The Human Library

A project where books are people and reading them involves sitting down for a conversation.

We joined forces with The Showroom Projects and Wunderbar to co-produce The Human Library, a project where books are people and reading them involves sitting down for a conversation.

Books in our Human Library come from all walks of life, including people whose life experiences have been misunderstood or misinterpreted in popular media and culture. Human Library aims to challenge these misconceptions and to confront stigma, prejudice and discrimination in all forms. Human Library invites you to become library dwellers with us, to judge a book by its cover and hear its story with your own ears.

Human Library is an open-source concept begun in Denmark in 2000. They take place worldwide, and Wunderbar has been organising them since 2011. Wunderbar produces stand-out projects that bring audiences and artists together on journeys of intrigue and wonder. The Human Library took place on 16-17 November 2013 at The Parlour Showrooms, College Green. 

In The City was curated by The Showroom Projects, who wanted to offer a regular platform for live performance, and a meeting place to re-imagine the city. In The City were interested in event challenging our perception of cities, discussing how cities evolve, what they leave behind and how the people that live in them exist.

The Human Library was kindly supported by Colston Hall, Bristol Central Library and Oxfam Bookshop, Queens Road.