English conceptualisations of ‘public’ libraries, c. 1690s–1710s

This paper examines the transcultural aspects of English conceptualisations of ‘public’ libraries in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. The article employs keyword-based approach. It discusses a proposal for a public library in New York by John Sharpe, the significance of holistic and connected approaches to the Bray library projects and the discourses surrounding libraries in early modern published travel accounts included by Bray in his suggested library curriculum. The article is informed by and contributes to literatures on the global dimension of the history of early modern Anglicanism and the role of libraries in early modern English travel and encounter narratives. Not only can the ‘global’ help us understand early modern English ideas of the ‘public library’, but ‘public libraries’ can help us rethink some of the ways in which England engaged with the ‘globe’.