Islam Issa hears from actor Adrian Lester and Professor Ewan Fernie about a project that will revive the Birmingham Shakespeare Memorial Library. Founded with the help of George Dawson - a man who had a powerful vision of Birmingham as a progressive social and cultural centre in the mid 19th century - the library houses Britain's most important Shakespeare collection, comprising 43,000 volumes, including a copy of the First Folio 1623. Over three years, the Everything to Everybody project aims to share these cultural riches with the people of Birmingham in a wide range of imaginative ways.

More information available here: https://everythingtoeverybody.bham.ac.uk/

This episode is one of a series of conversations - New Thinking - produced in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research Council, part of UK Research & Innovation.

Producer: Torquil MacLeod