Thread by @LucyHunterB

A short story about this line, given to The Times by the National Library of Scotland (NLS) on 12 August.

A fishy tale of a red herring, but more than that, a red herring with a bit of a whiff.

Are you sitting comfortably etc etc 1/14

The NLS line about reading room is obviously a red herring - as the issue is reversing its the decision to put the book on open shelves in the centenary exhibition, after staff complaints - but even taken on its own terms, it's not what it seems./

Background: NLS is one of the UK's copyright libraries. Publishers are obliged to lodge books they publish with this network. NLS's large physical collection is mostly kept in stacks, and most items have to be ordered up to the reading room./

As we understand, WWWW was submitted to the British Library by our publisher in electronic form, which is now a normal way of doing this. But the British Library's IT systems are still in a mess, after a huge cyber attack, delaying the transmission of a copy of WWWW to the NLS./

We know this from the FoI response, which notes that for the Library to be able to say truthfully the book is available in its main collection (missing the point, but leaving that aside, for a moment) they would need to buy in a physical copy. This email is dated 2 June./

Moving forward to last Tuesday 12 August, almost 2 months after the exhibition had opened on 20 June, when the Library gave its lines to the Times: "Anyone can visit our reading rooms and access this book."/

First thing on Wednesday 13 August, a regular library user (h/t @staylorish) tried to order the book through the online system. At this point, the NLS system was saying the book was not available, and would not be, until...

....next year./

So the line was simply incorrect at the point it was given to the press. On Tuesday 12 August, there was no copy sitting ready for a reader to call up.

If the NLS had ordered a copy in June, nothing had been done with it to make it available since the exhibition had opened./

By Thursday 14th first thing, the situation had changed. Those putting in for a copy were getting this notice. The book was still "not available", but this was now due to being "in transit" until... the previous day.🤷‍♀️/

By the end of Thursday, it was still "not available", but now due to being "on loan" for 6 days until....13 September. (The NLS doesn't lend out books to readers, so not clear what this tells us.)/

Yesterday evening, if you tried to order up the book, you were again told it was currently on loan and not available, but now only until next week./

A copy in the Dear Library exhibition would simply (and unusually for the NLS) have been available there since 20 June for any visitor coming in off the street to pick off a shelf and look at, till next April.

The main collection copy was always a very different sort of thing./

If you want to look at it, you need to join the NLS, know to ask for it, and, for now, join a queue.

So much for "Anyone can visit our reading rooms and access this book."

But on top of that, there simply was no copy available to bring up to the reading room on 12 August/

when the line saying so was first given to the press. This red herring of a line was inaccurate, just on its own terms.

It remains so, really, until the book is routinely available to passing readers.

The fishy tale of National Library and The Red Herring remains unfinished.

Footnote: "Anyone can visit our reading rooms and access this book" has been offered to the press again, today. thetimes.com/article/a68f01…