Jasper County Democrat, Volume 3, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 January 1901 — MR. SPOFFORD ON BOOKS. [ARTICLE]

MR. SPOFFORD ON BOOKS.

The Really Important Ones Frw to Comparison with the Mass. For a long time Mr. Spofford has practically lived among books. For years he was at the heacbof the congressional library in Washington, and is now assistant librarian at that institution. The really important books, he thinks, bear but a small proportion to the great mass. “Most books are but repetitions, in a different form, of what has already been many times written and printed. Most writers are mere echoes, and the greater part of literature is the pouring out of one bottle into another. If you can get hold of the few really best books you can well afford to be ignorant of-all the rest.” The kind of books which should form the predominant part in the selection of our reading, from Mr. Spofford’s point of view, says the Baltimore Sun, is a question admitting of widelydifferingopinions. Rigid utilitarians, he says, may hold that only books of fact, books crammed full of knowledge, should be encouraged. Others will plead in behalf of lighter reading, or for a universal range. There are many attractive books outside the field of science and outside the realm of fiction—books capable of yielding pleasure as well as instruction. As to fiction, he thinks “it is a. wise plan to neglect the novels of the year and read (and reread in many cases) the masterpieces which have stood the test of flme and criticism, and changing fashions. It is better to read a fine old book through three times than to read three new book* through once.”