Our local library
Wed. January 14, 2015
We are great fans of Carmarthen Library; I’ve visited three times since New Year. Morwenna likes Jacqueline Wilson novels some of which aren’t always appropriate for a seven year old. I pick up copies of biographies, latest is Lyndall Gordon’s of Emily Dickinson whilst Tim, well he’s more of the reference library fan and of course we all enjoy the occasional rental dvd. Like all libraries, Carmarthen is under financial pressure to make it “more appealing to the community”. I found myself completing a complaints form the other day whilst I was there. I was complaining about the new regime of background music, in the new teenage section, which invades the rest of the library. I felt like my mother moaning about boom, boom music (if I knew about any of the type of music played on Radio 1 I might have sounded a little more credible); I remember when I was in my early teens taking my Mum to Top Shop Oxford Circus clothes shopping, to my mortification she went straight to the desk and asked for the music to be turned down. Anyway, Top Shop is one thing but the library is another. Apparently they are trying to get more teenagers into the library. On this particular wet Monday morning the only people in the library were a young couple with a child and moaning me. On reflection its a bit patronising to assume all teenagers want music in the library. I don’t think teenagers go to the library to listen to the music (excepting that they may want to listen to something that they would like to borrow), they go like the rest of us, to borrow books and use the other excellent services which the library provide. My plea to our library – PLEASE TURN THE MUSIC OFF! some images below of Furnace House before and after it was “improved” by having its chimneys removed.