If knowledge is power, then libraries must be defended at all costs. That’s the mindset of Nairobi residents Angela Wachuka and Shiro Koinange, longtime friends who have taken it upon themselves to renovate the Kenyan capital’s fading, severely neglected colonial-era McMillan Memorial Library — and in the process reclaim it for an independent Black country. Over the course of seven years, their idealism is challenged by a lack of funding, corrupt and self-serving local politics and a surprising pushback against change. Tracing all this, How To Build A Library becomes a fascinating look at the power of individual action, and a thought-provoking study of colonisation, freedom and representation.
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