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Annual Report 2000

Full text of the 2000 Annual Report [PDF 250kb]

From the president...

[extract]

What does a man think about?
What does a man think about, working alone all day? What does a man think about, working all alone all day Down in the cranberry, fern, and waterlily country? What does a man know must not happen to him yet. Is it his boat broken or drifted, his house hurt by the weather, his own age.

No. He thinks a boat, weather, the tide all mean well for him, thinks, somehow all this "can give me what I must provide."

What does a man think, driving to get the day's food and mail, up in the stony-river country, where the evening road is pine-cool.

Is it a letter more than anything else in the world he hopes for?

Man looks at life and sees that it comes to him from somewhere far beyond his reach. He looks at life and dreams that it is good, sees that it is good.

A letter, literature, a means of communication elevates him, tears him from the normality, lifts him out of the mediocre, and brings him closer to the divine essence of things.

Full text of the 2000 Annual Report [PDF 250kb]

Call for Member Participation from Pat McMahon, President of the Library Association of Ireland, February 2001 [from Annual Report 2000]