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by Amy Sumner | Monday, 29th July 2019

In an age of single use and throw-away products, we can often find ourselves yearning for something with a sense of permanence. No sooner have we bought the newest, shiniest iPhone than Apple releases the newer, shinier version, rendering our new phone a technologically competent, but intrinsically second-best space-filler. The same is true of cars, of clothes, of practically everything manufactured these days. The only thing that seems not to fit this mould? Books.

by Amy Sumner | Friday, 26th July 2019

C.S. Lewis once said ‘You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me.’ This is a maxim which suits our Library team very well indeed; there never seems to be enough tea, and in spite of working in a library with over 150,000 books and printed items, we seem to race through good books all too quickly!

by Amy Sumner | Friday, 19th July 2019

We are very lucky here at Gladstone’s Library to have access to around 130,000 printed items in total, including around 6,500 books printed before 1800 and some as early as the 15th Century. The majority of these older books come from a very small proportion of our collections: either our pre-18^th Century collection, the Bishop Moorman Franciscan collection, or the Glynne-Gladstone collection. Many of these older books are kept in our Closed Access rooms in order to keep them in the best condition possible – but as a result, regular visitors to the library might not be aware of what treasures lie behind closed doors!

by Amy Sumner | Tuesday, 09th July 2019

Gladstone’s Library is embarking on a 24-month deaccessioning project on a section of its collections. This is the first review of the Library’s collections since 2008-10. Collection use and user demographic has changed rapidly in the past five years and the Library now has collection use data which can help it make decisions.

by Amy Sumner | Friday, 05th July 2019

As many of you will know a dear friend of Gladstone's Library, Muriel Maufroy, passed away in 2017. Muriel's family kindly deposited much of Muriel's personal library to us, and many of the volumes have now been added to our collections for the benefit of all.

by Amy Sumner | Friday, 28th June 2019

We can be quite traditional here at Gladstone’s Library: the Reading Rooms are silent study areas; we don’t allow food near the books; and ‘No, we won’t let you take that rare and precious Gladstone Foundation Collection book home with you tonight, Sir - we are not a lending library!’ In other ways though, we like to think of ourselves as quite innovative.

by Amy Sumner | Thursday, 27th June 2019

Help us make the Gladfest Fringe the best it can be. Share your passions and get the community thinking together!

by Amy Sumner | Monday, 24th June 2019

Gladstone’s Library is currently undergoing an upgrade of its online catalogue, MainCAT, as well as the database of Gladstone’s books and annotations, GladCAT. Both catalogues may be unavailable at unscheduled times during the coming week while these upgrades take place. We are sorry for any inconvenience caused by this.