Your Library Matters: On Reading and Worldview
April 2026
Bruce Newell, Helena
A preliminary note —
I write these essays because libraries are our communities’ shared workplaces in our collective pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness. When we advocate for libraries, which we surely need to do, I hope that we are able to lean into the notion that libraries are a necessary public good. And if you work in a library, for money, for love, or for both, I want you to feel proud of what you do.
The essay —
My partner Sue and I are just back in town after a lengthy road trip. While happily motoring along we listened to a wonderful book, The Bully Pulpit by Doris Kearns Goodwin. [1] All 36 hours 42 minutes of it.
We were struck by Goodwin’s extraordinary storytelling about a time in America’s history that strikingly parallels our own. For myself, and the focus of this essay, I became increasingly aware of how by listening to and thereby reading this book, [2] my view of the world, my worldview, was being expanded.
Worldview | noun | A particular philosophy of life or conception of the world. Oxford Languages, on the web.
We’re all constantly assembling and expanding our worldviews, and when we read we often journey into exotic terranes. Through books I have climbed Mt. Everest, sailed solo around the world, survived a spaceship wreck on Mars, and been given an intimate glimpse into others’ lives such as Roosevelt’s and Taft’s in Goodwin’s extraordinary biography.
If you will, please imagine that our worldviews are houses made up of many rooms, each with windows admitting a distinct view out into a larger world. Every book we read adds one or more rooms to our house, especially if our reading is accompanied by thought. With books, through reading and reason, we’re expanding and enriching our worldview.
Our worldviews are shaped by the company we keep, whether that company is other people, a book, or a social media platform. It pays to carefully select our companions with their associated worldviews. This is not a new thought, in the book of Proverbs (circa 971–931 BCE) it is written “…Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools suffers harm…” [4]
At the same time, we must remember that mummifying our worldview is as unwise as is consorting with fools. To quote no less an authority than Dr. Seuss, “The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.” [5]
John Locke wrote about this in 1706, advocating a diverse, expansive worldview:
“If men are for a long time accustomed only to one sort or method of thoughts, their minds grow stiff in it, and do not readily turn to another. It is therefore to give them this freedom that I think they should be made to look into all sorts of knowledge, and exercise their understandings in so wide a variety and stock of knowledge.” [6]
Continuing this thought, and echoing or perhaps adding to the book of Proverbs cautions, Locke counsels against merely increasing knowledge without wisdom or discernment, writing:
“Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge, it is thinking makes what we read ours.” [ibid]
It’s a beautiful world. My wish for you is that you read deeply and broadly and that you are able to help others do likewise. May reading broaden your worldview and deepen your happiness. Your library is doing good and important work. You are doing good and important work. Keep it up.
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As always, this essay and others can be found at the Montanans for Libraries website. montanansforlibraries.org/support-libraries
[1] Goodwin, Doris Kearns. The Bully Pulpit : Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism. Simon & Schuster. 2013. Available on MontanaLibrary2Go.
[2] ‘Audiobooks don’t really count as reading? Think again.’ https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2026/03/audiobooks-dont-really-count-as-reading-think-again/
[3] Proverbs 13:20, New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition.
[4] Dr. Seuss, I Can Read with My Eyes Shut! Random House, 1978. Available on MontanaLibrary2Go.
[5] Locke, John. On the Conduct of Understanding. Awnsham and John Churchill, publishers. London, 1706. (posthumously). https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Of_the_Conduct_of_the_Understanding/Of_the_Conduct_of_the_Understanding