Opinion

Our wonderful libraries offer a magical world to children

Alex Kane

Alex Kane

Alex Kane is an Irish News columnist and political commentator and a former director of communications for the Ulster Unionist Party.

Libraries are vital, argues Alex Kane 
Libraries are vital, argues Alex Kane  Libraries are vital, argues Alex Kane 

I think about her a couple of times a month. Indeed, I’ve thought about her a couple of times a month since the mid-1970s. When I walk into a bookshop, or write in my study, or read the book reviews in a newspaper, or sit on Lilah-Liberty’s bed (she’s six) and read her some Dahl, Kipling, Blyton or Potter—Harry and Beatrix.

The ‘her’ in question was a librarian in Armagh. I never knew her name and, oddly enough, never thought of asking. I met her in September 1967 when, aged 11 and after my first day at the Royal School, my mum took me to the library to get my first membership card. The ‘her’ wrote down my details, handed me a buff-coloured card the size of a bus ticket and pointed me in the direction of the children’s and young teenage section. Wow! Shelf upon shelf of knowledge, laughter, inspiration, secrets, dinosaurs, space rockets and mad pirates, along with the contented buzz of people who had discovered this wonderland long before me.

The ‘her’ came over after about half and hour and told me that if I ever needed any help I only had to ask. And about twice a week for the next seven years I asked her for something or other. She seemed to have read everything that had ever been written and I never remember stumping her. This was the era before computers and click-of-a-button searching: she just knew. She steered me from Blyton to Crompton and Ransome; from Doyle to Christie, Hammett and Allingham; from A Christmas Carol to all of Dickens and Trollope and Austen; from joke books to Wodehouse, Chesterton and Jerome; from Defoe to Poe and Hannay and Lewis. Looking back, she was one of the most important influences on my life.

I don’t know how many books I have read. I’ve about a thousand downstairs, mostly history, politics and novels. In my study there’s another few hundred, mostly Sherlock Holmes and assorted detective fiction. There’s not a day goes by when I don’t have at least one book ‘on the go.’ And even though it seems ridiculous to say so, I regard books as friends: old, reliable, challenging, comforting friends. Always full of advice. Always planting a new thought. Always forcing me to rethink set positions. Always a new insight. Even the lightest, most trivial book will contain a sentence or paragraph that sets my mind racing in a new direction; or makes me keel over with laughter. That’s the sheer joy, wonder and surprise of books—as it is with friends.

I take Lilah-Liberty to our local library as often as I can. She has very eclectic tastes and will spend a happy hour or so rummaging through anything that attracts her attention. At the minute she loves dinosaurs and mummies, but her current favourite is The Ghost Library (David Melling), about a girl who helps ghosts build their own library of stories and memories. She is finding her own feet in her own world, in precisely the same way that I did. She is discovering that screens can only do so much. She is realising that words are tools and that books are the ‘windows’ that really matter.

So I worry when I hear that libraries are closing and that others are having their opening hours restricted. There are few sights as encouraging as that of children wide-eyed with wonder as they turn a page and let their imaginations soar. Yes, I could just go to a bookshop and buy books for Lilah-Liberty; and hope for the best. But much better that she wades her way through the contents of a library and picks those that grab her attention. I never know, she never knows, what books will attract on a particular day. It could be the story of an exploding potty, or a dinosaur on the moon. It could be a collection of silly poems, or a pop-up book about the planets (she already knows My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas). She’s a child: anything, at any time, can appeal to her.

That’s why libraries are vital. We shouldn’t be having a public consultation about reducing hours so that Libraries NI can “live within its allocated budget.” We should be having a public consultation about how we ensure that libraries prosper, grow, reach out and broaden minds; how they can touch the poor and lonely; and the part they can play in encouraging the value of reading and imagination.

Anita Anand puts it well: “The library was my partner-in-crime. We were naughty together, the library and me. I would show it my membership card and it would show me the world.” That’s what libraries are for, showing our children a world outside their home. We diminish that world when we close libraries and restrict opening hours.