About us

„It is wonderful to finger through a sheet of paper that is informing us thoroughly.“

HISTORY
November 28th, 1946 is the date of birth of the embossing plant
for the blind in Levoča under the name of the Slovak Braille
Embossing. The real history of the Braille Embossing in Slovakia
started its recording on the 1st of October in 1948, when the regular
operation of this cultural institution began. Jozef Vrabel (1911 - 1964)
was meritous in its establishment.
The first library of Braille books was founded on 25th of October,
1955 in Báhoň (14 books). In 1971 it was transferred to Levoča.
On the 21st of May 1976, the new purpose built building of the
Embossing and Library for the Blind in Levoča was brought into use.
The Slovak Library for the Blind (SLB) carries a name of Matej
Hrebenda (1796 - 1880), a national revivalist, a blind colporteur
of Slovak and Czech books, who offered and thus spread national
literature and calendars to the nation.

NOWADAYS
The SLB in Levoča is the only and unique nation-wide library and
information centre for the visually impaired people in Slovakia.
Since the 1st of January 1999, it has been a state contributory
organization controlled directly by the Ministry of Culture of the
Slovak Republic.
The SLB‘s mission is to transfer documents (books, textbooks,
magazines etc.) into the formats available to the perception of
the blind people (Braille, audio books, digitized texts, large print).
Documents adapted in these ways are organized in the library funds
and used to offer presence, absence and delivery borrowing services
to the blind and partially sighted people in Slovakia and abroad.
SLB methodically co-ordinates around 30 departments for the
blind and partially sighted users in public libraries within Slovakia
including City Library in Bratislava. The SLB at the same time
provides these departments with the documents transferred into the
formats available to the blind.

MAGAZINES FOR THE BLIND
The SLB produces 17 magazines in three versions, of various
periodicity.
Magazines in Braille are: Nový život (New Life - the first issue was
released in September 1949), Vierka, Mladosť (Youth), Šach (Chess),
Nádej (Hope), Kultúrno-literárny výber (Cultural and Literary
Digest).
Audio magazines: Nový život (New Life), Prameň (Spring), Pohyb
(Motion), Novet, Rozhľady (Views), Dotyky (Touches), Akord
(Chord), Nádej (Hope), Vodiaci pes (Guide Dog), Život (Life),
Zdravie (Health), Slovenka (Slovak Woman). By the year 2010
audio books and magazines were provided on casette tapes.
Since 2010 these were replaced by CDs. Priezor (Visor), a component of
which is also the magazine Vierka, in large print is dedicated to the
partially sighted readers.
The subscribers get magazines in electronic form via internet as
well.

AUDIO (TALKING) BOOK
Recording of talking books on reel tapes and cassette tapes was
launched in 1962.
In 1997 the first book on CD in Daisy system was produced in the
audio recording studios.
Since 2003 all the audio books and magazines have been recorded
in audio recording studios in digital format. Thus the conditions for
the progressive accessing of audio documents to readers in various
digital formats (MP3, Daisy...) were created. It enables the SLB to
take adventage of internet in providing the library services as well.
Audio recording studios are equipped with the state of the art
Japanese technology, which were as a grant donated to the SLB in
2003, allow the recording of books and magazines at a professional
level. In 2010 the SLB ceased providing the audio books on casette
tapes and CDs are used instead.

BRAILLE
The first textbook embossed in Braille in this institution was a
spelling-book „First Little Steps“ (1948).
Nowadays the SLB along with the magazines, fiction and textbooks
in Braille releases calendars and tactile pictures.
The embosser Braillo 400 provides quwality of embossing and
follow-up book-binding process of magazines, books of fiction and
textbooks.

A BOOK AND A READER
About 6,000 users attend the SLB anually and they borrow around
45,000 library units, about 2,000 of which in Braille. The number of
mail delivery borrowings is
about 25,000 library units. Annual increase of audio documents is
3,200 library units and 800 library units = 800 library units in Braille.
The library fund of the SLB contains 38 thousand library units, that
is 4900 titles of talking books and 2300 titles in Braille.
About two thousand visually impaired users use the services of the
SLB.

THE MATEJ HREBENDA DAYS
The SLB participates in organizing of the nation-wide literary
competition of the blind and partially sighted people at poetry and
prose recitation and spoken theatre as well as the review of the
writings of the blind and partially sighted authors, named Matej
Hrebenda Days.
The updated MHD statute was on the occasion of 200th anniversary
of Matej Hrebenda‘s birth signed on the 7th of March 1996, in
Hnúšťa by the statutory representatives of the SLB, Matica slovenská
and the Slovak Union of the Blind and Partially Sighted.

THE SLOVAK LIBRARY FOR THE BLIND
OF MATEJ HREBENDA IN LEVOČA, ŠTÚROVA 36, 054 65 LEVOČA
tel.: +421(0)53/2451 202, 2451 201
central: +421(0)53/2451 001
e-mail: skn@skn.sk, website: http://www.skn.sk