Public take leading role in promoting reading for free

Take a book, leave a book. In the birthplace of the printing press, public bookshelves are popping up across the nation on street corners, city squares and suburban supermarkets.

In these free-for-all libraries, people can grab whatever they want to read, and leave behind anything they want for others. There’s no need to register, no due date, and you can take or give as many as you want.

“This project is aimed at everyone who likes to read – without regard to age or education. It is open for everybody,” said Michael Aubermann, one of the organisers of the free book exchange in the city of Cologne.

The western city’s latest public shelf, a €5,000 (£4,387) steel bookcase with acrylic glass doors, was put up two weeks ago next to Bayenturm, one of the city’s medieval towers. It is the fourth free shelf that Mr Aubermann’s group, the Cologne Citizens’ Foundation, has placed outside, with two more inside local Ikea outlets.

“We installed our other outdoor shelves last year and it’s been working really well,” said Mr Aubermann, a 44-year-old who works in IT management.

The shelves, which are usually financed by donations and cared for by local volunteer groups, have popped up independently of each other in many cities across Germany including Berlin, Hannover and Bonn, and also in suburbs and villages.

Each shelf holds around 200 books and it takes about six weeks for a complete turnover, with all the old titles replaced by new ones, he said.

Vera Monka, a 46-year-old Cologne resident said she takes advantage of the free books all the time.

“I have often left books here, but frankly, I have even more often taken books with me,” she said, browsing through the latest new arrivals.

“This project is simply great, because I do not have much money left to spend on good literature.”

Even commercial book stores and online book retailers seem to support the idea of free book exchanges.

“We see this project rather as a sales promotion than as competition,” said Elmar Muether, the acting branch manager at Cologne’s Mayersche Buchhandlung book store. “If books are present everywhere, it helps our business too.”

Bettina Althaus, a spokeswoman for buch.de, a German online bookstore which has been compared to Amazon, also welcomed the movement.

“Public bookshelves are in no competition with the online book trade. We are happy about any kind of motivation to read,” Ms Althaus said.

So far, the Cologne book group has had few problems with vandalism or other kinds of abuse, though a used-book seller once scooped up every book on a shelf to sell at a flea market. Another time the shelves kept getting stacked with material from a religious group.

“We made sure to get rid of that stuff as quickly as possible,” Mr Aubermann said. “Propaganda is the only kind of literature we do not allow, whether it is right-wing, racist or proselytizing.”

The book cases are like small treasure chests with an eclectic mix of anything from fiction to obscure self-help, travel guides or crime novels. During a recent visit, the bookshelf at Bayenturm was well equipped with hardcover classics including Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front, The German Lesson by Siegfried Lenz andMargaret Mitchell’s classic Gone with the Wind.

At another bookshelf in the Bayenthal neighbourhood, the lower shelves were reserved for children’s literature only.

“It is important that we make it easy for everyone to overcome their inhibitions and participate in this ‘reading culture on the street’ – from old readers to kids to immigrants,” Mr Aubermann added.