On the contrary, he
rather inclined to moralize: “I don’t know whether I’m not actually
better off than I was then. At any rate I’m free, and I can do what I
like. It’s not so bad, really.”
He wrote down a few sentences about Shakespeare.