The first library in Malaya was built in Penang, but its beginnings were uncertain.It was 1806 and C. Smith Esquire had a problem in Penang. Someone had borrowed the second part of the second volume of his Encyclopædia Britannica’s supplement and it had long been missing.While a situation like this may not pose much of a problem today, it was a big deal at the start of the 19th century. Books were scarce to start with, especially in a tiny...
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is a freelance journalist who has lived in the US and Australia but, for reasons unknown to herself, finds it impossible to call anywhere but Penang home.