IF APRIL is the cruellest month, then this year it was particularly harsh for Newfoundland and Labrador residents. The provincial Liberal government announced plans to close 54 of its 95 regional library branches – the majority located within the province’s poorest regions with the lowest literacy rates. A week earlier, a 10 per cent sales tax on books was introduced into the province’s budget. Educators, activists, and the literary community immediately came down on the government for its shortsightedness. In the online publication The Independent, authors Lisa Moore and Eve Crocker wrote a passionate editorial, stating, “The cuts to libraries and the tax on books threaten the very essence of what we all want to save, what is unique and powerful about this place: who we are as reflected in the stories we tell.”
In an interview with Q&Q, Andrew Hunt, executive director of Newfoundland and Labrador Public Libraries, suggested that shifting focus to ebooks would help compensate for the reduction in physical spaces. Beyond the fact that it’s unlikely e-readers are readily available to all residents (high rates of public-access computer use in rural libraries suggest this), making digital publishing the solution – putting format before content – brings us back to a time I was hoping we’d left behind. Although ebooks are now an accepted, well-integrated part of the publishing ecosystem, they can’t replace face-to-face interactions between patrons and librarians – experts in both their communities’ needs and available, quality written materials. And it doesn’t even begin to address the added roles that modern libraries now must take as community hubs and educational centres, let alone the effect the government’s changes will have on Newfoundland publishers and writers.