an St. James Square has nothing to suggest that behind the thoughtful limestone of London is a circle of bookshelf that spans many floors and buildings and holds more than one million volumes in a total length of about thirty kilometers. . Most of it is accessible in a bizarre sequence that leads to the discovery of amazing opportunities.

Founded in 1841 at the initiative of historian Thomas Carlile and financed by membership fees and donations, the London Library is now the world’s largest independent lending library. Legend has it that Carlyle was so in love with the preferential treatment given by Lord Macaulay, the librarian of the British Library, that he decided to make a choice.

Although the two Victorian historians were by no means inferior in their mutual disdain, Cholery Scotsman’s main objectives were free access to shelves and a desire to be able to borrow books. His experience in the British Library was that the title he had given was not the time to land on his desk until it was time to go home. In a public meeting Carlyle said that there was no place in the civilized world that was supplied with reading material for the poor as London.

Unique Aura – And Yet For All

From Dickens and Prince Albert, who donated Goethe’s collected works to Virginia Woolf and TS Eliot, to Tom Stopard and Kazuo Ishiguro, the London Library can claim membership of many of the country’s great minds. One of the best intersections in the city, it has retained the aura of a special club to this day, despite adapting to the digital world. Just that membership is open to everyone as long as they can afford the fees or receive subsidies from the Rejuvenation and Ethno-Cultural Diversity Fund.

One study found that around 7,200 members contribute £ 21.3 million annually to the UK economy through the production of 716 books, 235 plays, 234 screenplays for film and television and over 15,000 articles. On average, authors claim to give more than thirty percent of their creative activity to the library, which not only provides them with material, but also serves as a place of work and encounter. Just as it sent books to the forefront of two world wars, the London Library meets its members’ book requests by mail in lockdown.