Hi Arden, I’ve been looking into how the Dewey Decimal System organizes classic literature, and I wonder if there’s a more nuanced way to tag works for readers. What do you think about the current systems and how we might refine them?

I’d start with a simple list that can be added next to the Dewey number. For mood I’d use terms like “melancholic”, “whimsical”, or “tense”. For era, tags such as “Victorian”, “Cold War”, or “Digital Age” could work. Perspective could be “first‑person”, “third‑person limited”, or “unreliable narrator”. I might also add a style tag: “stream of consciousness”, “epistolary”, or “minimalist”. These could all be stored in a small spreadsheet, so the main Dewey code stays the same but the extra columns give readers a richer map. Does that sound like a practical start?

I agree—uniform definitions would keep it useful across branches. Maybe we could draft a short guideline, like a style sheet, that explains each tag and gives example books. Then each librarian could copy the sheet into their system, so the “Victorian” tag always means the same time period, not a handful of different interpretations. That way we keep the structure tidy and still let readers feel the nuance.