News
Olympic lives now online
Race for Knowledge
Transforming our understanding of Middle Eastern history
British Library awarded Catalyst Endowment to support future acquisitions
Olympic lives now online
To celebrate the London 2012 Olympics, we are making available a selection of 61 oral history interviews documenting the lives and careers of sportsmen and sportswomen throughout the twentieth century.
Available for anyone to listen to via our Sounds website, the recordings include interviews with such Olympic and Paralympic legends as Daley Thompson and Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson, talking candidly about their sporting lives and the experiences that shaped them.
Listen now at Sounds.
Race for Knowledge
Step up to the mark and shape up your grey cells with the British Library’s Race for Knowledge quiz. Marvel at the treasure troves of curiosities and gems on the shelves at the Library. Feast your eyes on Beethoven’s tuning fork, Napoleon’s ashes, or Peter the Great’s gloves and get your brain in gear to take up the Library’s Olympic Challenge.
We have picked six iconic British brains who have made their mark in history. Choose one to help you navigate your Race for Knowledge and become the best athlete of the mind. The player with the highest score in the fastest time will win an iPad and remember you can improve your score by playing again or challenging friends to beat your score. All players will save £2 on full price adult tickets to Writing Britain.
Play the game now: Race for Knowledge.
Transforming our understanding of Middle Eastern history
The British Library and Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development (QF) have unveiled an ambitious partnership to transform people’s understanding of the history of the Middle East, and the region’s relationship with Britain and the rest of the world. The £8.7 million project will digitise more than 500,000 pages from the archives of the East India Company and India Office, in addition to 25,000 pages of medieval Arabic manuscripts - all of which will be made freely available online for the first time.
The digitisation will take place over the next three years at the British Library, in close cooperation with the new Qatar National Library, and much information will be available in both Arabic and English. Once live, the site will also offer users the opportunity to add their own Gulf-related stories and memories, enabling them to contribute to the online resource, whether by sharing images of mementoes and old photographs, or by recounting the stories their grandparents once told them. In this way, historical items from living memory will be added to the archive of items dating back several centuries.
British Library awarded Catalyst Endowment to support future acquisitions
The British Library has successfully applied for a Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) Catalyst Endowment Award. The award will be worth £2 million, dependent on the Library raising £4 million over the next four years.
The amount raised by the Library, and the matched funding provided by the Catalyst Endowment programme, will result in a combined endowment of £6 million to increase public engagement with collection items, including exhibitions and online resources, and it will help support conservation work that may be necessary to make items accessible. The endowment will also fund work to support acquisitions of heritage items such as culturally and historically significant books and manuscripts. It will be managed on a long-term basis to provide funding for such activities over many years to come.
The Catalyst Endowment Awards are designed to bring new money into the cultural sector. The programme is a joint initiative between HLF, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and Arts Council England. It offers match-funding to help arts and heritage organisations become more sustainable and resilient by building a new endowment fund or developing an existing one, in order to increase their annual income.
Service updates
Possible disruptions to Reading Rooms at St Pancras: 26 July - 12 August 2012
WiFi access during the Olympic Games
Bag searching
Travel information
Events and exhibitions during the Olympic and Paralympic Games
Visiting the British Library during the Olympic Games
Possible disruptions to Reading Rooms at St Pancras: 26 July - 12 August 2012
There will be a change of opening hours at the British Library (St Pancras) and our Reading Rooms between 26 July and 12 August 2012.
London will be a hive of excitement this summer as the city plays host to the Olympic and Paralympic Games. With many extra visitors, delays to public transport are to be expected during the peak Olympic period (26 July – 12 August).
To allow for anticipated travel delays, the British Library (St Pancras) will open half an hour later than usual on Monday to Saturday: at 10.00 each day (26 July – 12 August). Sunday opening will be unchanged at 11.00. Please note that our Reading Rooms are closed on Sundays.
There may also be delays in the delivery of collection items held off-site during this period. The Library will resume normal opening from 13 August, however, visitors may still experience some public transport delays and possible disruption to Library services until after the Paralympic Games (29 August – 9 September).
Visit our website for more information about the Olympic period.
WiFi access during the Olympic Games
The British Library provides a free WiFi service in its buildings to support ongoing research by its users.
During the Olympic and Paralympic Games the Library will be restricting access, via our WiFi service, to websites streaming Olympic events. This should ensure that the WiFi service remains viable for Readers in our Reading Rooms who are undertaking research.
Find more information online: WiFi.
Bag searching
It may be necessary to introduce bag searching for all visitors during the Olympic period if the Library is advised to do so by the Metropolitan Police or the security ‘threat’ level for Government buildings is raised. This may result in it taking longer for visitors to enter the building.
Travel Information
For the latest information on public transport and to plan your journey, visit: Transport for London and Get ahead of the games.
Events and exhibitions during the Olympic and Paralympic Games
To celebrate the London 2012 Olympics, the British Library is running an exciting programme of summer exhibitions and events, including:
- Writing Britain (part of the London 2012 Festival): a collection of 150 great English literature treasures, from the original manuscript for J K Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, to the original draft for John Lennon’s In My Life and J R R Tolkien’s original artwork for The Hobbit: Writing Britain.
- Olympex 2012: a free exhibition from private collections, which explores the history, symbolism and iconography of the Olympic Movement through some 2,500 stamps and intriguing pieces of Olympic memorabilia: Olympex2012
Find out more and keep up to date with What's On at the British Library.
Event highlights
We run a wide range of fascinating events for the general public as well as researchers and businesses. Explore our full events programme online at What's On.
Future Shorts Festival at the British Library
Mrs Hemingway
Shaun Tan in conversation
Valerie Bloom and John Lyons: Whoop An' Shout
Speed dating - A meeting of the mind and heart
Future Shorts Festival at the British Library
20 August / 19.00 - 20.30
Free
This summer we are partnering with Future Shorts, the biggest pop-up film festival of its kind, showcasing the most exciting short films from around the world. Book your place to see our free screening of its summer line-up of BAFTA and SXSW award-winning films.
Mrs Hemingway
22 August / 12.30 - 14.00
Free (booking essential)
Naomi Wood is one of the British Library Eccles Centre Writers in Residence. Her next novel, Mrs Hemingway, explores the lives of Ernest Hemingway’s four wives. She reads an excerpt from this work in progress and discusses how the Library’s collections have helped shape her book. This event is free but booking is essential. To book a space please email Summer Scholars.
Shaun Tan in Conversation
24 August, 18.30 - 19.45
£6 (£4 concessions)
Shaun Tan is a masterly visual storyteller, whose brilliantly detailed picture books conjure up separate universes where anything is possible but where people are always at the heart. Based in Australia, his best-known books include The Rabbits, The Lost Thing, The Red Tree and The Arrival. He has also worked as a concept artist on animated films, including Horton Hears a Who and Wall-E. In 2011 Shaun Tan received the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award and an Oscar for best animated short for The Lost Thing. Shaun will draw and talk to Nicolette Jones about his work. Suitable for families with children aged 12 and above.
Valerie Bloom and John Lyons: Whoop An' Shout
26 August, 13.15 - 14.30
£6 (£4 concessions)
Make some noise at The British Library in the company of poets Valerie Bloom and John Lyons. Valerie Bloom is well known for her funny and engaging poetry. She performs across the country and abroad, appearing everywhere from local libraries to the Royal Albert Hall. She has written several poetry books and two novels for young people, Surprising Joy and The Tribe. John Lyons is a prize-winning poet and painter with five published poetry collections, the latest being No Apples in Eden, selected and new poems. His poems are also represented in numerous anthologies. He shares his love of cooking in a publication, Cook-up in a Trini Kitchen which features poems, anecdotes, recipes with drawings.
Come along to enjoy an afternoon of poetry, stories and noise. Suitable for families with children aged 6 years and over.
Speed dating - A meeting of the mind and heart
11 September / 15:00 – 19:00
Free
Artist in Residence Christopher Green takes over the public spaces of the British Library in his guise as Matchmaker Svengali Extraordinaire. With the aim of bringing people together creatively, intellectually or romantically, this is your chance to connect with fellow Readers. Talk to the Matchmaker and he will hook you up! Read Chris’s blog.
Free Reader Training Sessions
To find out more about all our workshops and book your place, visit the workshops page. There is a heavy demand for these courses so if you are booked on one and later find that you are unable to come, please let us know so that we can offer the place to someone else. your needs.
Service updates
Need a new Pass?
Keep updated via Twitter - @BL_Ref_Services
Need a new Pass?
Please remember that when you need to renew or replace a Reader Pass, you must provide appropriate identification – two original documents, one showing proof of your home address and one showing your signature. For details of the forms of identification, please see Reader Registration, email Reader-Registration@bl.uk or call +44 (0) 1937 546060.
Please note that records you have saved in 'My Workspace' in Explore the British Library, will still be available for you to view if you renew your Pass before it expires. Otherwise these records will be deleted.
There is a £10 charge to replace a lost or damaged Pass.
Keep updated via Twitter - @BL_Ref_Services
If you're visiting the Library you can keep up to date with developments by following Reference Services on Twitter (@BL_Ref_Services). We're tweeting updates on how busy the Reading Rooms are, giving top tips on getting the most out of your visit, and which days the Reading Rooms are closed. You can also find out about new services, free workshops, new e-resources, events and exhibitions. If you haven't got a Twitter account, it's free and easy to join – just go to Twitter Signup.
Tell us what you think about the 'new look' Reader Bulletin
We are keen to hear what you think about the Reader Bulletin – what you find interesting or helpful and what you feel we could improve. We are also interested to know the format you prefer, whether a printed copy or an electronic version, as well as your views on other possible forms of communication. Please email Melissa Byrd.
