Of sex and stacks

The pseudonymous "Thomas H. Benton" discourses upon the fate of intellectual inquiry (and other activities) in libraries when those libraries no longer offer the opportunity to immerse oneself in the printed work of previous generations.

I've commented before that some of most intriguing and life-changing moments I've experienced in my own life were the result of unstructured, free-ranging browsing in library collections. Without that kind of unstructured browsing, I would never have discovered James Branch Cabell, Lord Dunsany, or many of the other authors who have come to be part of my consciousness. I hope that similar moments of momentous serendipity are not forbidden to future generations by blinkered library administrators infatuated with shiny gadgets and ignorant of the value of the vast troves of ideas, stories, and information embodied in the printed collection of a typical university.