作者：唐静
出版社：西安交通大学出版社
格式: AZW3, DOCX, EPUB, MOBI, PDF, TXT
护书之苦——书若安好，便是晴天·新东方双语书话译丛试读：
前言
在这个世界上，有这样一些人——他们一走近书店，心就怦怦乱跳，不管有多少琐事缠身，总忍不住进店转转；见到一本心仪的书，不弄到手就坐立难安，哪怕买了书就要挨饿，也觉得心满意足。他们最爱做的，是在午后时分沏一杯香茶，捧读一本墨香淡淡、诗意浓浓的好书；他们最难忍的，是眼见好书被人蹂躏却无可奈何，抑或爱书在眼皮底下被抢去借走；他们最渴望的，莫过于拥有一间窗明几净、翰墨芬芳的书房，坐拥书城、徜徉书海。这些人，便是所谓的爱书之人了。
许多名人亦为爱书人，他们会在文章中经意不经意地流露爱书之情。这些文章林林总总，篇幅不一，或论读书历程和体会，或谈购书方法与艰辛，或道藏书室中的轶闻趣事，或抒群书散尽的悲伤感触。这套专为爱书人准备的“新东方双语书话译丛”系列之中，就收录了百余篇这样的文章。此套丛书共五本，分别是：
· 探讨读书方法与阅读境界的《书林辟径——邂逅生命中挚爱的书》
· 分享书海轶闻与随想感悟的《书海逸趣——有书陪伴的人生不寂寞》
· 介绍书籍天敌与呵护爱书的《护书之苦——书若安好，便是晴天》
· 讲述静处书斋与淘书苦乐的《藏书之乐——书架上的珍宝》
· 谈及爱书缘起与书虫定义的《一派书心——缘何此生只爱书》
在这套书中，你将看见形形色色的爱书人。有些以清新隽永的文字，如炉边谈话般将阅读心得娓娓道来；有些以诙谐幽默的笔触，令你或是会心微笑或是心有戚戚；有些担忧书的未来演进，如数家珍地罗列自己与书的陈年往事；有些则对此不以为然，并以各种事例证明，书籍永远是人类的挚友......同为爱书人的你，是否深有共鸣？
值得一提的是，为了让读者在文山书海遨游的同时，能够领略大师笔下清晰明澈的英文，“新东方双语书话译丛”系列特以中英对照的形式呈现。其中每一篇英文，无不经过多方查找、层层筛选，意图穷尽西方books about books 的经典之作，以及《纽约书评》《伦敦书评》等报刊的最新评述；每一篇译文，也都经过反复修改、多重校对，力求在贴近原文风格的同时，更符合当代读者的眼光、口味。“新东方双语书话译丛”系列虽只有小小五本，但从策划、选文到翻译、注释再到编辑、出版却尝尽了“十月怀胎”的艰辛。在这漫长的征程中，我与王岑卉、钱卫、陈滢、姚洋、李鹏程等诸位优秀译者常常为一个句子的结构推敲再三，也曾为一个短语的用法争执良久，为一个动词的译法辗转半宿更是稀松平常之事。足足十个月废寝忘食的坚持，才有了今天呈现于诸位眼前的精美小书。然而，书海无垠、译界无涯。该系列虽为悉心打造之作，但难免存在疏漏之处。如果您认为选取篇目尚可斟酌、译文质量仍可精进，欢迎随时与我们联系沟通！
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最后，要感谢俞敏洪老师的殷切鼓励，感谢新东方大愚文化传播有限公司的鼎力协助。没有你们的激励与帮助，就没有今天这套“新东方双语书话译丛”系列的诞生。
谨以此书献给天下爱书人！愿各位畅享阅读之乐！唐静第一章读之抉择Enemies of Books 书的敌人William Blades 威廉·布莱德斯作者简介
威廉·布莱德斯（William Blades，1824—1890），英国印刷商人、目录学家。1840年，他在伦敦师从父亲学习印刷业务。他对威廉·卡克斯顿（William Caxton）出版的卷册及英国早期印刷史颇有研究，著有《英国首位印刷家卡克斯顿的生平与印刷术》（Life and Typography of William Caxton, England's First Printer）一书。
威廉·布莱德斯不但热爱印刷业，也热衷于藏书。他于1880年出版的《书的敌人》（Enemies of Books）用诙谐的语言探讨了藏书的不易。该书出版后经久不衰，深受读者喜爱，本文即选自此书。布莱德斯笔触幽默，历数“无耻小虫”的种种“恶行”。现代藏书人虽已没有蠹鱼的困扰，但本文中流露的护书之心，想必不少读者读过后会心有戚戚焉。"There is a sort of busy worm That will the fairest books deform, By gnawing holes throughout them; Alike, through every leaf they go, Yet of its merits naught they know, Nor care they aught about them.Their tasteless tooth will tear and taint The Poet, Patriot, Sage or Saint, Not sparing wit nor learning. Now, if you’d know the reason why, The best of reasons I’ll supply; 'Tis bread to the poor vermin.Of pepper, snuff, or ’bacca smoke, And Russia-calf they make a joke. Yet, why should sons of science These puny rankling reptiles dread? 'Tis but to let their books be read, And bid the worms defiance.”—J.Doraston有种忙碌的蠕虫，能够破坏每本书。它们洞穿每一页，许多小孔被咬出。丝毫不知其价值，怜香惜玉也不懂。毫无品位的牙齿，撕裂诗人与圣徒。幽默学问留不住，你想知道为何故？小虫把书当面包，此乃最佳的缘由。胡椒鼻烟淡芭菰，它们全部都不怵。科学之子落下风，可恶爬虫反无束。只有将书常翻阅，虫儿午餐才打住。——J.多拉斯顿
A most destructive enemy of books has been the bookworm.I say "has been," because, fortunately, his ravages in all civilized countries have been greatly restricted during the last fifty years.This is due partly to the increased reverence for antiquity which has been universally developed—more still to the feeling of cupidity, which has caused all owners to take care of volumes which year by year have become more valuable—and, to some considerable extent, to the falling off in the production of edible books.
The monks, who were the chief makers as well as the custodians of books, through the long ages we call "dark," because so little is known of them, had no fear of the bookworm before their eyes, for, ravenous as he is and was, he loves not parchment, and at that time paper was not.Whether at a still earlier period he attacked the papyrus, the paper of the Egyptians, I know not—probably he did, as it was a purely vegetable substance; and if so, it is quite possible that the worm of today, in such evil repute with us, is the lineal descendant of ravenous ancestors who plagued the sacred Priests of On in the time of Joseph's Pharaoh, by destroying their title deeds and their books of science.
Rare things and precious, as manuscripts were before the invention of typography, are well preserved, but when the printing press was invented and paper books were multiplied in the earth; when libraries increased and readers were many, then familiarity bred contempt; books were packed in out-of-the-way places and neglected, and the often-quoted, though seldom seen, bookworm became an acknowledged tenant of the library, and the mortal enemy of the bibliophile.
书虫曾经是书的破坏性最大的敌人。我说“曾经”，是因为在过去的50年里，书虫之灾在所有的文明国家中都大有缓和之势，这一点值得庆幸。部分原因是崇拜古物之风普遍日益兴盛，而更重要的原因则是人心贪婪——随着古书逐年增值，书的主人越来越关心这些卷帙。此外，可以吃的书做得越来越少，这也在很大程度上造成了影响。
在漫长的我们称之为“黑暗”的中世纪，书主要由僧侣制作和保管。他们对书虫知之甚少，因此对出现在眼前的书虫毫不畏惧，因为再贪婪的书虫也不爱啃羊皮纸，而当时纸张尚未出现。在更久远的年代，书虫是否会向埃及的纸莎草纸发动攻击？我不甚了然——或许它们会这么做，因为纸莎草纸完全以植物制成。倘若果真如此，如今臭名昭著的书虫很有可能是它们的直系后裔。在约瑟和法老的时代，它们曾毁坏了无数地契和科学书籍，让神圣的祭司们苦恼不已。
在印刷术诞生之前，手抄本曾是罕见珍贵之物，受到了极好的保护；但印刷机发明之后，纸质书籍便在世界上迅速增加。随着图书馆和读者的增多，熟悉易生轻侮。书堆在无人问津的角落里，常被人引用但少有人翻阅。书虫成了图书馆的合法住户，也成了藏书家的死对头。
Anathemas have been hurled against this pest in nearly every European language, old and new, and classical scholars of by-gone centuries have thrown their spondees and dactyls at him.Pierre Petit, in1683, devoted a long Latin poem to his dispraise, and Parnell's charming Ode is well known.
But, as a portrait commonly precedes a biography, the curious reader may wish to be told what this "Bestia audax," who so greatly ruffles the tempers of our eclectics, is like.Here, at starting, is a serious chameleon-like difficulty, for the bookworm offers to us, if we are guided by their words, as many varieties of size and shape as there are beholders.
Sylvester, in his Laws of Verse, with more words than wit, described him as "a microscopic creature wriggling on the learned page, which, when discovered, stiffens out into the resemblance of a streak of dirt."
The earliest notice is in Micrographia by R.Hooke, folio, London,1665.This work, which was printed at the expense of the Royal Society of London, is an account of innumerable things examined by the author under the microscope, and is most interesting for the frequent accuracy of the author's observations, and most amusing for his equally frequent blunders.
In his account of the bookworm, his remarks, which are rather long and very minute, are absurdly blundering.He calls it "a small white silver-shining worm or moth, which I found much conversant among books and papers, and is supposed to be that which corrodes and eats holes thro' the leaves and covers.Its head appears big and blunt, and its body tapers from it towards the tail, smaller and smaller, being shap'd almost like a carrot…It has two long horns before, which are straight, and tapering towards the top, curiously ring'd or knobb'd and brisled much like the marsh weed called horses tail…The hinder part is terminated with three tails, in every particular resembling the two longer horns that grow out of the head.The legs are scal'd and hair'd.This animal probably feeds upon the paper and covers of books, and perforates in them several small round holes, finding perhaps a convenient nourishment in those husks of hemp and flax, which have passed through so many scourings, washings, dressings, and dryings as the parts of old paper necessarily have suffer'd.And, indeed, when I consider what a heap of sawdust or chips this little creature (which is one of the teeth of time) conveys into its intrals, I cannot chuse but remember and admire the excellent contrivance of Nature in placing in animals such a fire, as is continually nourished and supply'd by the materials convey'd into the stomach and fomented by the bellows of the lungs." The picture or "image," which accompanies this description, is wonderful to behold.Certainly R.Hooke, Fellow of the Royal Society, drew somewhat upon his imagination here, having apparently evolved both engraving and description from his inner consciousness.(NOTE: Not so! Several correspondents have drawn my attention to the fact that Hooke is evidently describing the "Lepisma," which, if not positively injurious, is often found in the warm places of old houses, especially if a little damp.He mistook this for the bookworm.)
欧洲从古至今的各种语言里差不多都有对书虫的诅咒，昔日的古典主义学者都抑扬顿挫地咒骂它们。皮埃尔·佩蒂特曾在1683年用一首拉丁文长诗谴责书虫，帕奈尔那首迷人的《书虫赋》更是盛名远扬。
但正如传记前面通常会放有人物肖像一样，好奇的读者或许想知道，这种激起人们熊熊怒火的“胆大包天的野兽”究竟长什么样。一开始，这就像要看清善变之人一样困难，因为如果按照作家的描述，书虫的大小和外形可谓五花八门。有多少位观察者，就有多少种书虫。
西尔维斯特在他的《诗律》中不无风趣地将其描述为“一种用显微镜才能看见的生物，蠕动于饱含知识的书页之间；一旦有人发现，就被碾成齑粉一片”。
关于书虫最早的记载，出现在R.胡克的《显微图集》里。该书是1665年于伦敦出版的对开本，由伦敦皇家学会出资印刷，记录了作者用显微镜观察的无数件物品。最为有趣的是，作者的许多观察相当准确，但犯错误的几率同样高。
作者对书虫的描述既冗长又琐碎，犯了不少愚蠢的错误。他称书虫为“一种闪着银光的白色小蠕虫或蛾子，我常在书本和报纸里发现它们。我猜它们是把书页和封面咬出洞来的罪魁祸首。它们的脑袋看起来又大又笨，从头到尾逐渐变小，身体的形状就像根胡萝卜……它头部前端有两根笔直的长触角，向顶端逐渐缩小，呈现奇怪的环形或球形，蓬松得很像一种名为‘马尾’的沼泽地野草……它们的身体末端有三条尾巴，形状与头部较长的触角极为相似。它们的腿上覆盖着鳞和毛。这种动物很可能以纸张和书籍封面为食，在上面咬出许多小圆洞。古时的纸张由大麻和亚麻的壳制成，须经过多次冲刷、洗涤、包衬和干燥，书虫或许能从中方便地汲取营养。的确，每当我想到这种小生物（它们不愧为‘时光之齿’）将无数木屑或纸片吞入腹中，就不禁对大自然的绝妙发明感到钦佩。大自然在书虫体内安排了如此强大的火力，让它们通过吞入腹中的食物和鼓动肺部的风箱持续不断地吸收营养”。与这段描述配套的画面或曰“肖像”妙极了。当然，皇家学会会员R.胡克先生画的图加了点想象的元素，他的描述和插图显然都是源于自己的内心意识。（注：不过也未必！许多读者让我注意到，胡克描述的无疑是“衣鱼”，这种生物并无大害，常出现在旧屋中温暖的地方，如果再有一点潮湿就更适合它们了。他误认为这些生物是书虫。）
Entomologists even do not appear to have paid much attention to the natural history of the "worm." Kirby, speaking of it, says, "The larvae of crambus pinguinalis spins a robe which it covers with its own excrement, and does no little injury." Again, "I have often observed the caterpillar of a little moth that takes its station in damp old books, and there commits great ravages, and many a black-letter rarity, which in these days of bibliomania would have been valued at its weight in gold, has been snatched by these devastators," etc., etc.
As already quoted, Doraston's description is very vague.To him he is in one verse "a sort of busy worm," and in another "a puny rankling reptile." Hannett, in his work on book-binding, gives "Aglossa pinguinalis" as the real name, and Mrs.Gatty, in her parables, christens it "Hypothenemus cruditus."
The Rev.F.T.Havergal, who many years ago had much trouble with bookworms in the Cathedral Library of Hereford, says they are a kind of death-watch, with a "hard outer skin, and are dark brown," another sort "having white bodies with brown spots on their heads." Mr.Holme, in Notes and Queries for 1870, states that the "Anobium paniceum" has done considerable injury to the Arabic manuscripts brought from Cairo, by Burckhardt, and now in the University Library, Cambridge.Other writers say "Acarus eruditus" or "Anobium pertinax" are the correct scientific names.
昆虫学家甚至从未关注过这些“蠕虫”的历史。柯比在提到书虫时说：“书虫的幼虫在自己的粪便上吐丝作茧，造成了不小的损害。”他还说：“我常看见一种小飞蛾的幼虫，它们生活在潮湿的旧书中，在那里进行大肆破坏。许多书痴如今视若黄金的珍稀黑体字本，都被这些破坏分子糟蹋殆尽。”等等，等等。
在本文前面引用的诗句中，多拉斯顿的描述十分含糊。对他来说，书虫在一句诗里是“一种忙碌的蠕虫”，在另一句里则是“一种可恶的小爬虫”。汉奈特在他关于书籍装帧的作品中说“甘蓝夜蛾”是书虫的真名，而加蒂夫人则在她的寓言中将书虫命名为“蔬果小蠹”。
多年以前，F.T.哈菲格尔神父曾在赫里福德郡的教堂图书馆里和书虫有些过节。他说它们是一种报死窃蠹，其中一种有着“深棕色的坚硬外壳”，另一种“身体洁白，头部有棕色斑点”。霍姆先生在1870年的《解释与询问》中声称，“药材窃蠹”对布克哈特从开罗带回、现藏于剑桥大学图书馆的阿拉伯手稿造成了严重破坏。其他作家则表示，书虫的正确学名是“肉食壁虱”或“家具窃蠹”。
Personally, I have come across but few specimens; nevertheless, from what I have been told by librarians, and judging from analogy, I imagine the following to be about the truth:
There are several kinds of caterpillar and grub, which eat into books, those with legs are the larvae of moths; those without legs, or rather with rudimentary legs, are grubs and turn to beetles.
It is not known whether any species of caterpillar or grub can live generation after generation upon books alone, but several sorts of wood-borers, and others which live upon vegetable refuse, will attack paper, especially if attracted in the first place by the real wooden boards in which it was the custom of the old book-binders to clothe their volumes.In this belief, some country librarians object to opening the library windows lest the enemy should fly in from the neighbouring woods, and rear a brood of worms.Anyone, indeed, who has seen a hole in a filbert, or a piece of wood riddled by dry rot, will recognize a similarity of appearance in the channels made by these insect enemies.
I remember well my first visit to the Bodleian Library, in the year1858, Dr.Bandinel being then the librarian.He was very kind, and afforded me every facility for examining the fine collection of "Caxtons," which was the object of my journey.In looking over a parcel of black-letter fragments, which had been in a drawer for a long time, I came across a small grub, which, without a thought, I threw on the floor and trod under foot.Soon after I found another, a fat, glossy fellow, so long—which I carefully preserved in a little paper box, intending to observe his habits and development.Seeing Dr.Bandinel near, I asked him to look at my curiosity.Hardly, however, had I turned the wriggling little victim out upon the leather-covered table, when down came the doctor's great thumb-nail upon him, and an inch-long smear proved the tomb of all my hopes, while the great bibliographer, wiping his thumb on his coat sleeve, passed on with the remark, "Oh, yes! They have black heads sometimes." That was something to know—another fact for the entomologist; for my little gentleman had a hard, shiny, white head, and I never heard of a black-headed bookworm before or since.Perhaps the great abundance of black-letter books in the Bodleian may account for the variety.At any rate he was an anobium.
就我个人而言，我碰见的书虫非常少。不过，根据图书馆员向我描述的，再据此加以判断，我想以下所述更接近事实：
啃书的毛虫和幼虫有许多种，有腿的是飞蛾的幼虫，无腿或腿已退化的是甲虫的幼虫。
我不知道是否有某种毛虫或幼虫世代仅以吃书为生，但许多种蛀木虫和食菜虫也爱啃纸张，尤其是那些一开始就爱上了啃食旧书装帧中常见的实木封面的虫子。有些乡村图书馆员深信这一点，他们拒绝打开图书馆的窗户，生怕虫子从附近的树林飞进来产卵。的确，如果你见过榛树或朽木上的窟窿，就会发现书虫啃出的洞与其类似。
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我记得很清楚，我第一次参观牛津大学饱蠹楼是在1858年。邦迪奈尔博士是当时的图书馆员，他心肠非常好，为我研究精美的“卡克斯顿版”藏书提供了一切便利条件，而研究这些藏书便是我那次的目的。在翻阅一包在抽屉里待了很久的黑体字散页时，我发现了一只小小的幼虫。我毫不犹豫地把它扔到地上，一脚踩死。没过多久，我又发现了一只肥胖油亮的家伙。这回，我小心翼翼地把它放进了一个小纸盒，准备观察它的习性和生长状况。我看见邦迪奈尔博士就在附近，便请他来看一下我的新奇玩意。可是，我还没来得及把那只蠕动的小东西拿出来放到皮质桌面上，博士的大拇指指甲就朝它当头碾了过去，桌案上一英寸长的湿痕粉碎了我的全部希望。这位伟大的书志学家一边在衣袖上擦拭大拇指，一边评论道：“哦，对！书虫的脑袋有时候是黑色的。”这事也值得昆虫学家记上一笔；因为我的这位小绅士有个又硬又亮的白脑袋，而我从来没听说过黑脑袋的书虫，那以后也没有听说。或许饱蠹楼里的大批黑体字本与这个现象有关。但无论如何，它们都是窃蠹。
I have been unmercifully "chaffed" for the absurd idea that a papereating worm could be kept a prisoner in a paper box.Oh, these critics! Your bookworm is a shy, lazy beast, and takes a day or two to recover his appetite after being "evicted." Moreover, he knew his own dignity better than to eat the "loaded" glazed shoddy note paper in which he was incarcerated.
The scarcity of edible books of the present century has been mentioned.One result of the extensive adulteration of modern paper is that the worm will not touch it.His instinct forbids him to eat the china clay, the bleaches, the plaster of paris, the sulphate of barytes, the scores of adulterants now used to mix with the fibre, and, so far, the wise pages of the old literature are, in the race against time with the modern rubbish, heavily handicapped.Thanks to the general interest taken in old books nowadays, the worm has hard times of it, and but slight chance of that quiet neglect which is necessary to his existence.So much greater is the reason why some patient entomologist should, while there is the chance, take upon himself to study the habits of the creature, as Sir John Lubbock has those of the ant.
我认为可以把吃书的小虫囚禁在纸盒里，这个荒谬的想法曾遭到无情的嘲弄。哦，这帮批评家！书虫是一种又懒又害羞的动物，被“释放”后要过一两天才能恢复食欲。此外，书虫还颇具自尊心，不会吃“监狱墙壁”那种光滑的劣质笔记纸。
如前文所述，当今（19世纪）没有什么书虫能吃的书。现今的纸张里普遍含有复杂的原料，虫子根本不会碰。书虫本能地不去接触那些陶土、漂白粉、石膏粉、重晶石的硫酸盐，以及如今用来与纤维制品混合在一起的掺杂物。到目前为止，在和时间赛跑的过程中，充满智慧的古代文学作品具有严重的缺陷，与现代的垃圾书相比难免落了下风。幸亏人们如今普遍对古书感兴趣，书虫才吃了些苦头。古书缺乏呵护是书虫生存的必要条件，但这种情况已很少发生。这就是为什么耐心的昆虫学家应该把握时机，好好研究一下这种生物的习性，就像约翰·卢伯克爵士研究蚂蚁一般。
书堆在无人问津的角落里，常被人引用但少有人翻阅。书虫成了图书馆的合法住户，也成了藏书家的死对头。William Blades 威廉·布莱德斯The Handling and Mishandling of Books 持书与毁书Harry Gidney Aldis 哈利·吉德尼·阿尔蒂斯作者简介哈利.吉德尼·阿尔蒂斯（Harry Gidney Aldis, 1863—1919），英国爱书人，在藏书方面亦颇有手段。其作品多与书有关，包括《1557年至1625年的图书贸易》（The Book-trade, 1557—1625）和《大学图书馆》（The University Library）等。本文节选自阿尔蒂斯1916年出版的作品《印刷之书》（The Printed Book），这本小书是剑桥大学出版的科学与文学小册子之一。作者的叙述简明扼要，多年来始终为读书人所称道。在本文中，作者详细讲解了如何护书，避免其遭受水火、烟气、书虫乃至读者本人的伤害。从藏书人处学得爱书护书之法，何尝不是乐事一件？
Of the risks of destruction to which books are exposed, that of fire is the most formidable, whether it be by violence, as in the case of the Strasburg Library in 1870, and the deliberate burning, by the same brutish hands, of the University Library of Louvain so recently as 1914, or by the more civilized though not less destructive agency of accidental conflagration.Of the latter there are many instances, from the wholesale destruction of books in the Great Fire of London in 1666, and the irreparable damage to the Cottonian manuscripts in 1731, down to the partial destruction of the Turin Library in 1904 and the burning of the New York State Library at Albany in 1911.But books are difficult material to make a thorough end of by fire.Church and state authorities discovered this when they endeavoured to destroy heretical books by means of public bonfires, and, says John Hill Burton, "In the end it was found easier and cheaper to burn the heretics themselves than their books." However, the destruction which fire fails to accomplish may readily be completed by its twin enemy water, for it is by no means an unknown experience that greater damage has been done to books by the water with which the flames have been attacked than by the fire itself.
Water, in the more rarefied and insidious form of damp, has been, probably, an even greater agency in the ruin of books.In an acute form damp in time bring a volume to such a point of decay that it crumbles away in powder; in a lesser degree mildew may ruin the binding and irremediably stain the leaves; while even a slight amount of dampness will favour the ravages of bookworms.These pests, more evident in their tracks than in their persons, are not often found except among books which are subjected to a somewhat humid atmosphere and are seldom disturbed.They are the larvae of a small beetle belonging to the genus Anobium, and have the appearance of a whitish maggot about five-sixteenths of an inch in length, with a dark brown head.In their silent progress some bore holes in all directions through the volume, while others confine their industry to the wooden boards of the covers which they gnaw to powder.They shew a discriminating taste in paper, for their attentions are conferred mainly upon books of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries; they seldom risk their digestions by attacks on the modern stuff which does duty for paper.When they are discovered to be in possession their activity may be discouraged by opening the book freely so as to disturb them in their tunnels.The book should then be treated with benzine or formalin, and shut up in a box for a few days before being aired off and returned to the shelf.
在书籍面临的种种灭顶之灾中，最可怕的莫过于火灾，无论是战火、蓄意纵火还是意外失火——1870年斯特拉斯堡图书馆毁于战火，而卢万大学图书馆则在不久前的1914年被大火夷为平地。意外失火虽更文明一些，破坏程度却一点也不低，其案例更是比比皆是——1666年伦敦大火令无数书籍化为灰烬，1731年科顿图书馆大火吞噬了数不清的手抄本，1904年都灵图书馆部分藏书遭到焚毁，1911年奥尔巴尼的纽约州立图书馆惨遭大火洗劫。但书是很难被火烧尽的东西，教会和州政府在试图公开焚烧异教作品时就发现了这一点。正如约翰·希尔·伯顿所说：“最后他们发现，焚烧异教徒比焚书更容易也更省钱”。然而，烈火无法完成的摧毁工作，却可以由它的死对头——水轻易地实现，因为人人都知道，浇水救火对书造成的损害往往超过大火对书造成的伤害。
水以更稀薄、更隐蔽的“潮气”形式出现时，对书的破坏或许更为严重。潮湿会让书迅速腐坏、化为粉末。霉菌的破坏性稍弱，但也可能毁坏书的封面，并在书页上留下无法清除的污渍；而即便是轻微的潮湿，也会助长书虫的肆虐。这些害虫身影难觅，只有在置于潮湿环境、极少有人翻阅的书里才能找到它们，人们见得更多的是它们留下的痕迹。书虫是一种窃蠹科小甲虫的幼虫，外形是白色的蛆虫，长约5/16英寸，头部呈深棕色。书虫在悄无声息的行进过程中，有些把书的内页钻得千疮百孔，还有些把木质封面咬得七零八落。它们对纸张有偏好，尤其青睐15、16世纪的古籍。它们很少拿自己的消化能力冒险，从不“攻击”所谓的“现代纸张”。发现藏品里有书虫时，随意翻翻书或许会干扰它们钻洞。应该用轻质汽油或福尔马林为书消毒，然后把书放在盒子里封闭数日，拿出风干后再放回书架。
When the bindings of books are affected by damp in the form of mould spots, they should be well rubbed with a soft duster—not forgetting to open the book and rub the insides and edges of the boards, as well as the outside—and thoroughly aired before they are put back.The shelves may also receive attention by the application of carbolic acid or some other germicide.Good ventilation is one of the best preventives of damp, and in order to allow free circulation of air it is advisable that an interval of about half-an-inch should be left between the inner edge of the shelf and the back of the bookcase.While the bookcase is in question it may be noted that, since contact with a sharp angle is liable to be destructive to books, the arris—that sharp and true edge which is the pride of the joiner’s craft—should be ruthlessly rounded off the front of the shelves.Books should not be packed so tightly on the shelves that they cannot be taken from their place without risk of damage to the binding; nor should they be allowed to stand so loosely that they gape open and let dust fall between the leaves.
书的封面受湿气影响出现霉斑时，应用软毛刷仔细清理——别忘了把书打开，把封面的里外和边缘都刷遍。书要经过彻底风干，然后再放回原处。书架也应该用石炭酸或其他杀菌剂好好清理。良好的通风是最好的防潮方法之一。为了让空气流通顺畅，书架内侧和书橱背板之间最好留出约半英寸的空隙。值得一提的是，书架的尖锐棱角容易把书弄坏，所以应毫不留情地把那些木匠引以为傲的笔直边棱磨成弧形。书在架上不宜塞得过紧，以免取书时把封面弄坏；但也不能摆得太松，以免书页打开，落入灰尘。
Other enemies to the well-being of books are the fumes of gas, most noticeable on the shelves near the top of the room, which, in time, will reduce leather bindings to dust; strong sunlight, which also dries up bindings and plays havoc with their colour.Last, though not least, spring cleaning, when books are banged together with a will,
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