You may have noticed that I’ve been inactive on the blog for the past couple of weeks. The main reason is that I was at Burning Man without any connection. I still need to gather my thoughts and write about it (spoiler: it was incredible), but for now, I want to talk about the central library in Los Angeles.
I have a theory that cities should be studied through their central libraries. It turns out that libraries are a loss-making enterprise for cities, but they are important for education and culture. By looking at how willing a city is to allocate money and resources to a library, and in what quantity, one can understand a lot about the real life in the city.
The central library in LA is a separate story. I really wanted to visit it during my last trip, but it didn’t work out. My interest grew after reading Susan Orlean’s book - The Library Book. In it, the journalist writes about the arson that occurred in 1986 and became a landmark event for the city. The book tells the story of the event through the experiences of the people who were affected by it. An interesting fact is that a large number of books suffered not so much from the fire, but from the water that firefighters used to extinguish the blaze. The entire city was involved in saving the books. To prevent the books from being completely ruined, they were frozen in their wet state and distributed to those who had spare freezer space, and then thawed one by one for restoration.
Despite not having a "residency" in LA, I managed to convince the librarians to issue me a library card for the collection. Last year, the library celebrated its 150th anniversary.
Strolling through the library among the bookshelves is a special pleasure even if you don’t plan to take anything with you.
It turns out that with the advent of computers, phones, and e-books, libraries have entered a crisis and have had to reinvent themselves and find new meanings. Today, it is a place where people come to work, where there is free internet, access to computers, 3D printers, and recording studios. A space where cultural events, children’s group readings, and more take place.
Do you like going to libraries? What’s your favorite one?
