Submitted by: Dana Caudle

Back in college I was a big player of fantasy role-playing games, called RPGs. My favorite type of character was the ranger, a human or elf who was at home in the wilds and often guided and protected travelers in the wilderness. In the spirit of Henry’s first column, I’d like to don my ranger garb again and take you on a brief tour of Elfland.

Those of you who’ve been here awhile may remember Elfland in olden days, when catalogers were personally responsible for most of the cataloging. In those now vanished days, the quickest way to get something for a patron was to call the cataloger who cataloged material in that particular subject. With the coming of the great and terrible Stella, Elfland was shaken to its foundations and fundamentally changed. For starters, Library of Congress copy cataloging rarely even enters Elfland these days. Shelf-ready contracts or our hardworking elvish cousins in Acquisitions take care of most of it. As for Elfland itself, it is a much more egalitarian and diverse place. The staff catalogers have taken over much of the routine and not so routine cataloging of printed matter. If it’s a book, our hardworking copy catalogers take care of it, even if it requires original cataloging.

Serials cataloging and maintenance is also part of Elfland these days and handled by other staff, as you saw in last month’s farewell column from Waits. Our high wizard, Jack Fitzpatrick, works great and powerful magic to manipulate the catalog at the global change level. The librarians who used to have charge of certain types of materials are now buried in the really nasty, arcane stuff when not training the copy catalogers to do more and more of the nonprint materials, too. Why is this important to know? Because the summoning spells to get something out of Elfland work quite differently now. Trying to contact a cataloger directly, even if a patron needs a nonprint item like a video or DVD, is actually counter-productive and will probably slow the rushed item’s journey. The catalogers don’t really see most of what goes in and out of Elfland and often don’t know where to begin looking for something.

So how do you get an item rushed? Use an email summoning spell sent to “lib_rush.” (don’t forget the underscore). At that point, Elfland erupts like a kicked over anthill as several designated elves scurry around trying to find the item. If it requires a cataloger’s attention, it will be given to the cataloger in question who will get it out as soon as possible. In fact, we now have new Fast Rush procedures to deal with the problem of catalogers having multiple or difficult rushes. With the new procedures, even videos, DVDs, and CD-ROMs can speed out of Elfland in an hour. So be sure to mention if the patron must have it immediately or if the normal next day turnaround is sufficient. That’s it. No more cranky catalogers or cranky patrons. I hope you’ve enjoyed your brief look at Elfland behind the scenes.