Transcript

Ergebnisse und Fortschritte der Bibliographie in Deutschland seit dem ersten Weltkrieg byJoris VorstiusReview by: Lawrence S. ThompsonThe Library Quarterly, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Jan., 1950), pp. 67-68Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4303856 .

Accessed: 14/06/2014 23:53

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

The University of Chicago Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to TheLibrary Quarterly.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 185.2.32.141 on Sat, 14 Jun 2014 23:53:20 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

REVIEWS 67

continues the field of the previous article, ex- panding it to a national scale and concentrating more on services than on personnel. The author takes up, in turn, the sources of publications, documentation, archives, and libraries. The most useful part of the article is the extensive report on public libraries, accompanied by tables, graphs, and sketch maps, showing the growth of libraries, numbers of inhabitants served, size of libraries, size of budgets, loans, and many other measures which can be com- pared with now universally applied methods of determining levels of library service. The survey includes academic libraries and special libraries and illustrates graphically the geographic con- centrations of library service throughout France. This is a survey on two planes, one historic and the other contemporary, and the author gently notes the significant differences between library service in the United States and elsewhere as compared with France. The survey follows closely the pattern of Carleton Joeckel's work in this field and represents a notable con- tribution to our knowledge of French libraries.

The remaining articles in this volume are of minor interest only. A fairly long article by Georgette de Grolier on display in public librar- ies adds little to the quality of the book. The black-and-white illustrations are poorly repro- duced in printing and represent rather primitive efforts at best. There are short pieces on Aslib, on photomicrography, on wartime publishing in Great Britain, on the Children's Book Council; but none of these is of great import.

The collection, as indicated above, contains some material of high quality. It is unfortunate, in the eyes of the reviewer, that these valuable essays are surrounded by a heterogeneous group of ephemeral and commercial matter. Nonethe- less, the work remains important for its two no- table studies, one local and one national, and it should serve students of the libraries of France for many years to come.

JERROLD ORNE

Washington University Libraries

University of Berlin and editor of the Zentral- blatt filr Bibliothekswesen, has the twofold dis- tinction of being the first treatise on this subject to be published and the most noteworthy con- tribution to the literature of library science which has come from Europe since the close of World War II. Covering, as it does, the period immediately subsequent to Schneider's defini- tive Handbuch der Bibliographie, it will prove an indispensable supplementary guide to German bibliography.

The work is divided into two main sections. The first, devoted to general problems of biblio- graphical theory and practice, discusses basic principles, originators of bibliographies, produc- tion of bibliographies, relationships to interna- tional bibliography, documentation, and stand- ardization. The second and major section is a comprehensive analysis of progress in the fol- lowing individual fields: international bibliogra- phy; national bibliography; personal bibliogra- phy; regional bibliography; subject bibliogra- phy; language and literature; history and folk- lore; philosophy, education, and religion; art and music; law, politics, and economics; general science; mathematics; inorganic sciences; or- ganic sciences; medicine; technology; agricul- ture and forestry. The Index is regrettably meager, providing only one entry, either by author or by title, for each work cited. A listing by both author and title would have facilitated greatly the frequent reference to this volume which will be made by those seeking the latest available survey of German bibliography in all fields.

Dr. Vorstius sketches the ebb and flow of German bibliographical achievement against a background of economic and political vicissi- tudes. Recovering slowly from the disastrous ef- fects of World War I and the inflation which followed it, bibliography was not fully revived in Germany until about 1924. Reaching its height in the late twenties and early thirties, German bibliography reflected the co-operative, internationalist spirit of the reconstruction era in its enthusiastic participation in international bibliographical activities such as those of the League of Nations Committee on Intellectual Co-operation and the International Biblio- graphical Institute in Brussels. This period saw the production of such famous German contri- butions to international bibliography as the sec- ond edition of the Index bibliographicus, the In- ernatWionale Bibliographie der Geschichswissen-

schafi, the Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke, the

Ergebnisse und Fortschritte der Bibliographie in Deutschland seit dem ersten Weltkrieg. By JORIS VORSTI}S. Leipzig: Otto Harrassowitz, I948. Pp. I72.

This summing-up of developments in Ger- man bibliography since World War I by Dr. Vorstius, professor of library science at the

This content downloaded from 185.2.32.141 on Sat, 14 Jun 2014 23:53:20 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

68 THE LIBRARY QUARTERLY

Deutscher Gesamikaklog, the Internationale Bi- bliographie des Buch- und Bibliothekswesens, and the Internationaler Jahresbericht der Biblio- graphie.

With the coming of the National Socialist era in 1933, German bibliography experienced an initial stimulus, owing to the high degree of cen- tralization in all phases of national life, but suf- fered in the long run from the ever increasing isolation of National Socialist Germany from the rest of the world. No longer permitted par- ticipation in the work of international organiza- tions, and denied free intercourse with foreign scholarship, German bibliography had already begun to lose ground, especially in nonscientific fields, before its disruption once again in the holocaust of war.

Although the history of German bibliograph- ical achievement during the last three decades has been one of unequal advances in various fields rather than a record of planned progress on all fronts, Dr. Vorstius, in reviewing the bib- liographical field as a whole, finds a considerable gain in prestige and performance. The most pro- foundly significant development in German bib- liography during this century of faction and strife has been the steadily increasing accept- ance of the conviction that bibliography, an ac- tivity vital to intellectual life, cannot thrive without conference and co-operation among men and nations.

LAWRENCE S. THOMPSON

University of Kentucky Library

Die Sachkata2ogisierung in den wissenschaft- lichen Allgemeinbibliotheken Deutschlands. By JoRIs VORSTIUS. Leipzig: Otto Harras- sowitz, 1948. Pp. Viii+58.

The tedhniques of the subject approach to the holdings of German research libraries differ considerably from Anglo-American practice. For example, the only library in Germany which has a dictionary catalog is the Augsburg Stadt- bibliothek, and the alphabetical subject catalog (Schlagwortkatalog) is really an innovation which began to catch on only after World War I. The classed catalog (Realkatalog or systemati- scher Katalogr), often serving simultaneously as

a shelf list, has been the main channel of ap- proach to the subject matter of German re- search libraries for the last two centuries.

In the twentieth century the classed catalog has been subjected to a rather careful re-exami- nation with respect to both practice and theory. Most striking from our standpoint has been the criticism of its dual role as a shelf list and a key to the subject matter of the collections ("sys- tematischer Katalog mit Standortbindung"). As a result, relatively few German research li- braries are still bound to the "Dogma der sys- tematischen Aufstellung" (phrase coined by Georg Leyh in the Zentralblatt filr Bibliotheks- wesen, XXIX [191 2], 24I-59, and XXX II9131, 97-136); the majority have gone over to some more or less arbitrary system of shelving ("me- chanische Aufstellung"). But theoretical review of the structure of the classed catalog itself has also been fruitful, and qualitative improvements have been effected in many libraries.

Vorstius lists the libraries which have each type of catalog and gives pertinent historical notes. Purposes, theories, and rules are dis- cussed in considerable detail with references to the extensive German literature in this field. Comparing the two types of subject catalogs, he rejects the notion that a library should select one or the other, pointing out that each catalog performs a different function. However, the al- phabetical subject catalog has suffered when- ever a choice has been made. In view of its greater elasticity and handiness, the alphabeti- cal subject catalog receives the indorsement of the author, who argues that every research li- brary should have one, even though reorganiza- tion of cataloging functions is necessary in order to construct and maintain it.

Vorstius' study, although brief, is well organ- ized and makes a rational presentation of the situation in the German research libraries. It throws subject cataloging into a historical per- spective that we in America are only now begin- ning to acquire. At the same time, Vorstius points the way for future planning, an essential to proper reconstruction of the German research library system.

LAWRENCE S. THOMPSON

University of Kentucky Library

X The terminology is confusing. The Realkatalog is also known as Fachkatalog, Sacskatalog, and wis- senschaftlicher Katalog. However, in the early part of

the nineteenth century the alphabetical subject catalog was called the Realkatalog.

This content downloaded from 185.2.32.141 on Sat, 14 Jun 2014 23:53:20 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions