For a librarian who has even a modest sense of either posterity or professional responsibility, entertaining any thoughts about a decline in the importance of books is painful. After all, books are how we speak to one another across generations, and one of the ways we can subvert the limitations of culture, class, gender, and personality.

But not all books are priceless additions to our heritage. Bad books cascade off the world’s presses in a torrent of never-ending intellectual sewage. Amid the constant babble, the best books have trouble attracting attention. —Dennis Dillon —College Libraries: the Long Goodbye (Chronicle)