Public Libraries for Asia: The Delhi SeminarReview by: Dorothy Williams CollingsThe Library Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 1 (Jan., 1958), pp. 89-90Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4304749 .

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REVIEWS 89

laws, presented state by state and including a brief statement of content as well as the cita- tion of each law, that the term "larger units of service" includes legal provision permitting combinations of towns, counties, and the cross- ing of state lines.

In view of the current interest in federal and state aid to libraries, it is regrettable that this revised compilation of state laws was not pub- lished simultaneously and under the same cover as another Library Extension section study dealing with state aid. Because the passage of the Library Services Act came after the work on this compilation, this listing does not in- clude state library legislation occasioned by the passage and continuance of that law. It is recognized, however, that any such compilation rapidly becomes out of date and that this work provides a solid foundation for additions and expansion.

MARION JAMES

Graduate Library School University of Chicago

Public Libraries for Asia: The Delhi Seminar. ("UNESCO Public Library Manuals Series," No. 7.) Paris: UNESCO, 1956. Pp. 165. $1.50; 8s.; fr. 400. (Obtainable in the United States from the UNESCO Publications Cen- ter, 801 Third Avenue, New York 22, N.Y.) Issued also in separate French and Spanish editions.

The work of UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organiza- tion) in the field of public library development is of world-wide interest and importance for at least two main reasons. First, for more than ten years, the organization has been actively engaged in assisting public library development through such means as international seminars and conferences; reports, studies, and other publications issued in various language editions; pilot projects; fellowships, study tours, and expert missions. Second, through these activi- ties, UNESCO has made it possible for persons engaged or interested in library development to profit from the international exchange of professional information and experience on a scale hitherto unprecedented.

The present volume, the seventh in the series of "UNESCO Public Library Manuals," came into being as a direct result of the UNESCO Seminar on the Development of Public Li-

braries in Asia held at the Delhi Public Library, Delhi, India, October 6-26, 1955. The seminar, the first international meeting on the subject ever to be held in Asia, considered the present status and main problems of public library de- velopment in the region and proposed a series of recommendations for action at the national, regional, and international levels. Participants included forty-six libraries and educators from the following twelve countries: Afghanistan, Australia, Burma, Ceylon, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaya, British Borneo group, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, and Thailand. The British Council, the United Nations, and the United States Information Service were also represented.

The main conclusions of the seminar may be summarized briefly. Group I, led by Mr. Frank Gardner, borough librarian of Luton, United Kingdom, proposed practical steps for the de- velopment of public library service on a na- tional basis in Asian countries, with units large enough to be viable linked into an integrated country-wide pattern of service, manned by a cadre of professionally trained staff, and sup- ported by public funds at the national, state, and local levels. Group II, led by Mr. Habi- buddin Ahmed Qazi, officer on special duty, Directorate of Archives and Libraries, Pakistan Central Secretariat, Karachi, studied the com- plex problem of providing suitable and suffi- cient printed and audio-visual materials in na- tional and regional languages for Asian library users, including newly literate adults. The group recommended that an adequately financed na- tional production center for such materials be established in each Asian country. Group III, led by Mr. Hector Macaskill, librarian, National Library Services, Wellington, New Zealand, proposed recommendations for the provision of effective library services for children in schools and public libraries.

Annexes to the volume include a list of the seminar participants; statistics and other data on public libraries for twenty Asian countries- and a directory of Asian library associations.

It is heart-warming to note that follow-up activities to the seminar are already well under way. These include the formation of an Asian Federation of Library Associations, which will serve as a clearing house for information on library problems in Asia; the publication by UNESCO of one of the Delhi Seminar working papers, The Delhi Public Library: An Evalua- tion Report, by Frank M. Gardner ("UNESCO Public Library Manuals Series," No. 8 [Paris:

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90 THE LIBRARY QUARTERLY

UNESCO, 1957], pp. 112; $1.50; 8s.; fr. 400) and the publication of two bibliographical tools prepared in response to recommendations made by the seminar: Books for Asian Children, com- piled by Shakuntala Bhatawdekar (UNESCO Doc./WS/086.79 [Paris: UNESCO, 1956], pp. 77); an annotated basic buying list of world literature for children suitable for use in Asia, in the original, in translation, or in adaptation (obtainable free on request from the Libraries Division, UNESCO, 19, Avenue Kleber, Paris 16e, France); and Directory of Reference Works Published in Asia, by P. K. Garde ("UNESCO Bibliographical Handbooks," No. 5 [Paris: UNESCO, 1956], pp. 139, text bilingual in English and French; $2.00; lOs. 6d.; fr. 500) (obtainable in the U.S.A. from the UNESCO Publications Center, 801 Third Avenue, New York 22, N.Y.).

DOROTHY WILLIAMS COLLINGS

School of Library Service Columbia University

Book Collecting: An Introduction to Modern Methods of Literary and Bibliographical De- tection. By ROBERT L. COLLISON. Fair Lawn, N.J.: Essential Books, Inc., 1957. Pp. 244. $5.00.

There is always a danger that the author try- ing to kill two birds with one stone will hit neither. Mr. Collison has produced neither a satisfactory primer of book-collecting nor an adequate manual of bibliography, although his title and subtitle promise both. In his Intro- duction the author sketches his plan: first, a chapter in which "modern efforts in the almost unknown field of bibliography" are outlined; then, chapter by chapter, a discussion of the components of a volume in the order in which the reader actually encounters them, starting with the binding and continuing through to indexes and end-papers, with added chapters on authors and publishers, contents and subject matter, cancels and fakes, and so forth. The penultimate chapter is devoted to conclusions, the last to the care and repair of books. Finally, appendixes provide a general bibliography (each chapter mentions specialized books in its text), glossary, a chronology of book produc- tion, a "Who's Who and What's What," and detailed notes on the thirty well-produced plates.

Chapter i, on bibliography, is a cursory apologia for the comparatively new art or sci- ence which it treats. It points out the inherent possibilities for error in the transmission of text, gives examples of the uses of bibliography in establishing authoritative texts, and advocates the booksellers' shelves as the best training ground for this rewarding study. (One cannot help wondering at the bookseller's reaction.)

When he begins his detailed treatment of the various parts of the book, Mr. Collison is ven- turing into deep waters. It is here that the faults of the book show most clearly; there is no chapter without a number of inaccuracies; often a fact is given correctly in one place and wrongly elsewhere. Thus on page 29 we are told that Napoleon wrote his will on "Whatmore" paper, misquoting a TLS review which gave the correct "Whatman"; on page 76, that the first printers carefully cut by hand a matrix for each letter, although the evidence indicates that punch-cutting, for the striking of matrixes, was a very early part of the typefounding craft; on page 99, STC is cited as the most comprehen- sive list of "British" incunabula; on page 130 it is stated that the illustrations in block-books were "stamped on paper by hand in a brown- ish ink." On page 146, Owen Jones becomes 01- wen, and 1800 is given as the date for the print- ing of the first halftone, in New York State (on page 203, 1880 is given-the year in which the first newspaper halftone was printed. The in- vention was actually a composite one, the work of at least a half-dozen men, in different coun- tries, beginning at least as early as the 1850's). On page 153, the first printer's mark is stated to be that of the Mainz Psalter, printed by Fust and Schoeffer in 1454; on page 200, 1484 is given as the date. (One could put up a case for 1457-one copy of the Psalter of that year, that in Vienna, has the device-or 1462, since the Bible of that year carries the mark in the whole edition.) The Papers of the Bibliograph- ical Society of America appear under its right- ful title once, on page 205; elsewhere it is called (frequently) the Publications. The Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society, in the same fashion, become the Pro- ceedings. On page 199, in the glossary, a so- lander case is described as being "made of the same type and colour of the fabric of the book it holds." Mr. Collison proves equally erratic in his citation of authorities. Several of E. Ph. Goldschmidt's books are listed in the text or bibliographies, but not his most important book, Gothic & Renaissance Bookbindings, although

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