Posted on 06/01/2024 11:06:19 AM PDT by nickcarraway
There was some amusement as well as surprise when somebody walked into Helsinki’s Oodi Central Library on Monday 27 with a book that was overdue.
84 years overdue
It’s not unusual to be a little delayed in returning a library book but this one was unusual in as much as it was due back on December 26, 1939 making it just over 84 years late!
The person who returned it isn’t the person who first took out the book The Refugees (Pakolaiset in Finnish) by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and it is not known whether there was a fine and if so how much.
Book returned to library 84 years overdue
Coincidentally, another book which was also 84 years late was returned to Coventry Library in the UK in 2022 and the fine then was calculated at £18.27, being one old penny a week for the 4,385 weeks it was overdue.
Russian Invasion of Finland
Apparently the book returned in Finland was in remarkably good condition and the library is considering whether to put make it available to the current generation of readers, especially as this is a survivor of the Russian Invasion of Finland which took place at the end of November 1939.
This is not apparently the longest overdue book to be returned in Finland as according to TV station YLE, Helsinki’s Pukinmäki Library received another Conan Doyle novel in 2015 which was 87 years overdue.
I’ve read The Refugees, and it didn’t take anywhere near that long. Maybe if I’d tried to read it in Finnish it might have.
Meh - try it in Hungarian.
I like these stories about how people are amused and forgiving about long overdue books but I live in deep-blue fascist New Jersey. I'd probably be jailed for 10 years if it ever came out.
If the person who returned the book is a registered Republican, there’s going to be one hell of a fine.
Had me beat, I only 39 years for mine.
Funny, I get £ 18 s 5 d 5
Why are these stories, anyone who buys used books has lots of overdue library books and school books they can pull out of their library, look at the books at garage sales and estate sales for examples.
I can't even give books away to my local library.
Reading’s for fags.
I love books, myself, but I’m a bit of a dinosaur in that regard. Everybody’s got their face buried in electronic devices of some kind these days. Seriously, when was the last time you saw someone reading an actual book?
It’s not necessarily “overdue.” Sometimes libraries have book sales. I’ve purchased used books online, and some of them have library stamps in them. Are they “overdue”? Or did someone get them at library sales and then they ended up at an online bookseller?
more remarkable is, the library is still standing after 84 years
Just wondering, did the library have Drag Queen Story hour back then? 🤓
I never understand why overdue books make headlines.
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