In praise of thriving local libraries: ‘This is really a place where people can belong’

They say members’ clubs are dead, but there remains one with undeniable perks. Its patrons are an eclectic bunch. You’ll find them lounging in armchairs with a copy of the New Yorker, convening for a foreign language film club, listening to David Bowie, or maybe even borrowing a book. Welcome to the library.

There are 330 libraries in Ireland. From Buncrana to Bandon, Inisbofin to Inchicore, there is a place to go and to be where you don’t have to spend a thing. You’ll find books, information, wifi, a place to study and to work, and also a place to meet, to learn and to play. Sometimes it’s a place to keep warm.

If you haven’t visited your local library since you lost their copy of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in 1982, things have changed. Fines on overdue books for one: they were abolished in 2019 – which is probably just as well for the person who returned The White Owl by Annie MP Smithson to Gweedore library that year, 83 years after it had been checked out.

More than 800,000 of us are library members. Last year, we borrowed 10,756,742 items – that’s everything from a book to a bassoon or bass guitar (you can borrow an amp for that too).

That They May Face the Rising Sun: The best Irish film in a very long time

---

‘When our last embryo failed, the clinic told us there was nothing more they could do for us’

---

Take That in Dublin review: ‘Whose idea was it to have stairs?’ puffs Gary Barlow as the band roll back the years with dazzling show

---

[ Do your shelf a favour and get back into your local library ]

A national public library strategy unveiled in 2017 aimed to increase membership from 16 per cent of the population to 30 per cent. Things were on an upward trajectory before the pandemic, but then came lockdowns and closures. Registered members have increased dramatically (from 483,433 in 2021) as people returned to libraries to renew their membership. A new strategy aims to increase membership every year for the next five years.

Eimear Corcoran grew up going to Cabra and Phibsborough libraries with her mother. She is on the other side of the counter now as librarian at the Central Library. That’s the one hidden in plain sight upstairs in Dublin’s Ilac Centre.

Wednesdays are particularly busy. “To be honest with you, it is packed. I usually describe it as a rave, it’s buzzing down there,” she says of the library’s junior section.

From 10.30am, you’ll find a jam of buggies arriving for toddler storytime with music. It’s a solid crew of 30 regulars and their adults who hang out afterwards for a chat. In the afternoon, it’s a Mandarin storytelling play group. This meet-up for the Chinese community, facilitated by the Early Learning Initiative, is now so popular there is another session on Fridays.

[ Staff at Swords library confronted by protesters over LGBTQ+ books ]

The Central Library had about 90,000 visitors last year. It has 10,000 registered borrowers, including 5,430 new ones in 2022. Since Christmas, the library has had about 700 visitors a day. They range from local Dublin 1 and north inner city residents to members of community groups, students, business people and day trippers. “There is never really a quiet time. It’s always busy,” says Corcoran.

We get a lot of homeless people in – they might be out of their hostels early, so they can come in from 10am when we open

—  Librarian Eimear Corcoran

Her current beat is the business section, where regulars come for the morning papers. “You can see maybe the older gentleman who might be up at the crack of dawn coming in to read them.” Foreign students converge here too to get their fix of Le Monde, Die Zeit, El País and Jeune Afrique. The library also gets new magazines every day. “The Economist, World of Irish Nursing and Midwifery, The New Scientist, Hello! - there is something for everyone,” says Corcoran. She can spot the work-from-homers too, perhaps in search of the ability to print documents, or a change of scene.

Members can borrow from a 6,000-strong CD collection, and there are 70 vinyl records available for listening on a Sony turntable – Pink Floyd, Marvin Gaye, Adele, jazz and heavy metal. Budding musicians can borrow instruments, sheet music, vocal scores and song books.

You’ll find learners and bona fide band members on the library’s bookable keyboards, says Corcoran. “The head banging, the body moving, some people do really get into it,” she says. “They are coming down, sticking the earphones in and just jamming out.”

Libraries are run by local authorities, but you don’t have to be a Dub to use Dublin City Libraries. “I always describe the library service in Ireland as being like one big happy family,” says Corcoran. “You can come up from Kerry or Cork or Donegal with your card – you could be visiting someone in hospital, going to the match and you come in here, you might see something that you like, you can borrow it and drop back in Kerry. Kerry will make sure we get it back.”

With vanishingly few places in the city to just sit down at, the library is a refuge. “There is nowhere really in Dublin you can go that you don’t have to buy a cup of tea or a cup of coffee. The library is somewhere to come and sit down, to read a book or a newspaper,” says Corcoran. “You won’t get this anywhere else and you can do it all for free.”

For some, the library is a refuge of a different kind, says Corcoran. “We get a lot of homeless people in – they might be out of their hostels early, so they can come in from 10am when we open. They will sit down and read the newspaper.”

Bray library, in the middle of the town, opened its doors in 1911. The building is one of 66 in Ireland originally funded by philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. State censorship and pious local library committees meant that for decades, patrons of Irish libraries only got the books others thought suitable.

In 1926, just four years after Independence, a Committee on Evil Literature was formed by the Department of Justice. The Irish Free State wanted to create an Ireland it believed reflected the values of the majority of its people. Book censorship was part of the effort, and titles from Edna O’Brien, Kate O’Brien, Brendan Behan, Aldous Huxley and Marcel Proust were kept well away from readers.

In recent weeks, groups of campaigners have been entering libraries to protest against “offensive” books with LGBTQ+ content aimed at 12- to 17-year-olds which, they say, promote “gender ideology and pornography”.

The Local Government Management Agency, which manages public libraries, issued a statement saying that all collections are curated by librarians with professional expertise. This includes categorising books by age. Parental consent is required for library membership for under-18s.

Bray library has not received any complaints this year about its LGBTQ+ book collection, says librarian Vita Coleman. She runs Wicklow County Library’s Read the Rainbow book club, an adult book club that reads fiction and nonfiction written about the LGBTQ+ experience.

“LGBTQ+ culture is very rich, and a lot of the time, people who aren’t part of that community think the books are not for them,” says Coleman. “These books are for the whole community. We all learn about this together. I think that’s the strength of the library.”

Meetings over Zoom bring participants from all over the county. “We’ve had Wicklow town, a good few from Bray, from Arklow and sometimes we get a few interlopers from Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown,” says Coleman. Rubyfruit Jungle by Rita Mae Brown, Still Life by Sarah Winman and Spinning by Tillie Walden have been favourites.

Coleman picks the book. “Sometimes I pick a terrible book,” she admits. “It’s only happened once, or maybe twice, where I pick a truly awful book,” she says. “But it’s always really interesting and a lovely group.”

[ Libraries and LGBTQ+ books: controlling what people read is a dark, dangerous step ]

The book club has been instrumental in building out the LGBTQ+ collection in libraries across the county. “We used to have people coming from all over to Bray because they didn’t realise they had a whole collection in their own tiny little branch library. The feedback from those small libraries has been incredibly positive,” says Coleman.

When people come in and want a book that has 2,000 reserves on it, you just say, ‘How patient are you?’

—  Librarian Vita Coleman

Bray library clocked over 7,000 visitors in February, up over a thousand on the year before. On Tuesdays and Saturdays, the big national delivery boxes arrive with the hundreds of books that everybody has requested. “It’s really interesting to see what everybody is reading. That’s where you really notice the more interesting trends.”

Sometimes, you can’t read people though. “I have one older borrower who is reading all of the Derek Landy Skulduggery Pleasant books. He just loves them. It’s great to see somebody just not caring what section the book is from and just really, really enjoying themselves.”

After 15 years in libraries, she has seen her fair share of book crazes, but the library isn’t really about servicing those.

“When people come in and want a book that has 2,000 reserves on it, you just say, ‘How patient are you?’ It really only becomes an issue for people who don’t really use the library or understand that it’s a different thing.

“It is kind of the antithesis of craze-driven, of this marketing force you see when you go into a bookshop where the books only have a couple of weeks and if they don’t sell, they are out. In the library, we have books here for 60 or 70 years,” says Coleman.

The BorrowBox app was the library’s sleeper hit of the pandemic. With time on their hands and bookshops shuttered, new library members flocked online to borrow and read or listen for free to the library service’s collection of 110,000 ebooks and audiobooks.

“That’s been really fascinating actually because during the pandemic, new library members could join online and we never saw them or knew about them,” says Coleman. That was until the library changed its computer system – unfortunately it triggered everyone’s membership to expire in the same two weeks.

[ Harry Potter and Sally Rooney among most borrowed library books last year ]

“People who had never visited the library were phoning in a wild panic because they couldn’t access their ebook. Thousands of them,” says Coleman. “The phone just rang and rang. It was actual panic, because that’s how people get to sleep now. They listen to audiobooks on BorrowBox slowed down. It’s amazing.”

It was a stressful but insightful time for librarians. “All these library members were telling us they can’t sleep without it. It was really affecting people, but it was great to speak to them and to chat to them.”

Teenagers can be hard to get through the door, says Coleman, but the Saturday Teen Comic Club is a hit with library member Sábha Devlin (12) and her twin sister Lile. “We get assigned a comic, like a graphic novel, which you have two weeks to read,” says Sábha. The club has just finished reading This Was Our Pact by Ryan Andrew. “It’s really good. I really like the art style,” she says.

“Sometimes we do a drawing game where two people say the first word that comes into their head. Then we make a one-page comic with those two words. I wrote a comic about an onion called Octopus. He loves to eat octopus.”

Shelving is one of the parts of the job that Coleman likes best: “Looking at books, chatting to everybody, seeing people coming through the door. And watching the library come back to life after Covid,” she says. “The books were all in order all the time, which was lovely, but that was the only positive. It’s great to see it messy and chaotic and a bit too noisy, to see it alive again.”

Into the west

The people of Castlebar love a bit of crime fiction, says librarian Emer Donoghue. Requests for Scandi noir have waned and it’s back to the old reliables. “The James Pattisons, the John Grishams and the newer authors like Liz Nugent – she has a new book out now and that will be really heavily requested,” says Donoghue.

At the library, you don’t have to do anything, you don’t have to be anything, you don’t have to buy anything

—  Librarian Emer Donoghue

If your thriller gets too tense, however, you can always borrow a blood pressure monitor. Castlebar library loans them out, in partnership with Croí.

“Every day really is a good day in the library,” says Donoghue, who has worked in public libraries for 22 years.

“At the library, you don’t have to do anything, you don’t have to be anything, you don’t have to buy anything. You can come in and just be. I tell classes when they come in, this is your space. You are welcome to come at any stage.”

For some members, this library is a weekly or even daily routine. “We would get to know people very well and it’s lovely to be able to greet them by name. For some of them, it is highly possible they haven’t spoken to anyone else that day. This is really a place where people can belong.”

You are looking at €10 a book and you might only read it a few times. Then we found out you could order these books from the library; I was amazed

—  Christina Nic Dhonnacha

Castlebar library recently mourned a patron of 55 years. “She was really into the Mills & Boon books and she would ring every couple of weeks for a bag of them,” says Donoghue. “For the last while, she was unable to get to the library herself, so we would choose them and put them aside for her and they’d be collected. She kind of realised we would know what she liked. Very close up until she passed away, she was requesting and reading.”

For Christina Nic Dhonnacha and daughter Athena Howley (4), storytime on Wednesdays is a firm date. “When she was born, you’d go in and sit down and have a coffee with the other mums, you’d have a chat. It’s just a very welcoming place to have a little down time and let the kids play.”

Coming from a Gaeltacht area, Nic Dhonnacha would like her children to have the language. “I would have bought an awful lot of Irish language books. You are looking at €10 a book and you might only read it a few times. Then we found out you could order these books from the library; I was amazed,” she says.

[ A turn-up for the books: Alison Healy on overdue library books ]

Located in Aras Inis Gluaire, a bilingual arts centre, Belmullet library out the road is a compact, one-person library that punches above its weight. For librarian Katie Healy, that means space for things like the Irish language puppet show she has just organised that played to a packed house.

“The puppet show was a really good example of cross-agency co-operation between Gaeilge Iorrais, the arts centre and the Library Service,” says Healy.

Belmullet library has a big and diverse catchment area. “We cover the whole Erris region, which is the size of Co Louth. The population is 10,000 and I have 2,500 members, which is above average for the population,” says Healy.

Ceol agus Spraoi, the library’s Irish language playgroup, is a multicultural affair. There are Polish, Latvian and Ukrainians, as well as the partners and children of Erris emigrants returned from the US, Asia and Australia. “We can have four or five different languages going on at the one time,” says Healy.

Through the Music Generation programme, children can borrow from 200 instruments, with lessons in the adjoining arts centre. “It’s another great example of the agencies linking together and trying to get as much value for money as possible,” says Healy. Concertinas, bodhráns and fiddles are the most popular items.

Mayo Libraries is also working to make its libraries more welcoming for neurodivergent people. Ballina has opened a sensory room for those on the autism spectrum and others who have sensory challenges. Castlebar and Belmullet have a “magic table” with interactive sound and light-based games, and a “sensory cubbie” – a relaxing space with colours, images and music.

“Some families would have kids coming into the arts centre for music or dance and there may be one member of the family who didn’t have an activity,” says Healy. “Families have said, ‘This is great because she didn’t have an activity, this is her time here, she is not left in the house or the car while I’m running to lessons with the others.”

The Erris region has a large older population too. For library members Francis Heaney and Carol Jackson from Ballycroy, Belmullet is their closest library.

I read a lot of Louis L’Amour, like The Sacketts and Down the Long Hills. Or biographies about Billy the Kid or Buffalo Bill, things like that

—  Francis Heaney

“To make it simple, we don’t have a television, we are readers,” says Heaney. “We usually have a good stock of library books, Katie is very good like that. We can have, usually, as many books as we require.”

They visit the library sometimes twice a week. They pick books off the shelf, but Healy makes recommendations too. “If I get through what she has, Katie would get a box sent in from Ballina so she keeps me well looked after,” says Heaney. For him, Westerns are preferred. “I read a lot of Louis L’Amour, like The Sacketts and Down the Long Hills. Or biographies about Billy the Kid or Buffalo Bill, things like that,” he says.

[ Travel books popular in libraries as Ireland Reads gets under way ]

Jackson is reading Act of Oblivion, a 17th century manhunt for the signatories of Charles I’s death warrant. Before that, it was a book about the internet. “I’ll read what takes my fancy, but I love Margaret Atwood,” she says.

During lockdowns, Healy had library books delivered to them. “I couldn’t praise her enough,” says Jackson. “It was so special to get books out to us, Katie’s son even delivered them to us one time.”

Francis reads a library book every day. “You can pick it up and put it down,” says Francis. “I have a big place out here. I might do a couple of hours and then I can come in and relax for half an hour and read a book. We don’t ever have to say to each other, ‘Oh Coronation Street is on’. God forbid.”

This month, libraries are reading...

The Central Library Sci-fi book club is reading Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik

The Central Library Short Stories book club is reading Modern Times by Cathy Sweeney

Bray Library Read the Rainbow book club is reading Haven by Emma Donoghue

Castlebar Library book club is reading Bournville by Jonathan Coe

Belmullet Library recommends The Brown Donkey & The Fairies That Lost Their Powers by Margaret Molloy