A library in Ohio finally found its white whale.
The Columbus Metropolitan Library received a package earlier this month from a former patron with a guilty conscience, WSYX-TV reports. Inside was a copy of Herman Melville’s classic 1851 novel, Moby-Dick, which the patron had checked out 56 years ago.
A spokesman for the library, Ben Zenitsky, waxed literary in announcing the return of the book.
“Much like Captain Ahab from Moby-Dick we here at Columbus Metropolitan Library have been obsessively hunting this lost book for the last 56 years, but alas it has returned to us,” Zenitsky said.
That wasn’t all that was in the package. There was also a new edition of the novel, and a letter, which read in part, “As of today, the book is overdue by approximately 56 years and 21 days. I can only imagine the inconvenience and frustration my actions may have caused both the library and other patrons who may have wanted to check out the book.”
The patron also offered an update on his life. “You may want to know that I only got a mediocre grade on my book report on this book, completed when I was a sophomore at Walnut Ridge high school,” he wrote. “However my reading skills improved and I went on to college, graduate school and a successful career in public service. I am now a grandfather who looks forward to taking his granddaughter to story time at the local library where we live.”
The library didn’t reveal the name of the tardy borrower—so let’s just call him Ishmael.
Michael Schaub, a journalist and regular contributor to NPR, lives near Austin, Texas.
