Western Radial Stacks

The Western Radial Stacks are the fifty-two spoke-aligned shelving arms that radiate inward from the western face of Floor 308 toward its Speculation Pit, and the term by which the Division of Radial Measurement designates that whole class of arm wherever it occurs. The arms are numbered W-1 through W-52 running clockwise from the western meridian, and no two of them are the same length. The shortest, W-1, runs fourteen paces before terminating at a reading recess; the longest, W-31, is recorded by the Division at one hundred and six paces and has been walked twice as one hundred and twelve, a discrepancy the Division attributes to the reader.

Terminology

Use of the phrase is governed by the Clarification on Radial Terminology, which reserves "radial stack" for arms that meet their floor's central aperture and "wing stack" for those that do not. The Clarification on Radial Terminology Document of 1,411 AT is the operative recension. Because the Western Wing Stacks resemble radial arms in section but terminate short of the Pit, they are excluded from the count of fifty-two, a distinction that has been litigated in writing for the better part of three centuries and, by the estimate of the Division's own registrar, does not interest anyone outside the Division.

The related but distinct class of Western Stack (singular) covers the shelving itself rather than its arrangement, and the two are constantly confused in correspondence. The Division's standing instruction, printed on the reverse of every measurement return, reads: "Stack is what is on the arm. Radial is how the arm lies."

Measurement and the Waning

Radial Measurement within the Western Radial Stacks is taken from the inward face of the Western Administrative Spire, which bounds the arms at their outer end. Every arm is measured in the first hour after the lamps are trimmed and always westward, never returning. On the evening of 3 Undecimber 2,904 AT, the clerk Silas Kilgore — then seconded from the Western Stacks — recorded arm W-31 at one hundred and twelve paces on the outward leg and one hundred and six on the return, a discrepancy of six paces that has never been satisfactorily explained and is now known as the Waning of the West Stack. The event occurred on the western radial stack of Floor 3174 but is catalogued with the Western Radial Stacks generally, since the Division holds that a Waning is a property of the arm, not the floor.

"An arm measured westward and an arm measured eastward are not the same arm, and it is the fault of the reader to think otherwise."

— Division of Radial Measurement, Circular 19, item 4

Kilgore's later memorandum on the subject, submitted in 2,907 AT, argued that the discrepancy arose from his having counted a reading alcove twice; he was asked to withdraw the memorandum, declined, and was reassigned. He is not recorded as having measured anything since.

Governance

The Western Radial Stacks fall under the Seventh Concordance, which classifies every arm of seven paces or fewer as a recess and therefore exempt from the shelving tithe. Seven arms currently qualify, though which seven has changed twice since the Concordance was last amended. The Western Legal Stacks on Floor 8,022 hold the authoritative copy of the Western Concordance and are the last word on the classification of any disputed arm, although the first word, in practice, comes from whoever is standing at the foot of the arm with a rule.

Aris of the Western Stacks entered a dissenting opinion in 3,002 AT asserting that the numbering of the Western Radial Stacks rests on uncertain figures, and that W-1 through W-52 should be renumbered to follow the arms' actual lengths. The Division rejected the opinion on the ground that renumbering would require renumbering everything, a position Aris described in his reply as "not an argument but a sigh."

Use

Four of the fifty-two arms are closed to readers: W-7, W-19, W-33, and W-48. The closure of W-19 dates from 2,118 AT, when the arm was found to be one pace longer every second winter, and no cause has been established. W-33 and W-48 are closed because the lamps at their inner ends cannot be reached for trimming without a ladder, and ladders are not carried in the Western Radial Stacks. The Migrating Map recorded in its early editions as a topographical survey of the western radial stacks of Floor 188 is unrelated to these arms, though the two are frequently shelved together and equally frequently misfiled.

The remaining arms are open during reading hours. Book carts must be returned to the western face before the lamps are trimmed. Arms W-40 through W-52 are not to be used for private study, on the instruction of the Western Habitation Annex, which has held a standing claim on that quadrant since 1,689 AT and has never given a reason in writing.