The Public Library in Britain, 1914-2000

Although viewed by most as an everyday and uncomplicated ingredient of British life, the public library is sociologically and historically intriguing. This book challenges the popular myth of the public library as an uncontroversial institution without a history. Blessed with a strong Victorian and Edwardian civic foundation, the public library after 1914 strengthened its standing and by the end of the century had developed into a progressive force for social growth and personal enlightenment. Alistair Black focuses on the emancipatory role of the public library, but at the same time he questions the institutional conservative impulse which has sometimes impeded the acceptance of mass and popular culture into public libraries, and their failure to reach certain sectors of society.