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What’s on

Face of Alexander the Great statue opened to reveal a pink elephant, a snake, a horse and a ship.

Alexander the Great: The Making of a Myth

Fri 21 Oct 2022 - Sun 19 Feb 2023

A football player and a woman reading a magazine

Chinese and British

Free

Fri 18 Nov 2022 - Sun 23 Apr 2023

Treasures of the British Library. Discover stories that shape the world.

Treasures of the British Library

Free

36 Chowringhee Lane Film Poster

India 75 film screening: 36 Chowringhee Lane

Sat 10 Dec 2022

Comic of Alexander the Great

Alexander the Great: A Day of Talks

Today

Oliver Stone and Colin Farrell

Alexander Revisited: The Final Cut, with Oliver Stone in conversation

Today

Participants at a previous event

Bookbinding Masterclass

Sat 10 Dec 2022

All events and exhibitions

News

Web maintenance at the British Library

Travel disruption and delivery updates

There may be some disruption to our services over the next few weeks.

Speakers at a ceremony

Cooked with Love launch a delicious success

This week we celebrated the success of our child-friendly Leeds award-nominated Food…

Ancient mappe of Fairyland designed by Bernard Sleigh

Dates for your diary – our 2023 exhibitions

Fantasy literature, the legendary Malorie Blackman, the future of storytelling, and animals in art and science. 2023 is looking…

Blogs

Untold Lives blog from the British Library

Private trade and pressed men – the voyage of the Houghton to China

European blog from the British Library

Propaganda or Protest? Hans Baumann’s ‘Alexander’

Asian and African blog at the British Library, collection item detail

A book of Malay pantuns from Portugal

Learn

Preview of the Black literature timeline poster, showing text entries by date, portraits and a tablet featuring images of book covers and handwritten manuscripts

Collage of photograph of Andrea Levy's parents and one of her manuscripts

‘How come England did not know me?’: Recording Andrea Levy for Authors’ Lives

More Learning resources

Discover

A Description of Three Hundred Animals [page: frontispiece and title page]

The Devonshire Manuscript

Explore this hand-written volume, known as the Devonshire Manuscript

Explore our Highlights

Get started

Get started at the British Library, photo of a Reading Room

Find out how to get a Reader Pass

Support us

Support the British Library

Help grow, protect and share our collection

Business support

Business support at the British Library

We can help you start, run and grow your business

Work with us

Students working in the Library

Current vacancies and other opportunities – and how to apply