A Love Letter to Public Libraries

Dear Public Libraries,

This is first and foremost a letter of love, but it holds within it an ask for forgiveness. You came back into my life after years of neglect - I had rudely turned away from the hours I’d poured into you, running away to the Midlands, and then the South, and attaching myself to the Academic buildings, losing myself in the stacks of textbooks and literary criticism and turning towards shiny new books in bookshops. The promise of newness made me forget what a joy it is to enter a building, card in hand, to hundreds of worlds to explore for free. (Cue Arthur's Library Song) How could I, a passionate library advocate, and former volunteer, whose childhood summers were filled with the Summer Reading Challenge, have left you?

At 16, I practically lived in you whilst I revised and studied, finding a new love for coffee from the £1 machine with the big china mugs. Brief chats with the wonderful staff made the time pass quicker as I muddled my head around German grammar. I think it’s easy to forget, as life gets swamped by studies, and reading for school, that libraries are always there with a new world for us to get lost in.

But this letter isn’t really about the past, it’s about a two-year love-affair in my new hometown. Your welcoming doorway, leading to the small room with an even smaller, more silent upstairs. Your extremely generous opening hours, and connections to libraries all over the county. You’re tucked away, a proud red-bricked building heading up our main high street. Sometimes I dash in whilst running errands to pick up the reservations from bigger libraries within the county - new-releases I’ve been waitlisted months for, eagerly taken home and devoured. Other times I slip in after getting off the bus, letting myself wander through your stacks and picking up age-old spines that catch my eye. Always warm and welcoming, I feel at home here.

I’m sorry I take so many liberties, renewing and renewing the 6 books I have out on my card, picking up my own books instead of the borrowed, time ticking away as they sit on my shelf. I promise to do better once you open your doors, and not hoard book after book. I feel lucky that you have such good connections, that new releases are listed on the website with 5 or more copies across the county; grateful that I can suggest you get a title, and most of the time it will turn up at one of the branches; and so happy that more often than not there are children pouring over the books, or listening to a story being read.

Snatched moments at work on my breaks, or on a lazy Saturday, I browse my wish list, adding and taking, keeping an eye on the availability of copies and trying to imagine what it will feel like to go through your doors again. I look at the loans I’ve had for near enough 6 months now, extended repeatedly during lock-down, and I make a promise to myself to read them before I can safely return, once again.

Thank you for always being there.

***📚***

I’m very lucky to have a fantastically supported local library in Oxfordshire, and as you can see above, can’t wait to get back when things can safely re-open again. Are you a member of your local library? If not, why don’t you have a look for it here and join up? And since we can’t go into our libraries physically right now, you should look into whether your library has access to BorrowBox or Libby, which are platforms that can be used on your smartphone and tablet, and will give you access to audiobook and eBooks for free through your library membership!