ABSTRACT
This chapter surveys Irish gentry libraries and other book collections, presents us with an overview of the social dimension to libraries across classes, and underlines the blurring of the private/public in libraries. Manley also touches on the erotic side to books, from Montesquieu’s taste for Ovid’s love poetry, to Giacomo Casanova’s extended metaphor of the woman as book. The library is seen by Manley as a place of satisfaction, stimulus, and even excitement.
