Robert Darnton's recent article in the New York Review of Books, "The Library in the New Age", cautiously celebrates the digitization of knowledge. It's mainly about the future of research institutions, but has a broader scope of implications for all libraries. Darnton critiques various aspects of Google's digitization project, speaking as a Google fan himself who nonetheless retains a heavy nostalgia for books -- not least for their smells and other tactile pleasures. From the article:

"Books...give off special smells. According to a recent survey of French students, 43 percent consider smell to be one of the most important qualities of printed books—so important that they resist buying odorless electronic books. CaféScribe, a French on-line publisher, is trying to counteract that reaction by giving its customers a sticker that will give off a fusty, bookish smell when it is attached to their computers.

"When I read an old book, I hold its pages up to the light and often find among the fibers of the paper little circles made by drops from the hand of the vatman as he made the sheet—or bits of shirts and petticoats that failed to be ground up adequately during the preparation of the pulp. I once found a fingerprint of a pressman enclosed in the binding of an eighteenth-century Encyclopédie—testimony to tricks in the trade of printers, who sometimes spread too much ink on the type in order to make it easier to get an impression by pulling the bar of the press...

"I may expose myself to accusations of romanticizing or of reacting like an old-fashioned, ultra-bookish scholar who wants nothing more than to retreat into a rare book room. I plead guilty. I love rare book rooms, even the kind that make you put on gloves before handling their treasures. Rare book rooms are a vital part of research libraries, the part that is most inaccessible to Google. But libraries also provide places for ordinary readers to immerse themselves in books, quiet places in comfortable settings, where the codex can be appreciated in all its individuality."

His conclusion?

"Shore up the library. Stock it with printed matter. Reinforce its reading rooms. But don't think of it as a warehouse or a museum. While dispensing books, most research libraries operate as nerve centers for transmitting electronic impulses. They acquire data sets, maintain digital repositories, provide access to e-journals, and orchestrate information systems that reach deep into laboratories as well as studies. Many of them are sharing their intellectual wealth with the rest of the world by permitting Google to digitize their printed collections. Therefore, I also say: long live Google, but don't count on it living long enough to replace that venerable building with the Corinthian columns. As a citadel of learning and as a platform for adventure on the Internet, the research library still deserves to stand at the center of the campus, preserving the past and accumulating energy for the future."

Read the whole article, and then come to the Nashua Public Library and check out some books -- books that you can hold in your hand and savor in all the ways Darnton rhapsodizes about -- about digital libraries and online resources.

Google and The Myth of Universal Knowledge, by Jean Noel Jeanneney.

The Web Library: Building a World Class Personal Library with Free Web Resources, by Nicholas Tomaiuolo.

Internet Digital Libraries, by Jack Kessler.

Coyle's Information Highway Handbook, by Karen Coyle.

Find it Online: The Complete Guide to Online Research, by Alan Schein.