The First Local to Head the National Library: Hedwig Anuar

Shirin
She was one of five people in the honours class in English. She was the only woman. She is the one who got the first class. The gentlemen got second and third class. And I think somebody dropped out. And the men, the four or three men, I guess three or four men, were all accepted into the administrative service. 

Jimmy
I did not know this. 

Shirin
Yes. So, she was not. The civil service apparently did not take women at that time. There was also a rumour that she was not accepted because of her involvement in student activities. So, I think this is something we will never really know, but that may have had something to do with it. 

And again, I think it was a very different time. And women had very few choices. They either ended up being teachers, nurses or, you know, maybe doing some secretarial work. And a large part was stay-at-home moms, I guess. 

[Music playing] 

Jimmy
You’re listening to BiblioAsia+, a podcast produced by the National Library of Singapore. At BiblioAsia, we tell stories about Singapore’s past. Some familiar, others forgotten, all fascinating. 

You wouldn’t describe Hedwig Anuar as a tall woman, but in the minds of Singaporeans, she is a giant. The first Malayan to hold the post of director of the National Library of Singapore, [a] position [she would hold] for a little over 20 years, from 1965 to 1988. As director, she was responsible for shaping the library in significant ways. 

Among other things, she pushed for a focus on books for children, spearheaded the roll out of branch libraries, and initiated the computerisation of the card catalog. She was also active outside the library. She was a founding member of the women’s rights group AWARE and eventually became its president after she retired from the library. Most Singaporeans know of her through her many public accomplishments. 

However, few people know Hedwig Anuar, the person, and someone who knows this side of her well is her daughter, Shirin Aroozoo. Shirin wrote about growing up as the daughter of Hedwig Anuar in BiblioAsia, and she’s here in the studio today to tell us all about what that was like. Welcome to the BiblioAsia+ podcast, Shirin. How are you? 

Shirin
Thank you for inviting me, Jimmy. I’m very happy to be here today. 

Jimmy
Thank you for coming. We are very excited to have you. I just wanted to start by asking you what it was like growing up as the daughter of Hedwig Anuar. Did people stop you in school that your teachers say, you’re the daughter of Hedwig Anuar? What was it like? 

Shirin
I think as a young child, you don’t really know what your parents really do for a living. You just know them as mum and dad, right? And, I think it was only later, perhaps in secondary school, that I realised that well, yeah, she’s the head of the library and, yes, some of my friends and teachers were aware of that. And, of course, when I went to the library, people knew me as Mrs. Anuar’s daughter. 

Jimmy
Right. Do you remember the first time you went to the library? What was your first memory? 

Shirin
I was very young. I mean, I must have been about 5, I think it was before primary one. The building was a very iconic red-brick building, as everybody knows, and I would go up to her office on the second floor. I remember it being very big, or so I thought. And it was just a very welcoming place. Very comfortable place. 

Jimmy
Did they allow you to stamp books? 

Shirin
Yes. Yes, I did do that occasionally. It was a lot of fun. 

Jimmy
I can imagine. And presumably, you spent a lot of time just reading books in the library, and, you know, mum would bring you to the library. 

Shirin
Yes. 

Jimmy
Deposit you in the children’s section or whatever? 

Shirin
Definitely. And that’s how I got to know some of the children’s librarians. My mother would go up to her office and sort of leave me there as, I mean, they were sort of the babysitters, I guess, in a strange way. But I would wander around the children’s section and look out for all the new books. And attend the storytelling sessions. 

Jimmy
Oh, right. So, did you go to the library quite frequently? After school, for example? 

Shirin
Yes. I only went to the convent in secondary school, so I would go there after school. In my younger days in primary school, my helper would sometimes bring us there. And on Saturdays, my mother would bring me to the library because the library was open only half a day. 

Jimmy
Right. Okay. Let’s talk a little bit about your mother and her background. She was born in 1928 in Johor Bahru. Tell me about her background and her education and how she ended up being the director of the library. 

Shirin
Sure. My mother is the second in a family of six siblings born to a Eurasian mother and a Eurasian father. Her father, Percival Frank Aroozoo was the principal of Gan Eng Seng Secondary School from 1938 to 1955. What I found very interesting in some of my research is that he qualified as a teacher at the age of 17, so he was very young. 

He was definitely a huge influence on my mother and her siblings in terms of generating a deep interest in writing and reading. So, when he was the principal of the school, he produced an annual school play for 12 years. And he also started the school magazine. He taught for 20 years before he became the principal of Gan Eng Seng. He encouraged all his children to aim high and to go to university. He had missed out on going to university because he had to start work, and he could not afford to go to college. 

Jimmy
Right. 

Shirin
From my understanding, he was also a very strict and stern father, but he was very close to his children nonetheless. And I think this is something that also carried through in his children, like my mother, and affected their outlook in life. Another interesting fact is that all of them were born in Johor Bahru except for her two youngest siblings who were born in Singapore. There was also a seventh sibling, but unfortunately, he passed on at about the age of 12 months. And the reason that they were born in Johor Bahru was that their grandmother lived in this lovely big house in Johor Bahru, and I guess my grandmother wanted to be with her mother for childbirth and needed family support. And so, they were all born there. 

Jimmy
Oh, so they were actually living in Singapore? 

Shirin
So, they did a bit of a shuttle, actually, she did go to school in Johor Bahru at the convent there from 1934 to 1936. And then when they made the move to Singapore, she moved to Victoria Street from 1937 to 1941. 

Jimmy
And she eventually went to university, I guess the University of Malaya at the time. 

Shirin
Yes. That’s right. 

Jimmy
And what was her degree in?  

Shirin
In English literature. 

Jimmy
Oh, okay. 

Shirin
Yeah. My understanding is that there were very limited subjects back in those days. She was not a science person, so it would either have been history, geography or literature. I think it was very limited. Yeah. She wasn’t interested in geography, but she enjoyed history and literature very much. 

Jimmy
She eventually became the director of the National Library, so she must have been a bit of a reader herself. What do you know about that? 

Shirin
Yes. So again, it goes back to her childhood. Her father was very much interested in reading and had all sorts of books in their home. I mean, I’ve seen pictures of book shelves lining the walls and every shelf is filled with books. And recently, I found a typewritten list of books that my grandfather had, and they were actually categorised by topic. 

Jimmy
Oh, so like a catalogue? 

Shirin
Yes, like a typewritten catalogue. Looks very yellowed. It’s very old from 1968. And it’s categorised and the subjects included art, children’s books, biographies, history, travel fiction, literature, which included drama, poetry and essays, as well as philosophy and religion. So, you can see the range is extremely diverse. 

Jimmy
So, your mother grew up in this environment? 

Shirin
Yes, they all did. And I think the only thing that was missing was sports. They were not a sports-oriented family, which was quite unusual. 

Jimmy
Okay. 

Shirin
I think the other thing that we need to remember is that it was a very different time. I mean, there was no television, there was no internet, obviously. So really reading was their form of entertainment. And the radio, they would listen to the radio. So, she really developed a love for reading. Discussing it with one of my aunts some years ago, she said that my mother was a real bookworm, and she was the biggest bookworm. She would just plonk herself in a corner and just read. She just loved that. And she also, I discovered, read to her grandfather because her grandfather had problems with his eyesight. So, she would read out [loud] to him, and again, would read, you know, all sorts of topics, I guess. 

Jimmy
So, I guess this, this love for books and this need to categorise... 

Shirin
Started from a young age. 

Jimmy
It’s genetic. 

Shirin
Yes, definitely. 

Jimmy
She had a very interesting time at university. In addition to obviously being a very good student, she was also involved politically, as many students in university were at the time. Where do you think that streak of activism came from? 

Shirin
I think it came from her experience in the Japanese Occupation. 

Jimmy
How old was she then? 

Shirin
She would have been a teenager. She was about 16, I think, 16, 17. And so old enough to know what was going on, I think. She was number two in the family. She was told that the younger siblings didn’t really understand what was going on. My grandmother, unfortunately, was not very well physically. So, my mother and her older sister had to take on a lot of responsibilities in running the household, cooking and cleaning and that sort of thing, while my grandfather was presumably at work. 

I think this also forced them to grow up very quickly, obviously. But going back to the political streak, I think the Japanese Occupation affected her a lot. And I think there was a lot of political chatter in the home about the British and the Japanese and she would have had conversations with her father, her uncles, grandparents, neighbours, etc. 

And I think the postwar period, especially, ignited her interest in politics as she could feel the impact of politics on everyday life. In fact, in one of her interviews in the 1990s, she mentioned coming across a demonstration on the street. This was after the war. There had been a one-day strike against the British government. And so, the buses went on strike and they had to walk all the way from their home in Penang Road to the university at Bukit Timah because they didn’t want to miss their lectures. Right. And it was very important to them that they didn’t have any disruption to their studies. And I think this was, you know, after the war. So probably about 1947, ’48, [and] she never forgot this incident. She always mentioned that it was a very exciting time in Singapore’s history. She said most of the students were very political in their outlook as they looked forward to independence. And she called all of them nationalists at the time. 

Jimmy
So, did you talk to her about her time during the Japanese Occupation or university? 

Shirin
It was a very painful time. The Japanese Occupation. She didn’t talk about it very much, but the little that she did, it was obviously a very difficult time. Obviously, food was scarce, and they saw a lot of, I mean, they saw a lot of crimes and fallen heads, I think, displayed at Dhoby Ghaut and they would walk by this. 

And so, there was always a fear of, you know, what might happen if her sisters went out. Yeah. And that sort of thing. And she could not go to Japan. She did not want to go to Japan for many, many years because she just hated the Japanese. It was much later in life that she finally went. But it was always very painful for her to talk about the Japanese. 

Jimmy
That is the war. 

Shirin
So yes, it impacted her greatly. 

Jimmy
Yeah. She was hoping, after she graduated, to join administrative service. But she ended up not getting a position. How do you think that shaped her? 

Shirin
I think she was very disappointed. She didn’t talk to me directly about it, but I have read about it. 

Jimmy
She had first-class honours, right? 

Shirin
She was one of five people in the honours class in English. She was the only woman. She was the one who got the first class. The gentlemen got second and third class. And I think somebody dropped out. And the men, I guess three or four men, were all accepted into the administrative service. 

Jimmy
I did not know this. 

Shirin
Yes. So, she was not. The civil service apparently did not take women at that time. There was also a rumour that she was not accepted because of her involvement in student activities. So, I think this is something we will never really know, but that may have something to do with it. 

Shirin
And again, I think it was a very different time. And women had very few choices. They either ended up being teachers, nurses or, you know, maybe doing some secretarial work. And a large part was stay-at-home moms, I mean, there were no domestic helpers back in those days. And it was only a few years later that some of her close female friends got accepted into the administrative service. 

So, it was a very different time. But I think going back to how it affected her. I think it stayed with her. I don’t think she ever forgot that. And I guess that was the beginning of her quest for, I don’t know, equality and joining AWARE and creating AWARE and all that later on in life. 

Jimmy
Do you know how she became a librarian? 

Shirin
It was purely by chance. I think she didn’t really quite know what to do. So, she had an English degree, and she was hoping to join the civil service, but she was rejected. So, she taught for about six months. I think she needed to work and earn some money. 

And, at that time, I guess public institutions were just coming to the forefront or just being created in Singapore, the library being a new institution. So, the job just came up and it just seemed like a good alternative. And so, she applied. As mentioned earlier, she applied for the Queen’s scholarship, but it went to a gentleman instead, who actually dropped out too, who didn’t even finish the scholarship. So, she was quite upset about that. And my mother often lamented that if she had gotten the scholarship, she might have ended up as an English professor at Cambridge instead, or something in academia. We will never know. Because there were very few career choices. This librarianship post came up, a library assistant, and so she applied and she got it. As I mentioned earlier, there were very few choices. Even the law faculty had not been set up yet. And anybody who wanted to study law had to go overseas. 

So, while she was a library assistant at the University of Malaya, based in Singapore, she got a scholarship to study librarianship in 1955. And, this was two years, so she spent two years in England studying librarianship. 

Jimmy
Okay. And so that set her off on – 

Shirin
On the path of librarianship. Yes. And, in 1962, she actually received a letter from Datuk Loke Wan Tho encouraging her to apply for the position of director of the National Library. 

Jimmy
This is 1962? 

Shirin
1962. Yes. And, he was actually the first board chairman of the National Library, and he had discussed it with Mr. S Rajaratnam, who was the Minister of Culture at the time. And they both decided that she would be the best person for this position. So, just to backtrack a bit, the library at that time in Singapore was being run by an expat and Datuk Loke Wan Tho sort of warned her indirectly that she may not be able to get the director position straight away and she would have to report to this expat. 

So that’s exactly what happened. She came back to Singapore from Malaysia, and she became the assistant director from 1962 to 1964, reporting to this person, which I think she was a little bit disappointed about. But anyway, subsequently, she became the director in 1965. So, all in all, she was involved with libraries for about 36 years. 

Jimmy
Among her many achievements, one of the things that she did was to actually push for books for children, ensuring that, you know, that the libraries would be well stocked with books. And, in fact, I think she actually got one of your aunts, her sister, to come and head the children’s collection. 

Shirin
Yes, that’s right. Eleanor. 

Jimmy
So, what do you think was behind this? 

Shirin
I think I’m not 100 percent sure, but I think that my mother could see the value of education. And I think that after food and shelter are taken care of as basic needs, education comes next. And I think that my mother believed that if you instilled the love of learning and reading from a young age, it would stay with you hopefully throughout your life. 

It's really about forming good habits. It’s just like sports. If you start a child in sports from young, presumably they will continue that interest. Everybody has got different interests, but I think it starts from young. So, she really wanted to cultivate that habit from a young age. And I think she saw, from her own personal background, how it could change one’s life and how you could move on, through education. So, it was very important to her. 

Jimmy
Okay. I want to turn to slightly more, maybe personal questions. What was it like growing up as her daughter? I mean, you mentioned earlier, she would bring you to the library when you were much younger, but how did her being a librarian sort of shape her as a parent, for example? 

Shirin
So being a very small family, it was just me and my mother. We did have a full-time, living helper at the time growing up. And she was almost like my second mother. I was very close to this helper. I think looking back, I didn’t know any different. I didn’t grow up with a father. I didn’t grow up with any siblings. So, I just thought, oh, this is it. It was sort of a quiet household, I would say, because it was just the two of us. She would bring home lots of books to read for herself and for me. When I was younger, she would bring home books for me to read. And then as I got older, of course, I got to choose my own books. Or a combination of, you know, whatever she thought might interest me. So, evenings were spent, either talking about the day or what I did in school. 

Homework, you know, the usual stuff. But we didn’t have, like, tuition classes back in those days. The most I did was, I had an interest in ballet. I enjoyed ballet, so I went for ballet classes, and I also took piano for a little while. So those were the two extracurricular sort of activities I did outside of school. 

But I didn’t go for tuition in math or English, like they do today. So, we would, I guess, discuss my day or her day, and we would listen to classical music. My mother enjoyed classical music very much. And then, of course, when television started, I think that was the late 60s. I remember we had a small black-and-white television. Very small. I think it was like 12 inches or something. And we would watch the news until, I think, they sang “Majulah Singapura” after all the local programmes. It’s either at the beginning of the programme or the end of the day, anyway. Yeah. So, we would watch a little bit of TV, but she wouldn’t sit there for hours. She was not really a TV person. And it was generally, I would say, a quiet household because it was just the two of us. 

Jimmy
And a very bookish house. 

Shirin
A bookish household. Yes. We would go to the park. That would sort of be our outing. We would go get groceries, like actually groceries, not so much. The helper would go to the market and get fresh produce.  My mother was not very domesticated, in that sense. Which I find strange. She was really more of an academic. 

Jimmy
So, she didn’t do the cooking? 

Shirin
No, she didn’t do any cooking or cleaning. The helper did that. And it wasn’t important to her. Yeah. She said you know there’s much more important things to do. Food was also not... That was very un-Singaporean of her. She enjoyed her food, but she was not the type of person to go out of her way to go and eat a particular dish or that sort of thing. It’s like whatever is in front of you and you just eat it. And I think that’s something she taught me. We had a helper, was very good at cooking, and she could cook all kinds of food from Malay, Chinese-style, Indian, Western. So, I was exposed to a lot of different types of food. And my mother always made me eat everything on the plate. 

Jimmy
All right. Yes. It was that time. 

Shirin
Yes. You know, there are people starving in Africa. Yes. So, looking back, I think that was, I think, that’s a trait that came from the war because, you know, it’s precious. And you finish[ed] what you had. Whereas in today’s world, I mean, people don’t think at all about leaving half of the plate full. So, that was very important to [her]. And the fact that she exposed me to a lot of different foods, I think, was also very good because there are a lot of children today who are extremely fussy with their food. 

Jimmy
And your mother frequently had to travel with you, she brought you along with her. 

Shirin
Not really the biggest trip but one of her big trips that she had was in 1972. She had some conferences in Europe. I forget exactly where, but she left me in England, and that was my first big trip. She left me with her sister. She had two sisters in London, so she left me there. And, I had a wonderful time. I think I was there for about three or four weeks. 

Jimmy
How old were you? 

Shirin
I was 10. So, I loved it. And then in 1975 she had another, sort of business trip, I guess you call it, to the U.S. And so, I tagged along as well. And it was mostly California and Hawaii and it was after those trips that I really wanted to go study. 

Jimmy
You wrote about it in your piece for BiblioAsia; I think you were 17 when you went to Canada, was it? 

Shirin
I went to the U.S. 

Jimmy
San Francisco? 

Shirin
San Francisco, yes. 

Jimmy
Right. But you know, you can imagine that, presumably as a parent now, letting your 17-year-old go off to a faraway country where there is no internet and no easy life. It’s a big decision. 

Shirin
Yes, it was a huge decision. I think I bugged my mother for probably about a year or more to go, and there was actually a lot of opposition within the family. I mean, basically her sister and her, other aunts and my uncles, you know, the fact that I was a very young girl going to this faraway place all by myself. 

Jimmy
And there was nobody there, right? 

Shirin
No, I didn’t have any family there. I was looking to go to California and there was nobody there. So, it was a huge deal. And there was also a financial cost, of course. Which she didn’t really talk about and only found out later that she actually had to borrow some money to allow me to go. 

Jimmy
That’s what parents do, right? You shield your children from all this. You do what you can. 

Shirin
Yes, you do what you have to do. And again, this is something that now, as a parent, of course, I understand that you do everything for your children. So that’s exactly what she did. So yeah. 

Jimmy
But, even when you were abroad, you guys kept in touch because you are obviously very close. 

Shirin
Yes. So, we spoke on the phone, I think every week, even though it was very expensive. I think it was like a dollar a minute back in those days and we wrote lots of letters. I have boxes and boxes of letters. 

Jimmy
Are you writing to her about your life? 

Shirin
Both. Yes. Both ways. And some of these letters are about, you know, five to 10 pages long and they’re very detailed. Yeah. I mean, I still have them. I go through a few of them occasionally, but I’m at a loss at what I’m going to do with them. Then after that, the letters that eventually change to emails [and we] e-mailed each other. 

So yeah, we always kept in touch and she would, when I moved to Canada, she would visit every other year and I would come back. So, we saw each other pretty much every year. 

Jimmy
And she also made it a point to be at your graduation. 

Shirin
Yes, of course. You know, special occasions. In 1993, when she became Woman of the Year by the Her World magazine, I came back to surprise her. 

Jimmy
She didn’t know you were coming? 

Shirin
No. Yeah. 

Jimmy
So, when she realised, how did she react? 

Shirin
I think I just showed up at home. Oh. My mother-in-law picked me up and said she had a surprise. 

Jimmy
Okay. And how did your mother react at that point? 

Shirin
It was wonderful. Yeah, I was very happy. 

Jimmy
I can imagine. So, you know, your mother has been involved for a number of years in the library; she’s helped start up the archives. Singapore Book Council. What do you think is like the common thread with all this? 

Shirin
I think the common thread is that if you are going to take up a role in any organisation, you have to give it your all. And my mother was very dedicated to all these organisations and others that she was involved with. In terms of a common thread, in particular for these organisations, I think the thread is her passion for education, writing, reading and history. 

You know, if we look at each of them sort of in isolation, for example, where she set up a little library that focused on women’s issues, and she would spend countless hours at the centre cataloguing the book titles and arranging the library and all this sort of thing. And on weekends, it didn’t end. She would go to various bookstores and always be on the lookout for books that covered women’s issues. 

Jimmy
Right. 

Shirin
That she thought would be useful for the library. So, you know, that thread of education is in that, for the National Archives that she was involved with, for almost 10 years. I think she felt that it was very important that Singapore build up an arsenal of our history for the future generations. She always believed that in order to understand where we are today, we need to understand where we came from and what future generations went through so that we can fully appreciate what we have today. 

And that’s what I think she believed that the National Archives was for and the Singapore Book Council, which was previously the National Book Development Council, was set up to promote reading and encourage the development of Singapore literature. This is again something that my mother was very passionate about. She was very supportive of local playwrights and local authors. You know, she had a whole collection in our home of Singapore authors such as Goh Poh Seng, Gopal Baratham, and many, many others. So, she really felt that this was part of Singapore’s history. 

Jimmy
You wrote in your piece that your mother, you know, introduced books to you, especially during different phases in your life. Like, you know, maybe when you were a teenager, she brought home books about relationships and all that. Can you tell us a bit about that? 

Shirin
So, my mother introduced me to books, obviously from a young age. I think we started out with picture books, you know, Eric Carle and Doctor Seuss and she would always read me a storybook at night, just to get me engaged. And then in my teen years, I enjoyed the series and books by a lot of female writers. I think, what I recall are [the] Nancy Drew [series] and Judy Blume. I can’t recall all the names, but I remember a lot of the protagonists were female and I think maybe, I don’t know, maybe that was a subtle message. You know, that women can do anything or whatever. So, when I was in secondary school, I did literature as well. And we would discuss some of the poems and she loved Shakespeare and poetry. So that’s what we enjoyed, critiquing the poetry, I guess.

Jimmy
And now, of course, you’ve undoubtedly passed it all to your son. Your son is how old now? 

Shirin
He’s 27. 

Jimmy
He’s a young man. 

Shirin
He’s a young man. Yes, yes. Late 20s. 

Jimmy
But do you remember the books you’ve read? 

Shirin
I started with picture books when he was young. And then, I think the book that sticks in my mind was something called Goodnight Moon. 

Jimmy
Okay. Right. 

Shirin
by Margeret Wise Brown. Trying to put him to sleep. 

Jimmy
Right. 

Shirin
I read that every night. Yeah. 

Jimmy
We’re recording this in 2025. How old is she now? 

Shirin
96, going on 97. In November, she will be 97. 

Jimmy
And she has some health issues. 

Shirin
So, my mother was officially diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in March of 2004. So, she’s been living with the disease for about 21 years now. Yeah. You know, we noticed on the phone calls when I was living in Canada at the time, that she was quite forgetful and repeating herself, on the phone and, for a bunch of reasons, we came back to Singapore at the end of 2003, and speaking with her friends, they said, you know, I think we need to get her checked out. 

So, she was officially diagnosed in 2004. Fortunately, the disease progressed very, very slowly. And, as you know, it is not a physical disease, but it affects the brain. And it’s really only in the last six years or so that the deterioration has become much more evident. She can no longer communicate. She no longer recognises anyone. She’s not mobile. She’s at an advanced stage now, and she is like a baby. Almost. She sleeps about 95 percent of the time, and she eats all blended food. But she’s very well taken care of, and she fortunately, she doesn’t have any other ailments, actually. 

Jimmy
Good physical health. 

Shirin
Yes, her physical health, her vitals are all good. 

Jimmy
And I understand that people from the library still visit her. 

Shirin
That’s right. Yes. 

Jimmy
So, what happens when people come in? 

Shirin
We sit around at the dining table with my mother at the head of the table in the wheelchair, and she’s pretty much sleeping most of the time. I’m not sure if she’s even aware of what’s going on. We like to think that she does and that she is absorbing something. The helpers do tell me that they believe. I mean, because they spend a lot of time with her, they believe there is something. There’s a little bit of reaction. But it’s very hard to measure because I’m not sure if her hearing is that good anymore. And also her sight. Yeah. So, it’s very hard to engage with her because of her current condition. 

Jimmy
But I guess the fact that her colleagues have made it a point to come and visit her, not just like once a year, but several times. 

Shirin
Yes, yes. 

Jimmy
You know, it speaks to them. 

Shirin
They’re very fond of her, yes. 

Jimmy
The friendship that has endured. 

Shirin
Yes, it’s very, very special. I have a WhatsApp library group. 

Jimmy
When did you come back to Singapore? 

Shirin
I came back in November of 2003. 

Jimmy
Okay. So, a little before your mum was diagnosed. 

Shirin
Yes. 

Jimmy
And you’ve been living in Singapore ever since? You’ve seen Singapore change and all that. So, what is your personal favourite library? 

Shirin
I’m very old fashioned, so I’m going to have to say the red brick building, which no longer exists. On Stamford Road. And it’s really because it holds a lot of special memories for me. I feel that the libraries of today, while they are obviously very advanced, they lack a bit of warmth. They feel a bit cold and intimidating. 

Jimmy
It’s the air conditioning, no? 

Shirin
Yeah, that could be it, too. But it’s all white, it’s a bit clinical. But having said that, it’s lovely to see people, you know, wandering through the stacks and looking for a book, and leaving the library with a bag of books, so that’s wonderful. And it’s also wonderful to see people of all ages, from young children to senior citizens using the library. And I think it’s something that my mum would have been, you know, very happy to see. For myself, I only really go to the Queenstown branch because I live near there, or the Central Library on occasion. 

Jimmy
You grew up in the library in some way. 

Shirin
Yes. 

Jimmy
So how would you say it? What are libraries to you? “Libraries are...?” 

Shirin
Constantly evolving. 

Jimmy
That’s true. 

Shirin
I think they were designed way back when as peaceful spaces for community and learning. But today, especially in the Singapore context, they’ve evolved into something much more, and by that, I mean, for example, the Central Library on Victoria Street, it’s got a drama theatre, it’s got a pod for special events. It’s got rooms that you can book for meetings. They’ve got computers, obviously, that people can use. They’ve got art exhibitions and various other exhibitions. So, it’s become a place not just for borrowing books, but for people to come together for various reasons. And they also run classes for people to be engaged. 

Jimmy
Well, Shirin, thank you for coming on the BiblioAsia+ podcast. It was really lovely having you. To learn more about Hedwig Anwar and her life and to learn more about Shirin’s memories of growing up with Hedwig Anwar as her mother, please read Shirin’s article on biblioasia.nlb.gov.sg. Shirin, thank you once again for coming on the show. 

It’s been a real pleasure having you. And I hope to see you in the library sometime soon. 

Shirin
Thank you for having me. 

Jimmy
Okay. 

[Music playing] 

Jimmy
If you’ve enjoyed this episode, subscribe to this podcast and the BiblioAsia  newsletter. Thanks for joining us on BiblioAsia+.

Shirin Aroozoo, “My Mother, Hedwig Anuar,” BiblioAsia 21, no. 2 (July–September 2025).

Timothy Pwee, “Hedwig Anuar: First Lady of the National Library,” BiblioAsia 21, no. 2 (July–September 2025).

This episode of BiblioAsia Podcast was hosted by Jimmy Yap and produced by Soh Gek Han. Sound engineering was done by Nookcha Films. The background music "Di Tanjong Katong" was composed by Ahmad Patek and performed by Chords Haven. Special thanks to Shirin for coming on the show.

The BiblioAsia Podcast by the National Library Singapore tells stories about Singapore history.