The importance of libraries

THE EDITOR: Our Prime Minister, when opening the Diego Martin Public Library a week or so ago, spoke of the importance of libraries to the community at large. In doing so he lamented the fact that society today in Trinidad and Tobago had many detractors whose letters to the press stated that public libraries were out of date and out of use, since modern technology has brought them today to our cellular phones.

While I sat listening to the Prime Minister, I couldn't help but recall a point made by Prof Selwyn Cudjoe who, in his speech at one of the crime talks sponsored by the UNC and chaired by Kamla Persad-Bissessar, informed the crowd that Dr Eric Williams was not the originator of the quote, "Great is the PNM, and it shall prevail."

If my memory serves me right, Cudjoe noted that the quote might have come from Cicero, the outstanding lawyer and statesman of Roman times. Of course, it is a well-known historical fact that Cicero tried to uphold in his speeches many guiding Greek and Roman principles of life by writing extensively on rhetoric, philosophy and politics.

I may be wrong but truly I felt, at the time, that Cudjoe sought to steal Williams's and the PNM's thunder, especially from a crowd that may not have favoured the policies of the present Government.

Well, at the time of Dr Rowley's speech, I was not placed on the agenda to speak, but if I had the chance so to do I would have informed the library audience that history has shown that many people in several communities have questioned the meaning of truth.

There was Pilate who condemned Jesus to death and had the gall to ask him "what is truth?" There was the 17th century Puritan, Thomas Brookes, who, in one of his homilies, asked not only what is truth, but went on to state that truth will always prevail. Mark Twain and Winston Churchill made the same petition: "What is truth? Only truth will prevail."

And then there was Eric Williams who read Roman and English history, including the sayings of Mark Twain, Cicero and Thomas Brookes, and changed their quote from "Great is truth and it will prevail," to one that people in 1956 could better understand, namely: "Great is the PNM and it will prevail."

Truly, dear reader, Williams read and understood Cicero, Mark Twain and Pontius Pilate, for Williams wrote his in Latin, thus: "Magnum est PNM, et prevailabit."

Hence you need public libraries today not only to understand the quotes of Romans, Africans, Greeks and early Europeans, but also to unravel their thoughts and positions and apply them to today's modern world. For example, it was Cicero who opined in a speech to the Roman Senate: "If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need."

HOLLIS "CHALKDUST" LIVERPOOL

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