Everyone who really knows me, knows that I have (away too) many books.
I’ve been wondering what to do about the situation for some time now. I was checking out someone a Twitter friend suggested following and stumbled into her blog depicting how other collectors had arranged their collections. Nice libraries, eh? ~Sigh~

Just yesterday I posted a photo of one of my Armchair Traveller Magnetic Bookmark line to my ArtFire site. It was of the lonely phonebooth in Strath Oykel, Ross, Scotland. I bemoaned the fact that these iconic British forms of archetecture are now being removed from the landscape forever!

But maybe not…

Apparently, there are others who share my sentiment, and who have found a creative use for them. And it’s a use that really jives with my bookish sense of the world, too! See & read more!!

Inter-Library loan can be an inexpensive method of obtaining information like an article or essay that doesn’t take up a significant portion of the book for which you are searching.

You need to give the librarian some information about the publication, obviously.

For a book, you would need to give at least the author and title. Other information like the year of publication, volume number, or ISBN also might be useful if they apply. Knowing the page numbers you require could be very important if, as in yesterday’s entry, Getting the Book You Want, another library has the item but will not lend it out (this is the case particularly with rare or reference only items). That library might agree to make copies of the relevant pages and send those.

For magazines or periodicals the essential information would include title, volume number, issue number, date of issue or publication and probably the title of the article and its author’s name. Again, it wouldn’t hurt to have the page numbers, too.

Inter-Library Loan items come in at varying time rates. I have often received items within a week or two. I’m still waiting for material I ordered from the Ontario Archives in June (they are consistently VERY slow). So, it’s a good idea, if you are working to deadline, to order as soon as you know you want the item.

The amount of time you can use the item will vary, too. Usually I’m allowed two weeks. Some libraries will accept requests for an extended due date if the initial period is not long enough for your purposes. That might depend upon the demand and supply of the particular item, though.

Sometimes it is impossible to find a copy of the out-of-print book/periodical that you REALLY NEED for that research project you have underway.

I found such a thing on Google Books, but it would only give me a snippet view. It looked to be an obituary article or a biography of one of my ancestors – Samuel Brandram, grandson to the Samuel I wrote about in Parallel Lives? Samuel the younger was a famous reciter who had committed Shakespeare’s complete works and many other literary works to memory. An amazing feat! The article I wanted was in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine of 1893, and covered almost seven pages. I had to have it.

I couldn’t find a copy for sale anywhere on the Internet. My next best chance of obtaining it was through Inter-Library Loan. Marg at the Kenora Public Library has come to know me pretty well over the last couple of years as an Inter-Library Loan client. Only rarely has she been unable to help me. A week or so after I had ordered the periodical, she phoned to tell me that she had found a copy, but the National Library would not send it through the system. But (sometimes buts are good…) they could photocopy the pages I required and send them!

The other day I got Marg’s call to say that the copies were at the Library waiting for me along with another book I’d ordered through Inter-Library Loan. There was no charge for the service.

The happy news was that the article had some great gems of information in it, and I learned more about Samuel than I had previously known. Samuel used to perform at Justice Talfourd’s house in Russell Square, where he met Charles Dickens. Dickens was so impressed by Samuel’s rendering of the great novellist’s work that he stated that Brandram was “a man who interprets me better than I can interpret myself.” With recommendations like that, the reciter was in high demand!

So, if you reach a brick wall in finding that tome you require, visit your local library and try out Inter-Library Loan. It doesn’t always work, and there may be a fee sometimes, but it usually brings good results!