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London Library

1841 establishments in EnglandCharities based in LondonGrade II listed buildings in the City of WestminsterHouses completed in 1676Libraries in the City of Westminster
Organisations based in the United Kingdom with royal patronagePrivate libraries in the United KingdomResearch libraries in the United KingdomSt James'sSubscription libraries in England
London Library 2020
London Library 2020

The London Library is an independent lending library in London, established in 1841. It was founded on the initiative of Thomas Carlyle, who was dissatisfied with some of the policies at the British Museum Library. It is located at 14 St James's Square, in the St James's area of the City of Westminster, which has been its home since 1845. Membership is open to all, on payment of an annual subscription, and life and corporate memberships are also available. As of December 2021 the Library had over 7000 members.T. S. Eliot, a long-serving President of the Library, argued in 1952 in an address to members that, "whatever social changes come about, the disappearance of the London Library would be a disaster to civilisation".

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London Library
Duke Street St James's, City of Westminster Mayfair

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N 51.507 ° E -0.137 °
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Duke Street St James's 5
SW1Y 6BN City of Westminster, Mayfair
England, United Kingdom
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London Library 2020
London Library 2020
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St James's Theatre
St James's Theatre

The St James's Theatre was in King Street, St James's, London. It opened in 1835 and was demolished in 1957. The theatre was conceived by and built for a popular singer, John Braham; it lost money and after three seasons he retired. A succession of managements over the next forty years also failed to make it a commercial success, and the St James's acquired a reputation as an unlucky theatre. It was not until 1879–1888, under the management of the actors John Hare and Madge and W. H. Kendal that the theatre began to prosper. The Hare-Kendal management was succeeded, after brief and disastrous attempts by other lessees, by that of the actor-manager George Alexander, who was in charge from 1891 until his death in 1918. Under Alexander the house gained a reputation for programming that was adventurous without going too far for the tastes of London society. Among the plays he presented were Oscar Wilde's Lady Windermere's Fan (1892) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895), and A. W. Pinero's The Second Mrs Tanqueray (1893). After Alexander's death the theatre came under the control of a succession of managements. Among the long-running productions were The Last of Mrs Cheyney (1925), Interference (1927), The Late Christopher Bean (1933) and Ladies in Retirement (1939). In January 1950 Laurence Olivier and his wife Vivien Leigh took over the management of the theatre. Their successes included Venus Observed (1950) and for the 1951 Festival of Britain season Caesar and Cleopatra and Antony and Cleopatra. In 1954 Terence Rattigan's Separate Tables began a run of 726 performances, the longest in the history of the St James's. During the run it emerged that a property developer had acquired the freehold of the theatre and obtained the requisite legal authority to knock it down and replace it with an office block. Despite widespread protests the theatre closed in July 1957 and was demolished in December of that year.