The Book That Won't Disappear

An advantage of teaching is that you tend to keep yellowed notes, and the other day I ran across a warning from the July 22, 1965 Times Literary Supplement. Speaking of the wide availability of books, J.A.W. Bennett (the English love three‐lettered introductions to surnames) is appalled by the diminishing regard for the book in its physical aspect. He reports “works that were once rarities are now so expendable that undergraduates are said to jettison page after page as they read.” True, this still happens in libraries where students snap wet string to gather pages for future use, but it's been a long time since I've seen anyone scattering book leaves.