LIBRARIES

Robinson College Library

Like every college of the university, Robinson has its own library. Ours is situated in Front Court.

Each member of the college has library access and borrowing rights. The library is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and can be accessed with your ID card.

For any queries relating to the College Library and its collection, please contact our excellent College Librarian, Ms Judith Brown (jab202@robinson.cam.ac.uk).

The University Library (or ‘UL’)

Every member of the University is entitled to use the main University Library, which is often called by its shorthand name: the ‘UL’.

One of six legal deposit libraries in the UK (this means it is entitled to claim a copy of every publication in printed form published in the UK and Ireland), the UL is located between West Road, Grange Road, and Burrell’s Walk. It’s not hard to find - it’s directly in front of Robinson; just turn left when exiting via the Porters Lodge entrance (or straight on, if you’re coming from the Member’s Entrance further down Grange Road).

You can find all information relating to the UL on their website.

For a full explanation of your borrowing rights, see here.

Other Libraries

There are over 100 libraries in Cambridge, many of which you will be able to use.

  • Every student at Cambridge is free to use any Faculty or Departmental Library, irrespective of which Faculty or Department they study in, or are a member of. For a full list, see here.

    There are many Faculty and Departmental Libraries in close proximity to the College, on the University Sidgwick Site. These include: the Seeley Historical Library; the Squire Law Library; the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies (FAMES) Library; the Faculty of Classics Library; the Marshall Library of Economics; the English Faculty Library; the Divinity Faculty Library; the Modern & Medieval Languages Library; and the Casimir Lewy Library (Philosophy). The Radzinowicz Library at the Faculty of Criminology is only accessible by appointment.

    Several libraries are clustered around the Old Museums and Downing Sites, which are located in central Cambridge, close to Emmanuel, Pembroke and Corpus Christi Colleges. These include: the Haddon Library (Anthropology and Archaeology); the Whipple Library (History and Philosophy of Science); and the Balfour Library (Biological Sciences).

    Other libraries include the Language Centre Library, at the University Language Centre on Downing Place; The Betty & Gordon Moore Library (Mathematics), which is located just around the corner from Robinson, on Wilberforce Road; and the Cory and Herbarium Libraries (for members of the Department of Plant Sciences, staff at the Botanic Garden, the Sainsbury Laboratory and those working in the University Herbarium), at the University Botanic Garden.

  • College libraries are slightly different. Usually, only college members have access to their college library. If, however, a college library houses special collections materials of relevance to your research, or a book that is unavailable elsewhere, you may be able to arrange to view and/or borrow that material by contacting the relevant college librarian.

    Some college libraries can be visited by appointment or following application, such as Corpus Christi’s Parker Library, home to a whole host of medieval manuscripts, and Trinity College’s Wren Library, which houses original writings by the likes of Isaac Newton, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Srinivasa Ramanujan.