Weekly Lesson: Visiting the New Library

For study until 1st September 2024

Subject: Visiting the New Library

Audio: On usual social media platforms.

Visiting the new Library

My Town decided to move the local public library to a new purpose built  complex around a decade ago. They started work on it in 2020, suspended it because of Covid  in 2021 and finally unveiled the new building earlier this year in 2024.

When I heard about it, I rolled my eyes and thought to myself “What a waste of money” but this was not a one off, it was my usual response to the local Government’s affairs, I rarely see eye to eye with any of their decisions these days.

I had no intention of going to visit the new library, but I was kind of nudged into going by a persistent stream of flyers pinned to the lampposts in my street.  Besides, I’m a little bit nosey, I wanted to see exactly what was happening.  Remembering that I pay taxes to the Government, I was curious to see whether I was going to get a buzz out of this latest community project or indeed a bang for my buck.

As I approached the building, the automatic door slid open and as I stepped inside, it had that smell of a new building. A mixture of PVC plastic and a newly laid carpet that brought back memories of my school days when they opened the new Maths block.  The colour scheme as usual with all Government departments was bandage colour which is Government chic in this country. Instead of long rows and shelves of books there were carousels with books neatly stacked. For the most part though, there were bench style seats on the walls, where people were resting and looking as confused as I was.

The tables, chairs and sofas gave the impression that I had accidently walked into a bookstore but the staff wearing their branded fleece tops holding their radios  reminded me that even in bookstores, the service would have been better. At least they are paid to offer a service. Whereas the library service  has all the charm of visiting a tax office.  Staff who are generally disinterested in much and these days without even basic social skills.

On one hand I was glad that they finally ditched the old image of libraries as stuffy unwelcoming old buildings with little old ladies judging you as they peered over their glasses if you dared to speak. Yet on the other hand there weren’t really enough books here to actually call this a library. The usual Harry Potter books, caught my attention but what happened to the rest?

I remembered the old library with the varnished wood, glass swing doors and stone steps, it existed in a state of grandeur, built in the 1800s with Roman pillars outside.  It had a number of Italian style atriums with huge shelves and ladders for staff to reach them. A trip to the library in those days was a day out, it was Britishness at it’s best. I never considered that it could be replaced with a whitewash bit of plastic  in the middle of the High Street.

I was urged to go to the top floor and experience “the view from the top”, which the staff described as awesome. I was more impressed with the number of PCs on the top floor and asked if I could use one. “These PCs are reserved for teenagers” – she growled at me. I looked around, the average age was 60, I was the youngest except of course for her, she looked like she was a teenager herself. My mind wandered to the question of what it would be like to have grandchildren – “Well they certainly wouldn’t be like her, that’s for sure” I commented to myself noticing the curiously shaped beak and attitude.

 There was one small row of books at the back of this floor  in the “languages section”.  Nothing related to any of the languages I was interested in sadly and it looked like a place nobody had visited. In fairness though the place had only been open 5 minutes.

The weather was awful and the threatening clouds seemed to match the bandage coloured walls. It all just looked drab and office like.  My thoughts were interrupted by the coffee machine next to me which was bubbling and marked “for staff use only” and as I glanced around the meeting rooms caught my eye and of course toilets for every conceivable type of gender, I counted 4 of them before I got completely bored.  “Why did a public library need meeting rooms?” I asked myself.

For me, they had ripped the heart out of reading. This was a frontal attack on academia. I can kind of get that younger people are not interested in history, life is moving on. Although I never understood that puritan harshness here that seeks to destroy beauty. It is a mindset which disrespects anything time honoured. I never quite forgave them for demolishing our Victorian Schools, which had beautiful carvings on the walls. They were right when they said that there aren’t enough kids to fill these schools and I also agree that the upkeep of these buildings costs a fortune but to demolish them seems an unforgivable act in my eyes.

Practicality is the name of the game for my local Government and I do understand that to take any other approach costs money.   Part of the problem is the way we live. Libraries are no longer part of our lifestyle and Covid has reminded us that shared books are one of the main culprits responsible for spreading disease.  Someone recently described books as “pigeons on paper” meaning that they spread germs as quickly as books do.

The Central Government has tried to remove libraries completely from public life and met so much opposition that they finally abandoned plans to close them. The next best thing was to slowly transform them into cheap office space while they move all of their services online.

Just like books, it looks like even libraries have a shelf life and in the words of another visitor “Everything has been dumbed down to meet the needs of a generation which receives information in many different ways compared the past”.   Like everything else, these libraries are being swept up into the cloud and this is only the start of a transformation which will take another decade to complete. Does it make me want to rush to the library and support it’s mission?  Sadly no……