Library Rave by Ben Macintyre

I came across this article: Paradise is Paper, Vellum and Dust, Libraries will Survive the Digital Revolution Because They are Places of Sensuality and Power, which is a little dated having been published in 2004 but still very cool. It is in praise of libraries in light of the controversy that the Internet will make libraries obsolete. Ben Macintyre, the author, writes:

"I have spent a substantial portion of my life since in libraries, and I still enter them with a mixture of excitement and awe. I am not alone in this. Veneration for libraries is as old as writing itself, for a library is more to our culture than a collection of books: it is a temple, a symbol of power, the hushed core of civilisation, the citadel of memory, with its own mystique, social and sensual as well as intellectual. Even people who never enter libraries instinctively understand their symbolic power."

The entire article can be seen http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/ben_macintyre/article403760.ece and was published by the Times Online in the UK, December 18, 2004.

Obviously I, and the staff of our library system, love books and libraries and technology and feel similar to Macintyre in his reverence for the institution. How about you, do libraries fill your reading and information needs? What would you like to see the library offer you?