Sonderbooks

Sonderbooks Book Review of

Our Own Selves

More Meditations for Librarians

by Michael Gorman


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Our Own Selves

More Meditations for Librarians

by Michael Gorman

Review posted April 4, 2009.
American Library Association, Chicago, 2005. 224 pages.

I'm a new librarian. I got my MLIS degree one year and one month ago. All the same, once something becomes a job, there's a danger that it will become "just a job" instead of a calling.

Reading a book like this one, slowly, one meditation per day, helped to remind me why I'm so proud and happy to be a librarian. It reminds me that, despite the day-to-day little annoying details, I am doing a good work from a noble tradition.

As Michael Gorman says,

One of the great intangible benefits of library work is the sense of self-worth that comes when we realize that, no matter how humdrum the day or week, we are playing a part in bringing the good things of life to everyone and improving our communities, one life at a time. A library serving a community of any kind (a village, school, city, college or university, corporation, government) enriches that community, which would be impoverished and weakened if that library did not exist.