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This paper aims to strengthen the cultural communication and educational function of the library, bringing newspirits and vitality into the development of the librarianship.

In this paper, the practical research on the living book service in university libraries has given concrete cases, the existing problems are analyzed in detail and some suggestions for improvement are extracted when putting forward, which can be used as the reference and be corrected by colleagues and related scholars in the same field.

There have been many research results on the topic of living book service, but there are few ones with promotional function. Living book service not only satisfies the readers' curiosity and enables them to obtain knowledge and experience they need, but also establishes a good relationship of communication and understanding between “Real Person Books” and readers. It resonates by face-to-face discussion of different life experiences, living experiences or beliefs, and it is also an innovation of the traditional library service mode.

Brand activities are taken as examples, and some thoughts and enlightenment on the living book service in the university library are put forward, helping us to better understand and evaluate the library activities.

Some reference books are not only useful but a pleasure to read. For anyone interested in literature, the outstanding example is the Wilson Authors Series, which, for over fifty years, has provided excellent summaries of the lives and works of critically acclaimed or popular writers known to English‐speaking readers. Through their coverage of minor writers and inclusion of the autobiographical statements of many twentieth‐century writers, these volumes have constituted a valuable record of the literary scene. Despite the proliferation of literary reference works in recent years, some covering more authors, others providing lengthier articles, the Wilson series has remained a cornerstone of the reference collections of libraries of all sizes and a model of concise biographical writing.

Public libraries in the twenty-first century are facing the challenges of being relevant in the face of new technologies, neoliberal cost cutting, and changing social realities. One of the fastest growing and changing social realities is associated with the trans community. We may be able to talk about the transgender tipping point; but in Spain, positive representations, access to information, and dialogue between local communities and the trans collective have traditionally been notable for its absence. In order to address these shortcomings in the public library system in Catalonia (Spain), a group of staff at the Biblioteca Nou Barris in Barcelona created the “Trans Identities and Gender” project.

The project envisioned creating a collection of materials aimed at the trans and gender-variant community as well as to all those who might be interested. In addition to the collection, activities were planned to use the library as a communal meeting point between the local and the trans communities as well as a means of promoting the collection and its use. The chapter focuses on the development of the project, on the growing relationship between the library, trans authors, trans community, and general public, and how new possible futures are being forged.

LIBRARIANS in Britain stand at the threshold of great possibilities. Having passed through the ages of the ecclesiastical library, the rich collector's private library, the academic institutional library, and the rate‐supported public library—all general libraries —they have reached the age of the special library. The next will be that of the co‐ordinated, co‐operative library service.

With this number the Library Review enters on its ninth year, and we send greetings to readers at home and abroad. Though the magazine was started just about the time when the depression struck the world, its success was immediate, and we are glad to say that its circulation has increased steadily every year. This is an eminently satisfactory claim to be able to make considering the times through which we have passed.

BOOKS are among the greatest and most wonderful achievements of human genius, they are also a powerful means of struggle for progress. The book accompanies man all his life; it is a creation of his brain and soul. It reflects the life of mankind and is the result of collective efforts of author and publisher, type‐setter and illustrator. But foremost a book is always and everywhere a social and political phenomenon. One of the most apt evaluations of the book was given by V. I. Lenin in 1917, when he was known to state to A. V. Lunacharsky, “The book is a great force indeed”.

Personal readers’ histories have long had a respected place in reading research. They add a human, personalized dimension to the studies of reading practices, often reported through aggregate findings and generalized conclusions. Moreover, they introduce a private context of readers’ lives, which complements other reading contexts (e.g. historical, socio-economic and cultural) required for an understanding of reading behaviours. The purpose of this paper, based on a selected data set from a larger reading study, is to introduce a gallery of portraits of immigrant readers with the aim to facilitate the library practice with immigrant communities.

Qualitative face-to-face intensive interviews with immigrant readers.

The knowledge of reading contexts and the opportunity to see readers as individuals rather than anonymous statistics are crucial for librarians who come in contact with multicultural populations. Personal histories can also serve as a step in building interpersonal relationships between librarians and community members.

The value of the study is in introducing a methodological approach which, through collecting and writing reading histories, allows librarians to gain insight into the cultural practices of multicultural communities and to adjust their work accordingly. This approach can also be used as a prototype for researching other community groups.

On 24th January this year the new and long‐promised legislation for public libraries in England and Wales made its bow in the shape of the Public Libraries and Museums Bill. Its first reading took place in the House of Commons on that day, and the unopposed second reading was on 5th February. As we write, future timing is uncertain, and it may be that by the time our readers are perusing these pages that the Bill will hare been passed in all its stages. The 23 clauses of the Bill occupy only 12½ pages. Briefly, the Bill will place the development of the public library service under the superintendence of the Minister of Education, and will set up two advisory councils as well as regional councils for interlibrary co‐operation. Non‐county boroughs and urban districts of less than 40,000 population which are existing library authorities will have to apply to the Minister for approval to continue as such. Clause 7 states that every library authority has a duty to provide a comprehensive and efficient library service, while the succeeding clause provides that, apart from certain exceptions, no charges shall be made by public library authorities. The Bill places considerable powers upon the Minister. Like most Bills, there is much in it which is open to interpretation. Does, for instance, clause 8, subsection (1) mean that those library authorities which are at present charging for the issue of gramophone records will have to cease doing so? This would seem to be the case, and we hope it is the case. On the other hand, which precise facilities are meant in subsection (4) of the same clause? Librarians will be disappointed that there is no reference to the need for library authorities to appoint separate library committees, nor is there a duty placed upon them to appoint suitably qualified persons as chief librarians. The Minister is given the power of inspection, and few library authorities or librarians will fear this. On the other hand no state financial assistance to library authorities is mentioned. In the 1930s and 19405 many wanted state aid but feared the consequential inspection. Now we have got the inspection without the money! When the Bill appeared, The Library World asked several librarians for their brief first impressions and in the following symposium will be found the views of a city librarian, a county librarian, two London librarians, a Welsh librarian, the librarian of a smaller town, and a member of the younger generation whose professional future may well be shaped by this new legislation.

In the absence of a working model for describing, managing and archiving the human library resources, this study aims to attempt a practical approach that will provide all the necessary information to the library users, library professionals and researchers.

Initially, different metadata standards, archival projects and attributes of the human books were reviewed to identify appropriate metadata standards that accurately describe the resources of the human library. A free and open-source software; DSpace was considered for implementing newly defined metadata schema in this study. Thereafter, a set of new subject entries was incorporated to standardize the contents of the human library.

This study finds that the widely used metadata schema – Dublin Core (DC) is not appropriate to describe the contents of the human book. It shows that selected metadata elements from the types – person and event of schema.org can be used for describing, organizing and archiving the resources of the human library. It further highlights that existing subject entries are not sufficient to standardize the contents of these types of resources.

Two metadata fields in DSpace are strongly recommended by the DSpace community to consider in the input-forms.xml file, that is why the study could not completely omit DC metadata elements in describing human books.

The study provides a roadmap to the library professionals on the inclusion of new metadata schemas in describing the uniquely featured resources of the library.

What is the Purpose of the Library? The question is exercising not only the English librarian but his American colleague, and we notice that one of our contemporaries there has given some space to this fundamental question. The simple reply to the question would seem to be “To provide the community with the books it needs.” Such a reply, however, is likely to be regarded as an over‐simplification. Nevertheless, we may adhere to it because the operative word in our definition is “needs” and not “wants.” To discover the needs of a community, which are as manifold as there are people in it, is in itself a formidable task; to supply the books which are likely to satisfy them is a life‐work worthy of the ablest of men. These considerations should never be lost sight of in the attempts which occur from time to time to define a programme of library work. We are the last to believe that our province should be a limited one and we deprecate any attempt to thwart the enthusiasm of any librarian, young or old, who has something constructive to contribute. Our definition, however, is indisputable. The addition to it that the librarian makes was defined years ago in Brown's Manual, which declared his work to be the exploiting of books. A programme then, if there is to be one, is merely of the best methods of exploitation by good technique, tactful advertisement, and a personal service which radiates willingness. The librarian must always beware of the many attempts that are made to harness the library to particular movements, shibboleths or partisan‐ships: the so‐called programmes which endeavour to define a purpose for the library will often be found to be influenced by one of these three evils. The matter thus stated seems trite enough, but it would seem that there is necessity for its fequent re‐statement.