There are so many weird and wonderful libraries across the world! From public libraries
to school libraries, and from adult libraries to kid's libraries, there is a huge
variety in the way that books are delivered. There are also many beautiful
libraries, but this blog isn't about breath-taking libraries like Trinity
College Library or the Library of El Escorial in Spain, and so many others.
It's about the weird and the wonderful, and the extraordinary lengths some people go
to in order to get books into the hands of readers.
The Donkey Libraries
Luis Soriano is a primary school teacher
who runs the Biblioburro program in his spare time. He loads his donkeys, Alfa
and Beto, full of books and then travels up to four hours each way to visit remote
villages in rural Colombia. He reads to kids, helps them with homework, and
loans them books from his mobile library. Occasionally, he encounters bandits,
but it's never deterred him, and so far he's brought books to over four
thousand kids who have little access to books.
The Camel Libraries
Rashid Farah, a librarian in the Kenyan
National Library Service, started sending librarians across Kenya on camels to
reach nomadic communities in order to raise the literacy levels in the North
East province, which were at only fifteen percent. With no running water or
electricity, schools had little chance of being able to afford any books. The
camel bookmobile serves over 6,000 people, with books reaching children who are
desperate for them.
In Argentina, Artist Raul Lemesoff took a 1979 Falcon tank (a tank which for many Argentines symbolises the dark days of the repressive military junta) and reconfigured it into a mobile library. He stocks around nine hundred books on it, and drives it to small towns and rural communities in the country. His Falcon is kept stocked with books by donations.
Retired Italian schoolteacher, Antonio
La Cava, decided that after 42 years of teaching, he wanted to carry on spreading
the love of reading to children. So he bought a second-hand Ape motorbike and modified
it to create a library on wheels carrying at least 700 books. He's been travelling
in his “Bibliomotocarro” ever since.
In Berlin, dead trees were bolted
together and cut with hollows covered with flaps to serve as bookshelves. The
first Book Forest was installed in 2006, initially planned to stay in place for
a year, but they have since multiplied and have now become a fixture in the city, with people bringing
books and swapping them for books they haven't read. The Book Forest is open
all hours and open to everyone.
Every year, between September and April,
a book boat called Epos travels to over 250 Norwegian communities on islands in
the fjords with 6,000 books and a couple of librarians. The service started in
1959, and it's paid for by the libraries of the three districts it serves.
The Beach Library
Herman Kompernas built a library on the
sandy beach of the Bulgarian Black Sea resort of Albena and stocked it with
over 2,500 books in 10 languages. Guests are invited to borrow the books (for
free) and leave their own for others to read.
The Micro-Libraries
Little free libraries started in 2009 - according
to Publishers Weekly there are now over 6,000 in forty different countries.
In the UK, de-commissioned red phone boxes,
bought from BT for a pound, have been turned into book swap zones. So far there
are over four hundred book phone boxes. In all, 2,400 phone boxes
have been adopted for £1 for all sorts of uses – book exchanges, heart
defibrillators, libraries, coffee bars, and even a pub. 
The Vending Machine Libraries
I didn't know that book vending machines
have been around since the 1930s. They've spread to train stations, busy
streets, shopping malls, and across the world. In one district in Beijing over
thirty per cent of books are borrowed through book vending machines.
The Bus Library
Brazilian bus conductor Antonio da
Conceição Ferreira, 42, was inspired by his love of reading to create Culture
on the Bus, transforming the bus he rides into a small library. He offers
around 15 titles on a shelf inside the bus everyday and lends those books to
passengers.
So you know how this blog is going to end, don't you?
The Fortress Libraries...
Sadly, in the UK the opposite is happening - we're either closing libraries or spending lots of money on turning
our community libraries into under-stocked fortresses with no librarians and limited access
for under 16s, who will have to be accompanied by an adult in order to get
inside the new key-coded, locked buildings.
Go inside most libraries after
school between 3pm and 6pm and you will find teenagers reading, looking at
books, and doing their homework. I was one of those teens at one time. It's a
terrible, terrible thing to deny access to libraries, to books, to the kids who want and
need it most.
Savita's WEBSITE
Twitter @savitakalhan
2 comments:
What a wonderful story! All those books where you wouldn't expect them and mobile libraries on donkey back and tank for people who wouldn't otherwise have access... And there are all those regular libraries being closed down! Shame on the government that allows this!
There's a Little Library in the Melbourne CBD, in the Melbourne Central station. It's a book swap zone. Someone must keep it in order and lock it up at night, and the rent must be huge. I don't know how they do it, but it's great. I took some students on an excursion last year and one of them pounced on it with a cry if delight and found some books she had wanted to read.
I know, Sue, it's a crying shame what's happening here. These stories of how people found a way of delivering books to those who want them gladdened my heart!
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