The Good Library Blog

This post on the Guardian's book blog cites the London Library as a good example of libraries continuing to invest in books.

The London Library's own website (http://www.londonlibrary.co.uk/membership/membership.htm#personal) states:

"The true cost of running the Library is approximately £300 per member per year".

Tim: any chance you could help them save a few quid? Or does this demonstrate that we need to spend £300 per capita on the sort of library service you advocate?

That would give your friends in Hillingdon £72,901,800 to spend on the 243,006 residents they have according to the 2001 Census data. Or £19,685,700 for their 65,619 active borrowers in 2006-7.

It is not practical to compare the London Library and the Hillingdon libraries. The London Library has a far denser stock: it has all those books, across 150 years, which the public-library system is in he habit of quickly throwing out. When in fact a public library should be a place where one can find out-of-print books (something which happens increasingly quickly).

That said, I have just been reading Hand Me My Travelin' Shoes, the new study of getting on the trail of the great blues singer Blind Willie McTell by Michael Gray. On page 79, he is looking up thing in Georgia, and notes:

"...the library system in America stands for all the civilized values that George W. Bush and the boyz-in-the-hood equally would destroy at a stroke if they could... On top of which, Georgia libraries have not yet gone the way of English ones - it may be different in Scotland - where they seem hell-bent on sweeping books away to make room for more and more computer games, DVDs, sub-teen pop CDs, and all the other paraphernalia of dumbing down, in the mistaken belief that if you get more people in through the doors, that's good, regardless of what you provide when they get there. Here in Atalnta, the library still subscribes to thirty-six international papers, including papers from China and Iran".

Of course, the MLA bureaucrats are never slow to don their travelin' shoes - and first-class tickets - but they never return with any of the wisdom shown by Mr Gray.

Michael

I would no more presume to suggest to the London Library what they should do - than I would tell the Dorchester hotel how to serve afternoon tea. My efforts are about public libraries. The London Library is one of my favourite places in the world. Tim

But the London Library's model seems close to the kind of "traditional" service you advocate: large book stock, a strong collection of out-of-print materials, opening hours extending into the early evening... And it seems to cost them rather a lot. What lessons do you think we, in public libraries, can learn from the London Library?

Michael

If you tell me which council you work for-- and they ask me-- then I should be delighted to give you all the advice I can. But I don't think the London Library will come into it much. Tim

By "ask", do you mean "pay"?

Tim, the words "traditional library services" strikes me as totally reactionary, and a frequent phrase used on this blog. Surely you and the writers of comments are capable of looking forward and not back to the so-called golden days of libraries - which really didn't exist. Please take off the rose-tinted specs.

Michael, they can easily ask-- whether they pay is up to them.