Reading literature in the library

I was looking at some new titles recently on a certain well known book website, and was fascinated by the plethora of titles such as "Reading Lolita in Tehran" and "Talking about Jane Austen in Baghdad" to name but two. Many missionary book lovers seem to be eager to fly to various war zones or similarly troubled areas with nothing but "Sense and Sensibility" and a smattering of the local lingo to see them through. And good for them - the more people who read the better, and good literature should reach across all boundaries.
I can't help but wonder, however, if we are neglecting our own readers at home as we evangelise our literature abroad. As an experiment I looked through our classics section - we have two copies of "Pride and Prejudice" neither of which has been out for six months. "Middlemarch" hasn't been out for over a year. The only Thomas Hardy to be issued recently was the one on the telly. Same goes for Dickens. Some of the older staff here reminisce fondly about a full set of Proust that is now hidden away in a stack somewhere. Our Forsters are tatty and our Brontes are battered. It seems a shame that just as readers in Afghanistan embrace our Emily, we are forgetting about her altogether.
I also despair when students come in for either the new-fangled graphic versions of various classics and set texts, or failing that the York notes. The graphic ones have about a quarter of the text, and are beefed up with gangland style pictures of hard looking youths and mean looking grown ups with a sexy Juliet and a languishing Romeo, in the case of Shakespeare. York notes have their place - I was a student after all, but students these days seem to order them instead of the text itself.
So next time your literary feet start to itch, how about Brontes in Birmingham, Proust in Pontefract, or Austen in Ambleside. You don't need to cross oceans to promote good writing.

Shld we worry about txt spk?

OK, so, I'm an old-fashioned girl. I learned parrot fashion at school. I did my times tables, and learned to spell the proper way, and I still try to do so. I have embraced my mobile phone, but I still message in proper sentences. I send emails, yes, but I write them just as I would a letter. I have yet to employ btw, or lol, or cul8r. It is just...wrong. But, I am old, and I accept that the younger generation need to find new methods for the new technologies they grow up with. I speak from a library that now has a "chill" area (no, not a fridge) and a "teenscape" (no, me neither). If it gets people through the door, then fine.
I did despair this week, however, when we received our leaflets from headquarters for our events for Adult Learners' Week. We apparently now offer "careers advise." Apostrophes are scattered seemingly at random. Events include nail art and Nintendo Wii. I'm all for doing whatever we can to get people using our services, but offering to paint nails or play games twice a year is not the way to do it, surely. And should we not be the last bastion of plain, correctly spelled English? By all means play fast and loose with the language on the move or at play, but does there not have to be a benchmark, a standard, a universality?
Tsk and tut, say the critics, surely understanding is what matters - my leaflet, after all, is not going to cause major confusion, and advisers will offer advice, however it is spelled, but I still can't help thinking that we are libraries, and language and communication is at the heart of what we do. Should we not, at least, try to do it properly?
Please tell me I am not a lone voice on this.

Eaten by the Easter bunny?

Holiday time, and all the people who never ever come in at any other time of the year suddenly appear, wanting to a)rejoin themselves, their children, and grandma too; b)have free stuff, be it colouring sheets, an hour on the computer, childcare, or pipe cleaners; c)register for activities - anything, but anything, to get rid of the kids for an hour. We were booked solid for over a fortnight by our more regular families who come to every event going, so we have to turn them away. Where are they all for the rest of the year, I ask myself?
And why does everyone else also appear in the hols too? We have a strange post Christmas slump, then suddenly, as if awakening from a long hibernation, people come in to find things out, harrass the MP or the councillor, and look up that person that Great Aunt Elsie said was a long lost cousin.
And now they have gone again. I would like to think that they are out lobbying their MP about the library, or at home feverishly reading all the books they borrowed last time they were in. And it is exam time, and I've a new rack of up to date revision guides, but no, they are not here. Just got Avatar on DVD. Any takers? Ok, the sun has shone for the last few days, and it is kind of hot and stuffy in here (air-con man if you are reading, come on over!) but surely someone wants a travel guide, music to play at that barbie, information on volcanos.
No? I can only conclude they have all been eaten by the Easter bunny.
Are you quiet too?

Beg, steal, borrow, buy?

I've been looking at the lending and buying figures for the last decade, published by the Public Lending Right people, and some very interesting things emerge. First and foremost I was pleasantly surprised to learn that more books were borrowed than bought, despite all the 3 for 2's and loss leaders in the supermarkets. Also, the authors borrowed were very different from the authors bought - JK Rowling sold easily the most books, but was only 96th in the borrowing lists. Yet another children's writer, Jacqueline Wilson, was high up in both charts. What makes a book buyable or borrowable?
The bestlending list is split between "traditional" authors such as Catherine Cookson, and writing for children such as Goosebumps and Mick Inkpen. Does this mean that we get little old ladies and kids and nothing in between?
The lending figures also reveal a population who cheat at cookery (with the help of Delia) write poetry (with the aid of Stephen Fry), holiday in France, and read about war, atheism and cricket. The buying figures, on the other hand, show a liking for Grail quests, vampires, cup cakes, reality TV, and the Caribbean. This would seem to suggest that two completely different sets of people buy and borrow books, but this a clearly not the case - a book lover is a book lover, and will get their fix wherever they can, and indeed will often donate books after they have read them (thank you, thank you, thank you).
So why borrow Delia but buy Jamie?
Why buy Terry Pratchett but borrow James Patterson?
Why borrow war books, but buy Jade Goody?
I have no answers, but will be eyeing my borrowers keenly to see what they have in their shopping bags.

Election escape

I have been following the election with a certain amount of interest, despite the ringing silence about the future of libraries from most of the main parties (if you have heard anything of any value from any politician please let me know). Yet it does strike me that the library is one of the few places you can go that is an election free zone - yes, we have a poster up telling you about the election, in the window, but it is small, albeit pink, and easily avoided. We have newspapers, and we have the internet if you seek them out, but there will be no-one haranguing you or asking you your voting intentions - a very real hazard in some towns and cities at the moment. Even the councillors, who usually hold surgeries in our library, have departed for a month to hit the campaign trail, so we are truly apolitical.
Unless you count the local blokes who sit in the library setting the world to rights very loudly before heading off to the pub in the afternoon, of course. I did suggest that if we installed a barrel of ale under the counter they would stay all day, thereby improving our visitor numbers, but this idea was not taken up. Beer and a book - it's a winner surely? I'd vote for it anyway. Caffeine addicts can get their fix in many a library these days, so why not cider lovers and ale drinkers too. Maybe I should stand for parliament on a libraries and lager ticket....although of course Dorothea never has anything more than a small sherry....

Rock and roll!

So, along with Casanova and Chairman Mao, Keith Richards has been outed as....a librarian! I was somewhat amused by the coverage - the public are quite prepared for any sort of sexual or social deviance from Mr Richards, but to find that he yearns for nothing better than stroking the spines of his Dewey-ordered books seemed to shock people to the core. I mean, libraries, not exactly rock and roll, is it?
But delve a little deeper, and you will find all sorts going on - for a start, we still seem to nurture the image of a librarian as at the very least, buttoned up. Now your very own Dorothea may have a starched cardigan and (occasionally) a bun (of the hairy variety)(and the cream variety) but she also has a twinkle in her eye, and a certain tolerance born of a long life experience which may have involved loud music and the odd illicit substance. Librarians are graduates, after all, from the school of life if nothing else, and have done all the stuff that people do at university - they even took their clothes off sometimes!
Also, books are still just not cool, somehow. Not once you get past the Hungry Caterpillar anyway. Kid reading equals boring. Bookish is still a playground insult, and even some parents, pleased though they are that little Joshua has a very good grasp of grammar and English, would rather he got out a bit more. I hope that the outing of Keith Richards can change this once and for all - what better after a night on the town than half an hour of calming prose before retiring to bed? Books fit into any lifestyle, even that of a rock and roll god.
And no, most librarians are not spinsters, nor are they waiting for someone to remove their glasses and show them just how gorgeous they are (although Keith, if you are reading, I could use a holiday if you feel like whisking me off somewhere...). Libraries and books are not a substitute for life - they are life itself! Get down to your local library and live a little! And, librarians, if you should roll into work after a heavy night, and feel like a snooze in the stacks, you are just carrying on a fine tradition of loose living librarians!

Festival time!

It is, believe it or not, springtime, and throughout the land literary festivals are sprouting up like so many daffodils. There are the biggies, Hay-on-Wye, Cambridge, and the little ones in every town from Dorking to Dorchester. The question is, what should the library do? At best they host as much as they can, sell tickets and be a general guide book to the whole thing. At worst, they are the ugly bridesmaid at Cinderella's wedding - based in a shabby building, not allowed to sell tickets, and giving away shiny brochures for glamorous events a world away from the dingy shelves and thumb worn books on display. And we are not known for selling books (yet) and those lending right fees pale in comparison with the big queue of eager people waiting to pay full whack for the latest hardback after a successful event.
But - when the authors have packed up and gone home, and the publicity posters are out of date, the library is once more the last bastion of literary culture in many towns, so enjoy the glitz and the glamour, smug in the knowledge that when they have all disappeared, you will still be there lending those books out and discussing them with your borrowers.
Don't have a festival? Start one! Surely you have a local author around who likes the sound of his/her own voice, or a town lad made good?
Who have you had in your town recently?