What are libraries for? To the generations that have grown up with free access to local public libraries, this may seem like a stupid question. The recent library closures in UK have generated heated debate. Should we forget about libraries now that we have the iPad and Amazon Kindle? Should we force our children to look things up in printed encyclopaedias when it’s so much easier to search for things on the Internet? Should we continue to pay for a building full of books?

According to author and motivational speaker Seth Godin, libraries were initially just “warehouses for books worth sharing“. This at a time when books cost “about as much as a small house”. We’ve come a long way from that. Books have been accessible priced, widely available and part of our everyday lives for centuries. There are, of course, regions of the world where books are…