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In our media‐orientated, image‐conscious contemporary society the librarian may very well seem particularly unfortunate, reflected in the imagination of the general public as a fussy old woman of either sex, myopic and repressed, brandishing or perhaps cowering behind a date‐stamp and surrounded by an array of notices which forbid virtually every human activity. The media, for whom the librarian is frustration personified, have reinforced this stereotype, hitherto transmitted solely by superstition and hearsay; its greatest impact has no doubt fallen on the two‐thirds of the population who never use the library. One of its effects will be to ensure that they never do so in the future. As Frank Hatt has pointed out: “The controllers of the new media of communication … have shown a tendency to limit choices by using the considerable power of the media to limit their audience's established attitudes, simply because such limitation is good business.” The popular BBC television series, The last of the summer wine, portrayed a librarian whose vicarious sex‐life through the pages of D. H. Lawrence led to inevitably frustrated attempts to act out his fantasies in occasional under‐the‐counter forays with his similarly repressed female assistant. A Daily mail leader on an appeal against unfair dismissal made by a London Deputy Borough Librarian reiterates this concept:

THE new chief in our parish, the London Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, in succession to S C Holliday is to be Melvyn Barnes, Chief Librarian of Ipswich in East Anglia for the last couple of years. The Kensington post offers a spacious central library of recent vintage, with particularly good reference services, though an over‐preponderance of student pre‐emption of table space. There is a strong local history interest in the borough, keenly fostered by Chief Assistant Brian Curle. We use central ref a good deal and have always found them very helpful, though some of the branches are a shade parochial. We look to the youthful Mr Barnes to blow a little fresh air into the system, and hope his salary covers the difference between the cost of houses in London and Ipswich.

MELVYN BARNES, Borough Librarian & Arts Officer of the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea (London), was asked to prepare a report for his libraries committee on the possibility of selling withdrawn library books to the public—that rumbling bandwagon which inevitably looks attractive to local authorities in hard times.

IT WAS THE then Duke of Gloucester who, observing the said Mr Gibbon (of Roman Empire fame) writing, said, to quote as accurately as my reference source will allow, ‘Another damned thick square book! Always scribble, scribble, scribble, scribble! Eh! Mr Gibbon!’

IT SEEMS THAT librarians, in common with many other forms of mankind, do not learn from history. One of the more interesting sessions of the recent La Public Librarians' Conference in Aberdeen dealt with the need for many more librarians in school libraries, and the kind of qualifications which would best fit them for the work. Clearly, professional training in librarianship and knowledge of the educational process are both relevant and valuable.

BY NOW, many readers of NLW will have made a pilgrimage to Birmingham to see the new central library, and many others will have resolved to do so at the earliest opportunity.

THE EMOTIVE term ‘over‐supply’ has been used for some years' in the library profession, particularly by those senior librarians who have experienced large numbers of applicants for each junior professional post they have advertised. The existence of an over‐supply has also been denied from time to time—not too recently, perhaps—or, at best, misgivings have been soothed by the feeling that unemployment in librarianship might not compare unfavourably with unemployment in other professions, and the general problem of graduate unemployment is a national factor quite unrelated to specific professions.

WITH, several days later, some residue yet of disbelief, allow me to tell you that at the end of October L actually went dancing. After an interval of 15 years since I last electrified my system in similar fashion, I may further tell you that dancing is no longer what it was.

Down my way in October there was the “unique event of a Trade Union leader being inslalled by his boss” as the TU leader so described it.

The Barbican Library is the headquarters of the City of London's lending library service. It includes a music library and a children's library as well as a special section devoted to the fine and performing arts. Anyone who lives, works or studies in the City may apply to be a member. Others who wish to join may do so under the interavailability scheme.