We are having a similar problem in London at the moment with some of our more senior members realising that they can't go on for ever. Where a collector has rare material that the VWML (EFDSS) would want to preserve there are issues of space, cataloguing and preservation/conservation costs. To get round this we have suggested book collections also can be donated by the same person and any that the library already has can be sold to pay for those costs.

Having said all that, if it is simply a book collection which largely consists of readily obtainable books or books that are coming online anyway, then the simplest way is to get someone like Dave Eyre in to give you a price for the whole library and let him sell them, and so pass them on to younger collectors/scholars. Dave has done this on several occasions for some pretty famous people in the last few years and I can fully vouch for his sensitivity and fairness.

I also like the idea of passing them on to some of the wonderfully talented young people who are taking an interest in the subject. (Sam Lee in London springs to mind.) Whem Malcolm died some of his folders were passed on to me. A lot of the material I already had so I immediately made arrangements to give this material to a young performer in our area who I knew would make good use of it.