Library

I was at the library, browsing among new releases, when I heard a group of young boys, 12-ish, coming up the stairs, excited, apparently with an adult (“Be quiet! Quiet!” every time their voices rose, which was often). Then what struck me as an odd observation by one of the boys: “They have books at the library?!” And the group then proceeded to the computer terminals to surf the web, check their Facebook pages, whatever.

Now I suppose this could have, and might have (I’d like to be generous), been merely a cute, ironic comment by a precocious kid. Surely one would hope that a 12-ish boy would have been introduced to a library with books before this, if only at school. But still, if only an ironic quip, it reveals the shift that clearly has gone and is going on in both books and libraries. It might not be unimaginable that books are becoming the province of bookstores (at least for a while) and homes (some), and that libraries are where you go to rent DVDs or get online. And that might not necessarily be all that bad a thing. I’ve been reading myself more and more newspapers and magazines online and reading more and more of my books on my computer and iPhone. I can’t imagine ever not mostly reading hard-copy books, bought, borrowed, or checked out. But it’s becoming much easier to imagine a 12-ish boy never reading a book or article except online or otherwise digitally. And again, I don’t know that it’s something to rally the defenders of the Book of Kells to the ramparts. It may just be inevitable progress. Or at least inevitable.