College and Research Libraries 376 I College & Research Libraries • September 1974 carefully. It is not recommended either as an initial or as a comprehensive review of these topics. To end on a positive note: the University of Chicago in publishing the report as a monograph has aided in making it easier for a user to gain bibliographic and physical access to the document.- M orell D. Boone, University Librarian, U ni- versity of Bridgeport, Bridgeport, Connec- ticut. Hug, William E. Strategies for Change in Information Programs. New York: Bow- ker, 1974. 373p. $13.95. It may seem a discourtesy to the author to write a review of a book that one has not read thoroughly, but that, unfortunately, is the situation in which I find myself. I have examined this anthology, but I cannot say that I have read it, nor do I intend to read it, despite the fact that change in li- braries is not only a subject which I recog- nize as being of some importance but also one in which I have an immediate and practical interest. Mr. Hug's anthology consists of twenty- four articles, mainly dating from 1969 on, arranged in two equal parts. The first part is entitled "The Subtle and Ubiquitous Na- ture of Change" and the second "Alterna- tive Strategies Or Ways to Aim at a Moving Target." There is also a three-page preface which describes generally the intent of the anthology and a five-page introduction to each part which comments briefly on each of the articles. There are only four articles by librarians: Wasserman on "Professional Adaptation," McAnally and Downs on "The Changing Role of Directors of University Libraries," Atherton on "Putting Knowledge to Work in Today's Library Schools," and, of course, Shera on "Documentation into Information Science." The remaining articles are by people in a number of other disciplines. Many of the contributions by librarians on a topic such as this may not be significant, but a scanning of those articles that are in- cluded here leads me to believe that they are not very significant either. One of the articles that I did read, for example, was a two-page one called "Ex-Innovators as Barriers to Change," by Bob F. Steere. Apart from his creation of the incredibly horrible jargon word "complacentor," one need cite only his concluding remarks: "Look around you, Mr. Ex-Innovator! Are you today' s traditionalist? Are you the pres- ent barrier to change?" Mr. Hug's descrip- tion of this article as "thought-provoking"- I would better describe it as "thought-re- volting"-gave me no confidence in his ability to identify the most significant arti- cles on this subject. In addition I can readi- ly cite a number of other more substantial and useful articles on this topic such as Victor Thompson's "Bureaucracy and Inno- vation" (Administrative Science Quarterly 10: 1-20 [ 1965] ) , and my knowledge is somewhat limited. I am increasingly dismayed by antholo- gies, generally designed to serve some poor- ly defined purpose, in which all of the ma- terial is readily available in any decent li- brary and for which, therefore, a solid bib- liographical article might well suffice and might, indeed, be even more useful since it could cover a wider range of material. Such anthologies only contribute to what can best be described as information pollu- tion. They might have some value as a sup- plementary textbook in a course, but they have relatively little other value. Surely there are less expensive and less polluting ways to make readings readily available to students. Such anthologies would be more bearable if they managed to include reason- ably lengthy, understandable, and useful introductory remarks that put the material into perspective, analyzed it, and used it to arrive at some kind of useful and mean- ingful conclusions. In this case Mr. Hug's preface is so brief and so jargon filled that it is of limited val- ue, and he appears to reach no real conclu- sions. The material is simply presented for the reader to make of it what she/he will. I came away from a scanning of this book with the feeling that to read it carefully would leave me no better informed about the nature and meaning of change and how to effectively accomplish meaningful change in a library setting. I cannot recom- mend it to others.-N orman D. Stevens, University of Connecticut Library, Storrs, Connecticut. Ford, Stephen. The Acquisition of Library MateTials. Chicago: American Library Assn., 1973. 251p. $9.95. In 1969, after considerable deliberation, an ALA committee recommended that a book on acquisitions work be prepared and published. Wulfekoeter's book ( 1961) was considered out-of-date and the need was felt for a synthesis of the abundance of lit- erature on new developments. Stephen Ford, formerly order librarian at the Uni- versity of Michigan, was found willing to prepare the book. According to the preface, it is designed for use as a textbook in li- brary schools and as a "conceptual manual" for practicing acquisitions librarians. Ford touches on most aspects of acquisitions work, such as searching, domestic and for- eign purchasing, blanket orders, out-of- print material, serials, automated order rou- tines, etc. A quick glance through the table of contents, the literature lists at the end of each chapter, the glossary, and the index at the end seems to point toward success because there are very few, if any, obvious omissions. Close reading, however, reveals two seri- ous problems which have been confirmed by evaluations from library ·staff with vary- ing experience and education. The first problem is the obvious failure to de£ne the book's audience. In trying to reach the public, school, college, and university ac- quisitions librarians, the trained and the un- trained as well as the student, Ford over- shoots his goal by a wide margin and, as a result, none are reached. He goes out of his way to cover all possible viewpoints, never going into too much detail, never showing preferences, and the result is a se- ries of halfway attempts. In this way, his description of the NP AC program has little meaning to anyone. He never really says what USBE is and does not even give aB address. A good example of his careful gen- eralization is the disappointing chapter on collection development and selection pro- cedures when he states: "Some academic libraries do not allocate funds to depart- menbl, and others have control over alloca- tions that permit library staff members to make purchases from them. In other institu- tions, allocations to faculty units are small and a large general fund gives the library faculty extensive responsibility for collec- tion development." Recent Publications I 377 My main criticism of Ford's book, how- ever, lies with editorial aspects. On page after page there are sentences and state- ments that at times are very hard to under- stand even for the well-trained reader. On page 50 Ford mentions that the annual sup- plements to the British Museum Catalogue appear periodically. But the worst sentence must be on page 123 where it reads: "Non- periodical serials also differ from other li- brary purchasing when they are purchased as series rather than as monographs. Li- brarians call these standing orders or con- tinuations." It is truly unfortunate that so much time and effort have been spent on this project by the author and numerous others. A less ambitious and more practical searching and acquisitions manual, such as the one Clara Brown did recently for serials (EBSCO, 1973), would have been far more useful, especially for those librarians involved in the continuous training of new staff. For the time being, we will have to go back to dog-eared homemade manuals, W)rnar's bibliography, and photocopies of good articles.-Hendrik Edelman, Assist- ant Director, Cornell University Libraries, Ithaca, New York. Williams, Harold. Book Clubs & Printing Societies of Great Britain and Ireland. Ann Arbor, Mich~ : Gryphon Books, 1971. (Repr. of 1929 ed.) 126p. $13.50. Here is a little volume that will delight the cockles of many a bookish antiquary's heart. It £rst appeared, in a severely limited edition and largely without notice, some forty-£ve years ago in London, and this Gryphon reprint now makes it for the £rst time generally available in this country. In- dividuals and libraries with interest in bib- liographic printing and the early book clubs and scholarly text societies will want copies. The author prefaces his text with a clear and succinct definition of his subject. "On the study of texts," he writes, "on the ap- peal of antiquarianism, on wayfarings among forgotten books or rare editions, and the contribution these ventures bring to our knowledge of history, of social life, and of literature, are founded those societies whose work this essay follows." After a brief survey of seventeenth- and