University Library News

Georgia State University Library

Animals in the Library

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A few days ago I wrote about a pigeon who wandered into the library which made me think about animals in libraries. The Lilian Jackson Braun detective books, The Cat Who….. series featuring two siamese cats who help their millionaire journalist human Jim Qwilleran (columnist for the Moose County Something, Pickax, Mich.) solve crimes, had Jim’s lady friend Polly the librarian adopting a marmalade cat for the new bookstore, thus increasing traffic. So it’s not a library, but very similar. But another book about a real life library cat, Dewey Readmore Books, is now a bestseller (see his web site Dewey Readmore Books) and has been instrumental in turning around the economic situation in a small Iowa town, so animals in libraries can have an effect. Do you know of other books that feature animals in libraries or actual libraries with resident animals? How does this relate to literature? Well it’s probably not serious literature, but a lot of the librarians and professors I know have either cats or dogs and definately have libraries!