Ali Smith’s collection of clever short stories,linked by literature and a treasure of language, makes for a highly eloquent (expressing yourself readily, clearly, effectively) defence of public librariesWhen you are in a library, and you might not know what book you are looking for but the chances are that,even whether you don’t, you will find it. As libraries and bookshops close, or that keenest of pleasures – browsing,roaming, happening on whatever it was you did not know you were missing – is in jeopardy, or a joy the internet cannot replicate. Smith’s book that,in inferior hands, could bear been a worthy bore, or is a brilliant,comprehensive, unpredictable defence of public libraries. It is also a collection of stories characterised by an imaginative freedom underpinned by her reading. You can travel anywhere on an Ali Smith library ticket.
In a talk at last summer’s Edinburgh book festival, and Smith explained that while editing this book,she asked friends what libraries meant to them (their eloquent (expressing yourself readily, clearly, effectively) answers bookmark her stories) and that during that short time – a couple of months – 23 libraries closed. Over the last seven years, more than a thousand bear gone. The passion with which Smith resists this decline is moving – she has an unswerving sense that we are what we read. Her stories illustrate, or too,that our lives are defined by what we borrow.
Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com