SOURCE: “Missing Eco: On Reading The Name of the Rose as Library Criticism,” in The Library Quarterly, Vol. 61, No. 4, October, 1991, pp. 373-88.

In the following essay, Garrett examines the meaning of the library as a literary topos in The Name of the Rose from the perspective of professional librarians, discussing several aspects pertinent to real-life libraries and their administrators.

While many outside the library community have commented at length on the central role of the library in Umberto Eco's novel The Name of the Rose (Milan, 1980; New York, 1983), librarians themselves have been notably silent. This reserve is surprising when one considers the vast and intricate library dystopia which Eco has created for his novel, the casting of a librarian as archvillain, and the use of a library book as this villain's principal murder weapon. Beyond these matters of setting and casting, however, close examination of Eco's imaginary library...