August 05 2020 – Two passers by outside the offices of The Bookery at The Palms centre in Woodstock, Cape Town Photo by David Harrison

For years, Mandela Day at The Bookery has been an annual highlight.

People piled in — sometimes “upwards of 500 volunteers” over the course of a day — to the book depot in Woodstock, Cape Town, to cover books headed for new school libraries.

This year, there were 35 people.

August 05 2020 – Library asistant Laeticia Cupido from Bokmakierie Primary School, helps to cover books at The Bookery in Woodstock. (Photo: David Harrison )

It wasn’t totally unexpected. Strict protocols notwithstanding, people are wary of squashing into closed spaces, breathing one another’s air, touching surfaces that cannot, regardless of how much effort is put in, all be sanitised.

Nor would the reduced fruits of volunteer efforts cause direct or immediate suffering to the organisation or the people it serves.

But the muted atmosphere did not bode well for an aspect of social development that has always been simultaneously neglected by all but its most ardent adherents, while also being generally hailed as the sure-fire route out of poverty cycles that bedevil generations.

August 05 2020 – Charleen Thomasso from Silverstream Primary School works with The Bookery as a library assistant, helping out at the Woodstock office by wrapping books in a protective plastic before they can be delivered to school libraries. (Photo: David Harrison)

The Bookery turns 10 this year, but what with a national disaster playing out, the non-profit organisation’s executive manager didn’t realise it was a significant year until it was pointed out to him.

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August 05 2020 – Cosmas Mabeya, executive project manager of The Bookery, in the Woodstock office. Photo by David Harrison

I suppose if this was a normal year, someone would have noticed and we would have had a celebration,” says Cosmas Mabeya. He laughs and shakes his head. Having a party is a concept that has become foreign in less than half a year. Celebration seems an almost quaint idea. This year’s annual principals’ lunch — where the principals of schools that have received libraries through The Bookery come together to talk about successes and improvements in academics at their schools due to learners having access to books for pleasure — will most likely also have to be shelved.

It’s a pity. The Bookery has had enough successes in a decade to have had a triumphant blow-out in 2020.

August 05 2020 – Cosmas Mabeya, executive project manager of The Bookery, in the Woodstock office. Photo by David Harrison

Like many people, Mabeya is currently working from home. Behind him, beyond the window he is sitting by, a well-established frangipani tree sparkles in the mid-winter sunlight. It’s one of those small details that tricks one into thinking life’s the way it’s always been.

August 05 2020 – Zeenat Slamong working admin at The Bookery, enters covered books details into a database & generates a bar code for each one before it’s ready to be delivered to a school library. Photo by David Harrison

The Bookery was in the process of establishing three libraries when lockdown happened, he explains during a Zoom interview. Had they been completed, it would have brought the total number of school libraries this highly effective outfit has brought into being to 89. That’s about nine libraries a year, and they are spread around the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and Gauteng. Each of these libraries has received shelving, infrastructure, books and support from The Bookery and its affiliates.

Because of these libraries, thousands of children have had access to books for reading for pleasure that they did not have before.

The concept of children reading for pleasure has always been a tough sell in South Africa, in spite of the tireless and excellent work done by the many organisations that concern themselves with early literacy.

“Kids who read for pleasure — and this has been shown over and over again internationally — have a much better chance of understanding context than those who don’t. It’s almost a no-brainer,” Mabeya says. “The feedback we receive from many principals is that the absorption of school material is notably improved after children have been given access to books to read for pleasure. There is also an improvement in language and a widening of vocabulary. And there is clear evidence from the schools we are in that check-outs (of books from the school library) improve over time, which is very encouraging.”

August 05 2020 – Charleen Thomasso (left) from Silverstream Primary School joins a team of library assistants working with The Bookery at the Woodstock office to help cover books before they can be delivered to school libraries. (Photo: David Harrison)

It’s encouraging because it means children become confident about using libraries to their advantage.

The concept of children reading for pleasure has always been a tough sell in South Africa, in spite of the tireless and excellent work done by the many organisations that concern themselves with early literacy.

August 05 2020 – Roslyn Willemse from the Kannemeyer Primary School who works as a library assistant with The Bookery joins a team at the Woodstock office to cover books before they can be delivered to school libraries. (Photo: David Harrison)

“Our job has always partly been to implement a cultural shift. In many of the constituencies that we partner with, reading does not come naturally, whether it is to the teaching community or to the parents. We just don’t have a culture of reading here,” Mabeya says.

The Bookery has worked closely with various organisations to change attitudes towards reading for pleasure, NGOs like Nal’ibali, Shine Literacy and FunDza Literary Trust, each of which supplies different kinds of support and interventions — from “ensuring that gogo can contribute to literacy even if she’s not a reader” to “making sure kids who are struggling have one-on-one support”, to “getting relevant stories to teenagers about people and circumstances they recognise in their own lives”, Mabeya explains. Many of these organisations, including Book Dash and Biblionef, are concerned with getting African stories to African children.

August 05 2020 – Precise Work – Roslyn Willemse from Kannemeyer Primary School joins a team of other library assistants at The Bookery in Woodstock to cover donated books before they are delivered to school libraries. Photo by David Harrison

Merely installing a library in a school is an exercise in futility if there are no adults around to show children why it’s there, what it’s good for, and how it serves them, observation has shown. Books are magic, but they need someone to go “Open, sesame”, otherwise the world of words remains as closed as the cave of treasures in the story of Ali Baba And The Forty Thieves. For this reason, The Bookery has always tried to match a library assistant to each library.

But library assistants are not paid for by education departments. Their positions at schools are tenuous because they are paid from fundraising. However, schools are unable to fundraise for what are called SGB (School Governing Body) posts during social distancing. Mabeya has been fielding calls and emails from schools saying that they have no option but to retrench their library assistants.

There are 50 library assistants trained and employed by The Bookery, and several others employed in SGB posts. There’s a lot of thinking going into how to keep them employed under the circumstances thrust on schools by Covid-19, how to keep saving lives by opening up the world of books to children.

August 05 2020 – Laeticia Cupido from Bokmakierie Priamary School works with The Bookery as a library assistant, helping out by wrapping books in a protective plastic before they can be delivered to school libraries. (Photo: David Harrison)

With library assistants removed from a room full of books, what remains is merely a room full of objects. When children eventually go back to schools, there might not be anyone at the school to help them find books to read and to check them out.

“Library assistants are motivated, capable and passionate about reading and children, and they engage children in library activities that encourage the idea of reading for leisure. They are the key to showing children that reading is cool.

August 05 2020 – Boxes of books in a quarantine area at The Bookery’s office in Woodstock, waiting to be delivered to school libraries. Photo by David Harrison

“Once you capture the interest of these kids, only then are you able to tell them, okay, if you enjoyed that book, maybe that one would also be something you enjoy. And that is why we feel very strongly that our work is not just about putting 4,000 books in a space and wishing the school well. It’s about getting adults in who can connect children to books.”

August 05 2020 – A box of donated library books waiting to be covered by library assistants at The Bookery in Woodstock. ( Photo: David Harrison)

Once the connection is made, as any adult reader will attest, once the treasure cave has opened up and revealed its treasures, children will find their way to books. It’s that connection that makes children read books with torches under their blankets after lights out — like Mabeya did when he was at school, because of a teacher who opened up the world of books to him. He believes it was that connection to books that transformed him from “the son of peasants” into first a banker, then a property investor and then the full-time manager of The Bookery.

He says that The Bookery has always worked closely with a number of co-funders, but that it relies for many of its day-to-day activities on donations from small and medium businesses. But many of their previous donors are now simply trying to keep their businesses afloat.

August 05 2020 – Cosmas Mabeya, executive project manager of The Bookery, in the Woodstock office. (Photo: David Harrison)

“It’s had a massive impact on our budget,” Mabeya says.

Mabeya has been with The Bookery since he started as a volunteer under the founding co-ordinators Richard Conyngham and Themba Tshabalala in 2010. Three years later he was joined full-time by Nobesuthu Faku. The Bookery now has eight admin staff and 46 library assistants on direct payroll.

Mabeya, it emerges after some more questioning, is foregoing his own salary in order to keep his team afloat for as long as it’s possible.

August 05 2020 – Cosmas Mabeya (left) executive project manager of The Bookery, along with Bookery trustee Zephne Ladbrook in the Woodstock office. Photo by David Harrison

There won’t be a birthday party to celebrate The Bookery’s many successes. Things are stalled and stuttering. But there are 330,000 books in schools that never had libraries before. There are 85,000 children across the country who have access to the picture and storybooks privileged children take for granted.

The best-selling children’s author Judy Blume is credited with saying that librarians save lives by handing the right book, at the right time, to a kid in need.

Extending that wisdom, not saving one librarian’s job means not saving many lives.

There are 50 library assistants trained and employed by The Bookery, and several others employed in SGB posts. There’s a lot of thinking going into how to keep them employed under the circumstances thrust on schools by Covid-19, how to keep saving lives by opening up the world of books to children.

Mabeya and his team are taking it one day at a time.

“We’re just trying to plug holes until we can get beyond this financial year.” DM/MC