Who needs books?

‘The true university’, said Carlyle, ‘is a collection of books’. His concept remains unchallenged — universities are more closely involved in the use of books than almost any other contemporary social institution — but with the uninterrupted expansion in publishing and the huge increase in the number of candidates for higher education it is no longer sufficient for university lecturers merely to point their students in the direction of the bookshops or the library shelves. Young people need careful advice and guidance in their selection of study material, otherwise they are liable to be so confused by the surfeit of choice that they will either work haphazardly, and for the most part unproductively, or simply withdraw altogether from the challenge of independent study and rely exclusively on lecture notes.