Reading - Part 4

GOING TO THE LIBRARY IN THE PAST

When I go into our local library, I often watch children looking at the shelves filled with a variety of brightly coloured books. They pick a book, glance through a few of the pages and then almost immediately reject it before beginning to look at another book. I smile to myself for when I was a child in the 1910s, we were never allowed anywhere near the books. They were kept in some remote corner of the building to which only the librarian had access.

How, you may ask, did we manage to choose the book which we wanted to borrow? Well, immediately to the right of the entrance was a room which served two purposes: it was a reading room for the older members of the community and it contained catalogues in alphabetical order of the titles and authors of the books kept in the library. Using these, all one had to do was to write out a list of the books required. However, since most of us knew very few authors by name, and even fewer book titles, the whole process of borrowing a book was based upon guesses. There was no possibility of looking through the first few pages to help us form an opinion, no looking at illustrations to discover if a book might arouse our interest.

Even now I recall almost with pain some of the selections my friends and I made. We learned with dismay that titles often gave little guidance as to what the book was about. If we could have returned the book the next day, our irritation would have been considerably reduced, but this was not possible. The librarian did not allow us to bring back any book until we had kept it for at least a week.

Having written out your list, you presented it to the librarian. If you thought your troubles were finished, you were sadly mistaken. Your hands were inspected to make sure they were clean. More than once, one or other of us was sent out of the library and told to return when we had washed our hands.

Once the librarian was satisfied that we were clean enough, she would disappear into another room and return with the first book on our list which was available. When a book was returned, she would make a thorough inspection of the pages to make sure that it had not been damaged in any way. At least that way we never got blamed for something we had not done.

Although the librarian appeared very strict and frightening to a small boy, I owe her and the man who gave the library to the town an immense debt of gratitude. They led me into the land of story, romance and adventure, which in years to come brightened many a dull day.