A childhood friend recently returned to our local school as a substitute teacher. He shared with me the private thought that the main problem with primary schooling is the lack of resources available to teachers to ensure motivation for students to engage with their studies. Hearing this I couldn’t help but think of a comparison in my own studies, a similarity not with the classrooms, but with the library. This is not an indictment of staff, but rather an observation that they lack the appropriate resources to enforce the golden rule of libraries: silence.
Be quiet
Despite the numerous signs and institutional taboos enforcing silence in the University of King’s College Library, these measures do not seem to be enough to ensure obedience. I speak not from mere irritation or critique but from desperation. There are only so many times I can bear having a study session tanked by the unseen but all-too-heard second-year prattling to their boyfriend about Brittany Broski, the frat boy scrolling through Instagram reels with the volume cranked and the broadway enthusiast singing — and I mean singing — the Spongebob musical theme song out loud.
There’s only so many times I can bear having my fickle attention ripped from my reading by an imbecilic conversation discussing the latest dormitory drama. There’s only so many times I can have my focus torn from me by an Augustus Gloop wannabe munching on a box of individually wrapped chocolates. One time, while reading, I had just coaxed my disobedient focus into a state of hyperfixation, when my peaceful study was obliterated by the nattering of a couple on their first date. I don’t care who your favourite artist is, what you think of Pelotons or your employment history, so long as you share these fun facts outside of the silent Sancta Sanctorum that is the Library.
Not my circus…
If some outsider were to poke their head in on a weekday they’d think they walked in on a zoo of college happenings, a downright cortisol circus. They’d see Chadwick munching fistfuls of sour cherries while he scrolls his phone, Tammy and Derek flirting in the philosophy section, Phloyd practicing calisthenics near the computers and Valentine playing bass guitar by the marble busts while a troupe of merry pranksters tie-dye a school bus beside the water fountain. The library has no system of punishment to ensure a silent atmosphere, no way to effectively motivate compliance, and thus the one sanctuary where we can retreat to crank out assignments, readings and whatever else is demanded from us is reduced to a bohemian orgy of distraction. If we wanted to witness the chaos of student drama in action we’d camp out in the Wardy, or if that didn’t satisfy our depraved voyeuristic cravings, the Killam.
Since opinion writing is a fine line between insightful observation and all out complaint, I shall return to the centre field by proposing a solution: The library requires a new branch of support staff, a league of Volume Monitors. Librarians and their assistants have no legitimate authoritative power to enforce the single most important rule of silence. If such miscreants are brash enough to make such a racket in a library, they’re not going to feel compelled to obey the poor souls paid to enforce this seemingly impossible standard.
Troublemakers must be punished
A solution of force is the only possible way order can be restored. We need a squadron of uniformed officers armed with dog control poles and trained in Jiu Jitsu. A zero tolerance policy must be adopted towards all those who wish to abuse the silence. Violators are to be seized from their desks and thrown out, like mongrels. If the dog control poles fail then buttery nets, tranquilizer darts and blow guns will do just fine. We must develop systems of punishment to preserve the sanctuary of the library, to allow the librarians to assert their authority, via carrot or stick, over those who dare to commit such offensive misdemeanours. With such systems in place I can only imagine the blissful silence that would set in over the library, like some comforting velvety blanket of freshly fallen snow. It’d be a silence that’s only broken by the soft turning of a page, the subtle rustle of a book reshelved and the gentle clip clop of vinyl heeled patrol boots on linoleum.
For those of you entitled enough to chatter in the sacred halls of the library, just remember, we, the silent, are there as well — and we can hear you.
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