Ivanhoe Reading Circle first met in 1920, and has been meeting continuously ever since. It is the oldest, and longest running book club in Melbourne. It’s incredible the book club is still going.
The first convenors of the Ivanhoe Reading Circle were avid record-keepers and the tradition of recording what books were read has continued. The Reading Circle thus has an archive that tracks a social history of the area.
What books were read shows trends in tastes, trends in availability of books and what types of issues and ideas people were interested in. We can gain some insight into who lived in the regions of Ivanhoe and Heidelberg.
We produced a list and an essay of all the books ever reviewed. Both can be found here and here.
Ivanhoe Reading Circle Inc. 