Zadie Smith and Libraries

The presence of Zadie Smith in the Kensal Rise Library campaign is no doubt part of the reason for the extraordinary amount of publicity is has attracted.  It seems to be to her that we indebted for recent coverage in the Wall Street Journal, the Daily Mirror, and two Italian newspapers here and here.  It also illustrates the complicated nature of "saving" local  libraries.

In her Today programme piece, she referred to her childhood memories of Willesden Library, reminiscences that Toby Young used against her in his rebuttal to imply that she was claiming that Willesden was up for closure which she clearly did not.  Before she moved to New York, her nearest local library would have been Kilburn Library on Salusbury Road in Queens Park.  In fact, under the proposals we passed on Monday, both these libraries would benefit substantially.  Kilburn in particular, would open for seven days rather than the current five.  Both would see an improvement in stock, more events, better equipment for disabled people and (I hope) better trained and motivated staff. 

Thus, in opposing the proposals, she is actually campaigning against improving the libraries that one might have expected to be closest to her heart.  Then again, she also claimed (possibly falsely) that her family stole numerous books from Willesden library, so her approach to defending libraries has always been a bit odd.