American Library Association

The Power of BooksAuthor(s): Elizabeth HartSource: ALA Bulletin, Vol. 45, No. 8 (SEPTEMBER 1951), pp. 285-286Published by: American Library AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25693596 .

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The Power of Books Elizabeth Hart

"These are the cadets of Gascony!" ?Cyrano de Bergerac

Picture

a point of land jutting out into the harbor of a great city. It is winter,

and this is a desolate place. Ships' spars, factory chimneys and the vast bulk of a

grain elevator loom grey against a foggy sky. Almost lost between the high walls of warehouses, the little homes of workers

straggle down to the waterfront. These are homes of workers without work, for this is Locust Point in the winter of 1932.

There is talk of a Great Depression?talk that the people do not fully understand.

They only know that their small savings are

spent, their men sit idle, there is no heat in their houses and very little food. At night the children crowd into the small public library, for here at least is light, warmth and companionship.

On such a night a group of boys stood huddled at one end of the charging desk.

They stood because there was no room to

sit. I call them boys though their ages ranged from 17 to 20, for as librarian of the Locust Point branch I had known them since they were children.

There was Dennis, Irish, tall and slim, with an air that would have been jaunty had there been one spark of gaiety left in his world; Rudolph, Austrian, a frail boy with high, hunched shoulders and sensitive dark eyes; Michael, Polish, blond as the

Archangel; and David, a Jewish lad with the aesthetic face of a young Disraeli.

Their clothes were frayed and faded. Their faces wore a pinched look and an

expression of puzzled discouragement. Each was an eldest son. In the eyes of their world they were men. Long since out of school, they should have been shouldering

Miss Hart is a member of the staff of the Enoch Pratt Free Library, Branch 19, Baltimore. Her paper, "The Power of Books," was written for the ALA 75th Anniversary Contest and was selected as the best statement that illustrates the power of books to influence the lives of men and women. Miss Hart received a $200 prize for the paper.

the burden of supporting younger brothers and sisters. But there was no work. For

two years there had been no work in the

factories, on the docks or the ships. What few jobs there were went to older, more

experienced men.

Often, in those days before relief was

organized, when hope was at its lowest ebb, I agonized over the children of Locust Point. They needed so much, and I had

only books to offer.

Tonight the boys were talking in low tones. Outside the air hung like a damp blanket against the windows, and the mournful hoot of a tug was the only sound that reached us.

"But," Dennis said softly, "I just don't like the idea of drowning. I almost drowned once when I was a kid."

And Rudolph said, "Aw, what's the dif ference? A guy can't go on this way.

What have we got to lose?" I thought, "I've got to do something to

help these boys, and I've got to do it right now."

And suddenly across the years there came a memory of the time when, in the darkest hour of my own youth, I had escaped from a world grown too difficult into the glamor ous court of His Majesty King Louis XIII.

Taking The Three Musketeers from the

shelf, I opened to the passage where

d'Artagnan, on his ridiculous steed, sets out

to seek his fortune; and placing the book on the desk I began to read aloud:

Imagine to yourself a Don Quixote of eight een; a Don Quixote without his corselet, without

his coat of mail, a Don Quixote clothed in a

woolen doublet, the blue color of which had faded to a nameless shade . . .

"My son," said the old Gaston, "You are

young; you ought to be brave for two reasons. . . . Sustain worthily your name of gentleman." And so on through the fight at the inn to

the first appearance of the mysterious "Milady."

That night when the boys left the library The Three Musketeers went with them.

And that was the beginning of the whole

thing. Locust Point had been introduced to Romantic Literature, and at that moment

285

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286 ALA BULLETIN: SEPTEMBER 1951

found it good. Other boys joined the

original group. Dumas, Rostand and the

early works of Cabell were swept from the shelves. The poetry of an age long past spoke again to a new generation, and Villon and Cyrano swaggered the streets of the Baltimore waterfront.

From there on it was only a step to The Game. It started when someone noticed that Rudolph unquestionably possessed the

Hapsburg lip. Of Rudy's antecedents little was known. His father, long since lost at sea, had been a ship's cook. But he had hinted at aristocratic connections in the old

country. That was enough for us. We devised for Rudolph an elaborate genealogy, proving beyond a doubt that he was heir to the Austrian throne. Until the matter of the Austrian succession could be properly arranged, we elected Rudolph Emperor of Locust Point. The rest of the crowd be came nobility of various degrees. Dennis, the Emperor's right hand man, was Duke of Driftwood Beach and Warden of the Marshes. Michael and David were Vis counts with equally high-sounding titles, while the Locust Point Branch library swarmed with a throng of lesser nobility. They offered me a Duchy, but I protested that I was content to remain as Keeper of the Royal Archives.

There was something a little tragic in the

way these boys threw themselves into the

game of make-believe. Childhood for them had been too brief and too hard. Now, with

nothing better to do, they were playing with all their might to make up for the lost

years. And yet the game was essentially a

comedy, for behind the grandiose pretend ing loomed the grim world of reality, and

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all were conscious of the contrast. Thus the elaborate make-believe became for them an unfailing source of laughter.

Yet it served its purpose. Perhaps one cannot think of himself as noble, even in

jest, without a change of spirit. Courage is

contagious though it comes to us across three centuries by means of printed page, and honor has little to do with man's

worldly goods. Was there so great a difference between

the threadbare young cadets who once

thronged Ragueneau's bakeshop and the

group that gathered nightly at the library? Here too there was a camaraderie that came from sharing more than hardship.

# # * ?

As time went on there were jobs to be had, and later there was war. From Aruba

to Newfoundland and from Guam to Nor

mandy these modern cadets of Gascony were scattered across the face of the globe. And I cannot but believe that they were better soldiers for having served an appren ticeship in the King's Musketeers.

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