Friends of Montclair Library

Keith Richards visits the NYPL in October 2010. Photo by Jori Klein.

Rolling Stone Keith Richards may be known as a rock-and-roll bad boy, but you probably didn’t know he was also a library scofflaw.

The New York Times reports that “Mr. Richards, in an interview with The Mirror, confessed that more than 50 years ago, as a teenager, he failed to return a number of books to his local library in Dartford, England, resulting in fines that British newspapers estimated would now have compounded to anywhere from £3,000 to £20,000 (about $4,500 to $30,000).”

Richards has been quoted elsewhere in praise of libraries, saying, “When you are growing up, there are two institutional places that affect you most powerfully: the church, which belongs to God, and the public library, which belongs to you. The public library is a great equalizer.”

Read more about Richards in his autobiography, Life, or check out “The Best of the Rolling Stones” on CD, at the Montclair Library.