The Library of Things!

The article about the future of public libraries was intended to be the final one in the series, but I have recently learned of an interesting new development that is worth highlighting. 

I said previously that public libraries have changed with the times in their fight for survival. For example, some of them are providing various community educational services and calling themselves Idea Stores. 

I came across another new community initiative when I went past a library on a bus and saw a notice in the window advertising items for hire. Cleaning, camping, gardening, DIY and events were among the uses mentioned.

This seemed like a great idea to me. I investigated online when I got home, and found that there is a new social enterprise called the Library of Things.  

The company lends tools, equipment and other useful objects rather than books, and they do this through the public library system. Their aim is to promote community spirit and the sharing economy and reduce excessive consumption:

Why buy when you can borrow?

Borrow useful Things for your home, projects and adventures.

Affordable. Convenient. Kinder to the planet.

Of the steadily growing number of participating libraries,16 are in London. The one I saw is in the Royal Borough of Greenwich. 

London's first Library of Things opened in Crystal Palace in 2018. Their collection of 50 useful items included an ice cream maker, a carpet cleaner, a lawn mower and a ukulele:

Public libraries need all the help they can get
Many councils are reported to be facing effective bankruptcy, which means drastic cuts in funding, slashed services and the closure of yet more public libraries. 

Many campaigners are fighting to save their local branches. Guardian cartoonist Tom Gauld has some useful suggestions:

Library of Things encourages people to join or start new campaigns to bring the community borrowing service to their neighbourhood. 

I really hope that this new scheme will help to keep some public libraries open.

It certainly gives 'browsing the shelves' a new meaning:

A few more quotations from L. M. Montgomery's Green Gables Letters

Many elements in the life, letters and works of L. M. (Lucy Maud) Montgomery are of great relevance to this blog; several topics and publications associated with her have been featured or referenced on here in various articles in the past. 

This article contains some further extracts of interest from The Green Gables Letters, which were written by Lucy Maud to her pen friend Ephraim Weber between 1905 and 1909. 

Each of these extracts reminds me of something that I have read in the works of another writer.

More wise words about writing
Everything that L. M. Montgomery has to say about the art of writing, the compulsion to write for example, is of great interest and worth highlighting. 

This is her advice to Ephraim Weber:

“...don’t give up writing; it’s the best method of soul cultivation there is; even if you never published another thing the writing of it would bring you a beatitude.”

This reminds me of what Steve Hassan has to say about how cult leavers benefit from writing their story down.

The battle between the Orange and the Green
The connection between Irish Catholics and the colour green  has been mentioned earlier. Their long-term enemies the Irish Protestants favour the colour orange. 

The battle continued when Irish people emigrated to the New World. 

This amusing anecdote describes an incident outside the building of L. M. Montgomery's American publisher L. C. Page & Company:

“In July a big party of Orangemen were going on a picnic. At the Boston North St. station, they saw a copy of Anne of Green Gables bound in green on a newsstand. They took, or pretended to take—they were likely half drunk—the title as a personal insult, marched across to the Page building, the band playing horrible dirges, and nearly mobbed the place. One of the editors came out and told them that although the title might be offensive “the heroine, Anne, had hair of a distinct orange hue.” Thereupon they “adopted” Anne as their mascot, gave her three cheers and went on their way rejoicing.”

So the Orangemen accepted Anne's orange connection and overlooked the green. 

This story has made me think of the rejection by both the Red and the White sides in the Wars of the Roses of a member of the Prune family because he wore a pink rose!  By coincidence, L. M. Montgomery says in one of her letters that she much prefers pink roses to red ones.

A scene of special interest from a Dion Fortune occult novel

There are a few scenes in Dion Fortune's occult novels that have particular relevance to some of the material on here. 

These scenes contain familiar elements; they provide supporting evidence for some key theories about certain metaphysical influences and phenomena; they enable people to put similar experiences into a wider context and learn some useful lessons.

This post features one of these scenes. It caught my attention when I was skimming through Dion Fortune's novel The Demon Lover (1927). It describes the negative effect that a girl who is being controlled by an evil entity has on someone she encounters.

Bad energy repels the doctor
A mediumistic young girl called Veronica Mainwaring is a major character in The Demon Lover. While she is harmless in herself, everything changes when she comes under the hypnotic influence of a black magician called Justin Lucas.

After his death, he uses her to help him drain children of their vital energy so that he can materialise; some of the children die.

Possessed by the spirit of Lucas, a huge mastiff goes crazy and kills the doctor's son; this man had hoped to marry Veronica, so Lucas saw him as a rival.

Veronica is taking her morning walk when the doctor drives past in his dog cart:

“He gave her one glance, and shaking the reins, drove swiftly past without any other sign of recognition than was conveyed by that look of hate and repulsion.”

The doctor knows nothing but senses everything:

“...there was something about the girl which did not fall within the laws of his three-dimensional universe. What it was, he could not define, even to himself, but he hated and dreaded her as children and dogs hate and fear, without reason assigned, yet with an unerring instinct.“

The doctor senses that Veronica is overshadowed by Lucas's malign influence, he is repelled by the negative energy around her, and his intuition rightly tells him that she was somehow involved in his son's death. No wonder that he hates and fears and hurries away from her. 

Veronica behaves in a similar way towards the huge killer dog that she has inherited from Lucas. She is a dog lover and at first she quite likes the friendly old thing, but this changes after he comes under the evil influence of the dead Lucas:

“...to Veronica...the whole ‘feel’ of dog, kennel, and surroundings was so repellent that she drew hastily back and hurried away from the yard and its sinister occupant.”