“Green Library” or why spend time in the park, book in hand

 For the second consecutive year every Saturday in August, Sofia City Library opens summer reading-areas in the capital's parks. The first such reading-area was open on the 6th August from 10am to 3pm in Sofia's Boris Garden. The second is the now opening one in South Park, next to what is known as the Big Meadow. There will be two more reading-rooms - on the 20th August near the Monument to the Soviet Army and on the 27th in Zaimov Park, alongside the alley leading up to Sofia Theatre. During the events the organizers give out free reader passes valid for one year, which book lovers can use in libraries after the 15th August. 

This year there are some surprises. The attendance of foremost names from different spheres of art - writers, poets, musicians, artists, is one of them. Young Bulgarian authors will read their own works and will sign their books for fans. Avgustin Gospodinov, Ivan Landjev, Yordan Eftimov and Petar Chuhov have already done so on the 6th August. Over the next few days Boyko Lambovski, Kristin Dimitrova, Marin Bodakov and others will take part in the event as well. An interesting part of the experience in the reading-areas will be the workshops where people are able to learn how to play different instruments. 

Maria Brankova - head of the library collection department of the Sofia City Library, says that the visitors give suggestions how the reading-areas could be improved:

”In the time when the Sofia City Library was just called the Sofia Library (from the 1950s to the 1980s), there used to be a permanent summer reading-room in Boris Garden. The older Sofia citizens still remember that time and it is usually they that make suggestions of improvements. Apart from standard books, there is also periodical literature. This year we have prepared popular literature mainly for the youngest children who come with their grandparents. People also look for romance books, cookbooks, healthcare journals… We take into account what our readers recommend. “ 

It seems that the greater part of visitors are prep-school children and kids from primary schools. This has prompted the organizers to make the events more education-oriented. In the meantime, Sofia City Library is taking part in two projects for preserving the cultural heritage of Sofia. It is pleasure that they have noticed that more and more people are interested in the library's services. In 2015 there were 300,000 visits. So far, the readers registered are 35,352, with the newly registered numbering 11,660. 35 per cent of them are young people studying at high school or at university. This means an increase of 10 per cent in comparison to last year. Almost half a million reader passes have been used so far.

“This increase is, probably, due to the mobile version of the e-catalogue and all digital sources of information we offer”, Maria Brankova further explains. “Now, we are participating in several projects alongside Sofia City Art Gallery and Museum of Sofia for the digitalization of the cultural heritage. Our aim is to become Sofia's biggest digital cultural heritage center. We are in the process of digitizing some valuable editions. There is one more project in which we are taking part - this time with the Institute for Literature of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences and the National Museum of Bulgarian Literature. The name of the project is “Bulgarian Literary Classics - knowledge for everyone”. The project follows a Norwegian model. With the progress of technology more and more people are interested in reading. The mobile version of the e-catalogue was released almost a year ago. For two months the database has been used almost three times more than usual. To our surprise, our readers are interested not only in information resources but in the book fund too. This is primarily due to the fact that we have all books published in Bulgaria as well as many rare editions. Besides the book fund, we also offer many musical scores and gramophone records, which are being digitized too. We are proud to possess the first gramophone record by famous Bulgarian singer Lili Ivanova. I am glad that these are the things that bring back more readers to the library.” 

 

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