Erwin Szabo City Library is the largest public library network in Budapest . The main library building is located in the Jozhefvaros district, not far from Calvin ter metro station on Szabó Ervin tér.
The library was founded in 1904 [1] . In 1927, the Wenckheim family palace, a monument of architecture of the 19th century in Jozsefvaros, was allocated to the library for accommodation. After a 4-year reconstruction of the palace in 1931, the library was opened in a new building [2] . As the library stock grew, the area of the palace ceased to accommodate the entire stock, several modern buildings were added to the Wenkheim palace, which made up a single complex with the historic building. In addition to the main building, the library network of the city library includes about 50 small libraries located in various parts of Budapest [3] .
Jozhefvaros has a large number of educational institutions, including faculties of the University of Budapest , the University of Semmelweis , the Protestant University of Gaspar Caroli , the Catholic University of Peter Pazman and several others. The main building of the library is actively used by students of these educational institutions, they make up more than half of all visitors [2] .
The library is named after Erwin Szabo , the Hungarian Social Democratic activist who was the first director of the library. In 2010, right-wing politicians proposed renaming the library, considering Szabo “a communist ideologist” and “a totalitarian left-wing intellectual” [4] ; however, a number of prominent figures of culture and art of Hungary came out in defense of the current name and it was abandoned.
When created in 1904, the library catalog totaled 33,000 books. At the end of 2010, the library consisted of 3,217,759 documents in the collection, including 2,372,540 books and periodicals, 6,437 cards, 53,389 musical scores, 147,861 audio material [1] .