Synopses & Reviews
"The starting point is a question," Alberto Manguel writes in the introduction to
The Library at Night: since few can doubt that the universe is ultimately meaningless and purposeless, why do we try to give it order? After all, our efforts are surely doomed to failure.
Its hard to think of a more profound or serious subject to start with – but The Library at Night, Alberto Manguel says, is by no means a systematic answer. Rather, it is the story of the search for one. In the tradition of A History of Reading, this book is an account of Manguels astonishment at the variety, beauty and persistence of our efforts to shape the world and our lives, most notably through something almost as old as reading itself: libraries.
The result is both intimately personal and incredibly wide-ranging: it is a fascinating study of the mysteries of libraries, a thorough analysis of their history throughout the world and an esoteric, enchanting celebration of reading. It is, perhaps most of all, a book that only Alberto Manguel could have written.
The Library at Night begins with the design and construction of Alberto Manguels own library at his house in western France – a process that raises puzzling questions about his past and his reading habits, as well as broader ones about the nature of categories, catalogues, architecture and identity.
Exploring these themes with a deliberately unsystematic brilliance, Manguel takes us to the great Library at Alexandria, and Michelangelos Laurentian Library in Florence; we sit with Jorge Luis Borges in his office at the National Library in Argentina, travel with donkeys carrying books into the Colombian hinterland, and discover the Fihrist, a chaotic and delightful bibliographic record of medieval Arab knowledge. There seem to be no limits to Manguels learning, or his ability to illuminate his investigations with magical, telling details from the past.
Thematically organized and beautifully illustrated, this book considers libraries as treasure troves and architectural spaces; it looks on them as autobiographies of their owners and as statements of national identity. It examines small personal libraries and libraries that started as philanthropic ventures, and analyzes the unending promise – and defects – of virtual ones. It compares different methods of categorization (and what they imply) and libraries that have built up by chance as opposed to by conscious direction. Although it is encyclopedic (and discusses encyclopedias assembled by Diderot and fifteenth-century Chinese scholars alike) and full of concrete historical analysis (including a brief investigation of the prejudices underlying the Dewey Decimal System) this book is animated throughout by a gentle, even playful sensibility: it is governed by the browsers logic of association and pleasure, rather than the rigid lines of scholarly theory. After all, everything in a library is connected: "As the librarians of Alexandria perhaps discovered, any single literary moment necessarily implies all others."
In part this is because this is about the library at night, not during the day: this book takes in what happens after the lights go out, when the world is sleeping, when books become the rightful owners of the library and the reader is the interloper. Then all daytime order is upended: one book calls to another across the shelves, and new alliances are created across time and space. And so, as well as the best design for a reading room and the makeup of Robinson Crusoes library, this book dwells on more "nocturnal" subjects: fictional libraries like those carried by Count Dracula and Frankensteins monster; shadow libraries of lost and censored books; imaginary libraries of books not yet written.
The Library at Night is a fascinating voyage through the mind of one our most beloved men of letters. It is an invitation into his memory and vast knowledge of books and civilizations, and throughout – though mostly implicitly – it is also a passionate defence of literacy, of the unique pleasures of reading, of the importance of the book. As much as anything else, The Library at Night reminds us of what a library stands for: the possibility of illumination, of a better path for our society and for us as individuals. That hope too, at the close, is replaced by something that fits this personal and eclectic book even better: something more fragile, and evanescent than illumination, though just as important.
The starting point is a question.
Outside theology and fantastic literature, few can doubt that the main features of our universe are its dearth of meaning and lack of discernible purpose. And yet, with bewildering optimism, we continue to assemble whatever scraps of information we can gather in scrolls and books and computer chips, on shelf after library shelf, whether material, virtual or otherwise, pathetically intent on lending the world a semblance of sense and order, while knowing perfectly well that, however much wed like to believe the contrary, our pursuits are sadly doomed to failure.
Why then do we do it? Though I knew from the start that the question would most likely remain unanswered, the quest seemed worthwhile for its own sake. This book is the story of that quest.
–from The Library at Night
About the Author
Internationally acclaimed as an anthologist, translator, essayist, novelist and editor, Alberto Manguel is the bestselling author of several award-winning books, including A Dictionary of Imaginary Places and A History of Reading. He was born in Buenos Aires, moved to Canada in 1982 and now lives in France, where he was named an Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters.
Reading Group Guide
1. What is your overall opinion of
The Library At Night? Would you recommend it to a friend? Why, or why not?
2. The Library At Night is, among other things, a collection of beautifully chosen fragments. What was your favourite story, library or quotation?
3. Discuss the importance of "nighttime" themes in this book, such as chance and coincidence, and their importance to reading and to libraries.
4. Alberto Manguel sets out some objections to the widespread optimism about Internet libraries. He mentions their fragility, inaccuracy and evanescence, for example, as well as the diminished pleasure of looking at a screen rather than holding a book. Do you agree with his moderate scepticism about the promise of this new technology?
5. Did Alberto Manguels thoughts about the nature and significance of catalogues and categorization give you pause? How do you order your own books? Do you think youll reorder them differently now?
6. In "The Library as Identity," Alberto Manguel presents a delightful lists of books he would like to have in his library, although in many cases they do not exist: “an as-yet-unpublished novel by Joseph Conrad,” for example, and “the diary of Kafkas Milena.” What would be on your list?
7. Discuss the treatment of politics / censorship / memory / history / identity / architecture / the theme of your choice in The Library At Night.
8. Can you think of anything Alberto Manguel has left out, or a library you would recommend to him? Which is your favourite library, and what is special about it?
9. What did you learn from this book? What surprised you about it?
10. What are your criticisms of The Library At Night?
Author Q&A
The Library At Night seems to contain everything: how did you conduct the research for this book, and how did you decide what to include and exclude?I am a very disorganized researcher. I am not academically trained, so I allow my imagination to wander through the books I remember and to build an argument as I write: I don’t know, when I start, where I will end nor what exactly the book will contain. I learn as I write.
What gave you the most pleasure in writing The Library at Night? What was the biggest challenge? How was the experience different from your other books?
Most pleasure: learning about the mad and marvellous ways of readers and their libraries. Biggest challenge: trying not to show my ignorance of that which librarians and specialists in the history of the book have studied in great depth. The experience was different in that every book is its own world, with its own laws, geography and language.
What do you hope readers will take from The Library at Night? Is there any advice you would give a book club to guide them through their reading of the book?
It seems to me impertinent to suggest what it is that another reader might want to find in something I have written. And no, I can give no advice: advice is resented if it concerns something the reader has not yet considered, and scoffed at if it is something the reader already has.