Keith Manley's Irish Reading Societies and Circulating Libraries Founded before 1825: Useful Knowledge and Agreeable Entertainment concisely demonstrates the integral position held by libraries and reading societies in Irish individuals' self-improvement, literacy, and social consciousness across class and religious barriers in pre-1826 Irish society. The author takes a clear yet detailed approach to surveying early modern Irish libraries, reading societies, and related establishments. A library cataloguer for the National Trust, he has published on early modern Irish library history. He co-edited The Cambridge History of Libraries in Britain and Ireland, vol. 2, 1640–1850 (2006), which covers a larger timeline and geographic expanse than the current work. His 2012 work, Books, Borrowers, and Shareholders: Scottish Circulating and Subscription Libraries before 1825, covers the same period and also includes a list of libraries, but focuses on commercial libraries.
This monograph is in chronological order; topic, social class, and library type...
