CHEAP LITERATURE am truly sorry that my little parody has
upset
the fine and famous Trinity College, Dublin, at a time when they are making a new appeal for support : and I have sent a modest cheque to the fund. But I am very glad to have extracted the assurance that no books are sold, that all are retained and made avail- able to the public. This should allay much uneasiness here.
1 have never seen the report of the Copyright Com- mittee, 1952 (of which, says Mr. David Idwal Jones, I have made a 'rehash'). 1 got my facts, figures, and complaints from certain publishers in 1959. I knew that there were certain differences in Wales, and in- cluded them, too briefly, perhaps, under 'some cxccp- tions.' I did not know about the special rules for expensive and limited editions. So on that point the word 'six' should have been 'five: But that does not, Mr. Jones, make 'nonsense' of the argument else- where. Why should these excellent arrangements be confined to Wales?
Bomb stories about the British Museum do not
seem very relevant. We are all delighted that these great libraries should get their books for nothing. The simple point is that the State, which decrees these benefactions, should pay the bill. This is not a new thought. Sir Henry Craik, a University Member, said in the House of Commons when the Section was dis- cussed in 1911: 'I dare say there are sound arguments in favour . . . but I should like to hear them before assenting to the principle that a grant to a National Library' (Wales) 'however excellent in spirit it may be, should be given at the expense of a particular class—the authors. . . . My objection is not to the grant of books, but to the grant being made in the form of a tribute from a particular trade.'
But my magistrate, you may remember, was 'satis- fied that the action of the two defendants was more in the nature of a political demonstration or protest than an assault on the ancient prosecuting libraries.' He was right. This affair is symptomatic of much larger discontents in this land of State-aided book- borrowers and State-raided book-producers. I note, with sorrow and surprise, that neither of your cor- respondents makes any sympathetic reference to the general troubles I mentioned. May I add now that the unfortunate publishers are soon to be harried by the Inquisition under the Restrictive Practices Act. One thing against them, it seems, may be that they permit a discount of 10 per cent. to the 'free' Public Libraries —though they are compelled by law to give the 'copy- right libraries' a discount of 100 per cent. Some of the Public Libraries, I believe, are asking for more. The authors have long wanted more from the Libraries; but nobody, so far, has paid the slightest attention to them. I hope that our new Minister of Education will cast his intelligent eyes on this extraordinary, and possibly explosive scene. I should respectfully sug- gest that a visit to Denmark would be instructive : but 1 expect he knows all about that already.—Yours faithfully,
A. P. IILRBI RT
12 Hammersmith Terrace, W6
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