Library Life on Lockdown – Cassy Sachar, Senior Librarian

The first time my sister visited my office in the LBC Library she surveyed the room and observed: “Piles of books, lots of boxes? Cassy, it’s just like your flat!” So with lockdown and the relocation of my office to the living room in my flat, the addition of piles of LBC Books, papers and indeed some boxes, is not especially disruptive. But although the interior design is essentially the same, there is one very big thing missing from the temporary reference collection that now resides on my couch – and that is people. I have no faculty members rushing in for a reference book just before class, I have no Friday morning regulars making dangerous piles of books for their dedicated reading day, I have no visiting researchers requesting obscure material from locked rooms. But actually people haven’t disappeared, they are simply making contact in new ways: students WhatsApping to see if digital copies are available, Faculty emailing to requests scans, library colleagues from across the globe seeking obscure material from locked rooms. Reading continues, research continues, writing continues. And the work of the library supporting these endeavours continues too, just in new ways.