Libraries have some magic about them, don’t you think, dear Pandas? They’re more than just the sum of their parts. More than just places to get books. More than the books, the shelves, the delicious aroma of yellowed pages. It’s the librarians working there that help bring everything together into a wonderful place of learning, exploration, and adventure. They’re the custodians of our imaginations.
Hard-working and stern, fun and supportive, whatever character your school librarian had, they’re bound to have left a mark on your life. Well, now Twitter users are opening up about their most awesome librarian moments, inspired by high school librarian and book author Amy Milstead from Texas.
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She shared an incredibly heart-warming letter she received from a student that got people talking about the positive impact that library staff have had in their own lives. Scroll down for some soul-healing posts.
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Librarian Amy’s post got over 264k likes on Twitter. The biggest victory was the photo of the letter going viral and reminding people just how much they love reading, books, and the people who helped them in school with wise words and genuine support.
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There are plenty of book-lovers who end up working with them outside of school libraries, too. For instance, earlier, Bored Panda spoke to Marianne Chala, the Director of the Willoughby Book Club, the UK’s leading personalized book subscription service. She told us all about the pet peeves that her staff and other book-lovers have and about the crimes against books that she’s seen with her own eyes.
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“Our staff are comprised of book obsessives, booksellers, and library assistants—I was a bookseller myself for 20 years before joining The Willoughby Book Club, so we have seen a lot of abominations towards books in our careers!” Marianne said that, unfortunately, far from everyone is kind to books.
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One book ‘crime’ that she has seen in some people’s homes, for instance, is books being arranged with their spines facing inwards. “This is a crime against literature,” she quipped.
What’s more, Marianne and her fellow staff members also hate it when people crack the spines of books on purpose. Especially if they do it in front of everyone. What’s more, the book club isn’t a big fan of film tie-in covers: “We’re all snobs, and loathe these!” They also frown upon anyone who buys books just for show, without any intention of reading them.
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Some of the worst things that Marianne has seen people do to books include: having lent a beloved book to a family member, only for the dog to maul it; a burst pipe destroying an entire collection of books that reduced Marianne to tears, and someone using a bread knife to saw a large book in half because it was “too big to read in bed.”
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“From working in bookshops, I have had books returned for a refund that have been dropped in the pool on holiday and are crunchy with sand… or when 50 Shades of Grey was the thing, we’d get copies returned with the spine cracked on the saucy bits,” she told Bored Panda.
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“I have seen sandwiches, burgers and on one memorable day, a whole burrito tucked into the shelves with the books… and a large coffee upended on the Christmas display tables of bestsellers— ugh, it’s giving me hives to have to re-live it,” Marianne explained to us just how far some people have fallen.
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Bored Panda had also asked Marianne about book borrowing etiquette, as well as how long it’s usually polite to hang on to a book. After all, not everyone lives close to a library.
“I’m cringing a little at this because I am a notorious book magpie and have ‘accumulated’ quite a few books that were lent to me in good faith. This is Not Okay and was the most frowned upon behavior from the Willoughby team,” Marianne was very honest that she collects borrowed books without meaning to (just like yours truly).
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“We’ve all fallen victim to it (but I’m the only one owning up to doing it myself!). It also raises the issue of hurt in the poor lender. None of us set deadlines, that’s just not how it goes, but I think if you don’t see it back in a few months, you can wave goodbye to it forever.”
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She added: “Despite the risk of books not being returned, we all love books and will take that risk to pass the love on. It’s so great when someone loves a book you’ve recommended, and we’re really lucky to be able to do that for a job!”
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Source: boredpanda.com