I visit York libraries infrequently these days. The front-line staff are as friendly and helpful as ever, if seemingly a trifle despondent.

However, there is an enormous rift between what I believe a library should be, and the ethos of the present management (The Press, March 3). I cannot accept the definition of a library as “a space for people to come and sit, and chat, and have fun”.

Nor can I accept Fiona Williams’ assertion that our council is unfit to run a public library. When I first came to York there was a thriving music library and, until recently, a very fine reference library, all thanks to council policy. As to the suggestion of impending political interference… What! From councillors who strenuously denied that the reference library sell-off was any of their business?

Equally, I fail to recognise Stephen Lewis’s description of York libraries as run by “sourfaced librarians glaring at you and hissing ‘sssh!’ every time you raise your voice above a whisper” amid “dusty bookshelves in dark corners forever unvisited”.

If Explore centres are what people prefer, well and good; but let us not denigrate our splendid libraries of the past.

William Dixon Smith, Welland Rise, Acomb,