Price of Libraries (2010년 1월 30일)

As I browsed through a newspaper in a library last week, I came across an article that said Korea lags far behind other economic powers as far as public libraries are concerned. Being a believer in the value and importance of books and libraries, the news was more than frustrating to me.

I have often felt that books can create miracles. Even if you are in a crowded bus terminal, you can be free from the engulfing noise around you if you can find a small space where you can sit and focus on your book. Libraries may not perform instant tricks as books do, but they also create wonders that often affect you for the rest of your life.

All my happy memories have a library or a reading room in them. My father, who quit school at an early age because of poverty, had acquired quite a collection of books by the time I could read. I would pick a book from his shelves and remain stuck at his chair and wooden desk until I finished reading it. Finishing a book was like awaking from a sweet dream. As I closed each book, I was overwhelmed by a strange mixture of fulfillment and sadness that usually forced me to choose yet another book.

My father's desk was at a space at the center of the house called ``daecheong," and wasn't in fact an independent room. Still, the small space served as a reading room, if not a library. I sometimes wonder if I liked the space and the books as much as I did because I wasn't very happy as a child. Anyway, I learned the pleasure of reading then.

The best thing about my university was its library. The high ceiling of the building and the smell of the old and new books was both comforting and stimulating. The library closed at 10 p.m. and a librarian would inform the students of the time five to ten minutes before. Her sharp, unfriendly voice was startling in the quiet hall, but it wasn't bad enough to force the readers to abandon their books right away.

 

About 10 years ago when I arrived in Washington, D.C. for a visit, I found that my condo didn't have Internet access. So, instead of trying to inform my family in Seoul of my safe arrival, I ventured out. I decided to take a walk to Georgetown University, which I had heard wasn't very far from my accomodation. I walked for some time under the unusually warm April sun, enjoying the vivid colors of the flowers along the sidewalks and individual houses. Then, at some point, I changed my mind and began exploring, crossing the street whenever I saw a green light.

I was soon lost but wasn't worried. I was a traveler, after all. I kept on walking and came upon an old house of books nestled in a peaceful neighborhood. If my memory serves me correctly, it was a community library. The house gave off the familiar smell of the libraries I had frequented. For all its time-honored features, it offered free Internet and I could send word back home that I had safely arrived. I visited many memorable sites in the U.S. yet the small library topped them all.

Though I can't tell to what extent libraries have influenced my formation, I know several people whose lives have been greatly affected by them. one of them is Benjamin S. Carson, the American doctor who successfully separated a pair of Siamese twins for the first time ever. Dr. Carson was only eight when his parents divorced and his young mother, who had married at the age of 13, began to raise him and his brother on her own. She worked two to three jobs at a time after leaving them at public libraries. It isn't surprising that Dr. Carson lauds the institutions in his autobiography, ``Gifted Hands."

I hope I will be able to open a neighborhood library one day. I will put copies of ``Gifted Hands" and other proof of the worth of libraries on its shelves, while abstaining from installing computers; people will have too many of them at home and work and may crave for a break from them.

The news article ended with the government's plan to increase the number of public libraries in Korea from 698 to 900 by 2013. I hope the government will build more of them. If money matters, they could draw some from the budget for the controversial ``four-river project." The late American broadcast journalist Walter Cronkite once said, ``Whatever the costs of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation." His words will be resoundingly true in the years to come as in his time (1916-2009)..

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신문에서 우리나라의 공공도서관 수가 선진국들에 비해 현저히 적다는 기사를 읽고 쓴 칼럼입니다. 요즘 우리나라에선 구청 몸집 불리기가 유행입니다. 인터넷 시대라 많은 민원이 온라인으로 해결되는데 왜 구청이 그렇게 커야 하는지 알 수 없는 일입니다. 새로 짓는 구청들처럼 크지 않아도 좋으니 공공도서관이 골목마다 하나씩 생겼으면 좋겠습니다.