When I was very small there was a Penny Library at the back of Boots the Chemist at the foot of Wimbledon Hill. You could rent a book for 1d
(one old penny) a week. A strange idea now. I mainly used to go with my Dad to Wimbledon Library where the Junior Library filled a whole room and you could easily get lost in the grown-ups' library, with its tall shelves and reading tables. My Dad said that if you spent your whole life in the library reading you would never have time to read all the books. That's why you have to learn to choose. You had your own set of cardboard pocket tickets into which the librarian would slot the card from the book and then insert it into her ticket file under the due back date which she would stamp onto the slip in the front of the book. If you knew what you were looking for you could flick through hundreds of index cards in vast banks of little drawers. Soon all this will be as distant a memory as the Boots Penny Library. Lizzy will think it most quaint.
It was my dream to be a librarian so I could stamp the cards so my sister and I made our own library, patiently sticking date sheets into all our books and issuing them to each other, as well as to our dolls and stuffed toys. I should have maintained this habit because then I would know to whom I have loaned my copy of "The Civilising Mission and the English Middle Classes" by Dr Alison Twells of Sheffield Hallam University. This is the most expensive book I have ever owned, and purchased because as well as giving a fascinating glimpse into the Victorian mindset, it has a very well researched chapter about the extraordinary Mary Ann Rawson and the Read Family of Wincobank Hall. If it is on your bookshelf please may I have it back?
