Join a Parisian library (free) and borrow foreign language books

The libraries of the City of Paris offer the classical services that you find in most libraries around the world: access to books, newspapers and magazines, free Wifi, and a quiet seat to study or read. On top of this, they offer an e-library where you can borrow e-books online, and a rich cultural program of workshops, meet-ups and reading groups.

Signing up is easy and for free*. All you have to do is to go to your nearest library with a valid ID and register. Once enrolled, you have access to all the 57 libraries of the city and are ready to borrow your books!

The libraries have a large collection of foreign language books and it continues to be extended with new purchases (for example, I recently saw The Hill We Climb in my local library). Whilst in most libraries you will find books in English, some are more focussed on foreign languages than others. Below you will find an overview of the places with the most books in English, Spanish, Italian or German. Some other languages are concentrated in a specific library, e.g. Arabic (Couronnes-Naguib Mahfouz – 20th or Marguerite Yourcenar – 15th), Russian (Valeyre – 9th), Chinese and Portuguese (Marguerite Yourcenar – 15th), or Japanese (Canopée la Fontaine – 1rst).

Arr.	Library Name	English	Spanish	Italian	German
1	Canopée la Fontaine	1000+	100+
3	Marguerite Audoux	500+
5	Buffon	1000+	600+		100+
5	Mohammed Arkoun	1500+
5	Rainer Maria Rilke	500+
6	André Malraux	500+	50+	50+	50+
9	Drouot	1000+
9	Valeyre	500+	200+	200+
10	Françoise Sagan	500+	100+		200+
11	Violette Leduc	500+
11	Parmentier	500+
12	Hélène Berr	500+
12	Saint-Eloi	1000+	300+	100+	100+
13	Italie	500+		800+
13	Glacière Marina Tsvetaieva	300+	100+
13	Jean-Pierre Melville	300+
14	George Brassens	500+	100+
14	Benoite Groult	500+
15	Marguerite Yourcenar	1000+	300+	300+	200+
15	Andrée Chedid	500+
15	Vaugirard	500+
16	Germaine Tillion	1500+	300+	200+	200+
17	Edmond Rostand	500+
20	Marguerite Duras	1000+	200+	200+	100+
20	Couronnes-Naguib Mahfouz	300+

* The services are for free, except if you want to extend your subscription to include CDs or DVDs, you will have to pay 30,50 euros and 61 euros respectively.