Still following a regular three‐year cycle, Walford sails on outwardly unchanged and apparently unperturbable: electronic revolutions, Internets and the rest may all happen, but all are subsumed within the now traditional layout of this most magisterial of reference books. But the outward calm and unchanging face mask a rapidly changing reference world, as all readers of this journal know, although they must also know that reports of the death of the reference book are greatly exaggerated. That has been indicated often enough by ourselves, and is now confirmed by the most unimpeachable source, namely the reference librarian’s bible. Certainly, CD‐ROMs, World Wide Web files and the rest are now here and are all treated in Walford, but still it is a vast number of printed reference books which make up the bulk of the volume.
Bulk it is. It is to the credit of the Library Association that a volume the same size as the previous edition has only increased £5 in price. That insignificant increase is certainly no reflection on either the work of the editors or the value of the product. The editors have attempted their unenviable task of continuing to try and squeeze a rapidly changing quart into a pint pot (actually, more like a gallon into a pint pot with 8,312 entries in 1,158 pages) and, as ever, they have succeeded, with some entries removed to make way for newer ones. Their herculean task is well explained in the introduction: “to be of manageable proportions a guide such as this must inevitably be selective. Most major reference tools are included, whenever originally published, provided they remain useful. Geographic scope is international, but with an emphasis on English‐language material. A special effort has been made to ensure that the output of small and specialist publishers is not neglected”. Also, our own problems within Reference Reviews of defining a reference work (and for ourselves adopting a very catholic interpretation) are reflected here: “in addition to the expected bibliographies, indexes, dictionaries, encyclopaedias, directories, etc., a number of important text books and manuals of general practice are included. While the majority of items are reference ‘books’, Walford is a guide to reference ‘material’. Thus periodical articles, microforms, on‐line and CD‐ROM sources are all represented and there is an index of on‐line and database services”.
Many reviewers, myself included, have reflected on the continuation of Walford as a printed volume or an on‐line database, but there can be no doubt of its value as a convenient printed source. Claims about up‐to‐dateness are likely to be the only difficulty in a printed volume on such a scale, and this one (published in December 1997) comes about as near up‐to‐date as is possible: “Work on this volume overall was completed in mid‐1997. Although no cut‐off date for new material was specified, the aim has been to include as many 1996 publications as possible, together with some items published early in 1997. Intimation of planned new and revised editions is also given where possible”. At the same time, despite the comings and goings of titles and forms, one of the joys of this, as of every volume of Walford, is not just to refer to core and standard reference books but also to more obscure titles on sometimes abstruse topics: do you need a bibliography of Latin American folklore or a work on marine archaeology in Australia? You will find them here. One of the joys of human enquiry is that people are interested in studying, and then publishing books (or whatever) on so many extraordinary topics. We see it to a limited extent by editing Reference Reviews, but here it is positively institutionalised.
What once was the work of a single indefatigable, almost legendary, man, A.J. Walford, is now spread among a still hardworked team. This volume divides into two roughly equal sections. The first (covering classes one, two, three and 65) is now under the editorship of Michael Walsh of Heythrop College,University of London. The greatest tribute to be paid to a newcomer is that his contribution goes almost unnoticed to the extent that the previous standards of coverage and content are maintained; but not, surely,unnoticed to anyone appreciating the amount of work involved. The second section is edited by our own indefatigable Alan Day. This section (on the class nine) has been substantially revised with 670 new entries, more than 700 updated and revised and 775 deleted to make room for them. “A realistic approach removed many distinguished entries, now long out of print and not easily accessible, to be replaced by works more likely to be available within the resources of a single library system, or within its region. Foreign language material was not altogether excluded but was undoubtedly curtailed”. One obvious problem is that of the abounding numbers of tourist guides, many of them of high quality; but we have enough faith in a bibliographer of Alan Day’s experience and standing that coverage of these is limited to titles of genuine library reference use, while allowing an even wider coverage of areas of the world.
The contents and layout of this work must be known to every reader of Reference Reviews; suffice it to say that they are unchanged in this new edition. The entries continue to carry brief useful annotations where appropriate, including reference to and short quotations from reviews, Reference Reviews among them. It is also worth restating that the indexes remain models for their comprehensiveness, accuracy and clarity, in both the author/title and subject indexes. Comments about using UDC for arrangement have been made before, so I shall not repeat them here. Probably there is no realistic or practical alternative and any problems will be alleviated, if not solved altogether, by the excellence of the indexing.
So where does all that leave us? Certainly, with another reference masterpiece in terms of selection, editing and presentation. The aims and objectives of the work are stated clearly: “the objective for Walford to provide a “one‐stop” source of information on all types of reference material, regardless of form. Targeted users include librarians developing and revising reference collections, staff on enquiry desks needing advice on further sources when local stock has been checked, research workers in the preliminary stages of projects, and students of library and information studies”. Certainly all that is achieved and the statement gives a context to a work of fundamental importance in a changing reference world. This service may one day become another World Wide Web site with links everywhere, but while some things would be gained, many others would be lost. The convenience of handling and consulting the volume and the joy of browsing would be among them. I have myself in the past questioned the continuation of Walford as printed volumes as opposed to an electronic database, but I must express my admiration for the work of the compilers and for the joy of handling and using the printed volume. It has an authority, almost a majesty, unlikely to be accorded to a version in another format; if that is not enough to warrant purchase for your library, just consider the range of contents and ease of use. But we also come back to authority: in at least one case that I have come across my own words are quoted back to me from a review; I am not always certain of my own opinions, but this time I must be right: it says so in Walford.
