The paper focuses on the emergence of new initiatives and undertakings in the field of promotion and use of literature in comparison with the possibilities and practices of the traditional public library institutions and of public cultural policy. First a description of a dual development of the public library and of UNESCO’s agenda City of literature makes a setting; then three parts mention different scenes and initiatives: small scenes for performance of literature, festivals of literature as a mode, and – more detailed – the various types of houses of literature - with primarily Danish/Nordic examples. The discussion gives some explanations of these scenes and activities from a sociological view of the literary life and in relation to e.g. experience economy, states that the public cultural policy mostly has fluctuated regarding these scenes and houses, and suggests generally a need to clarify questions of subsiding and relations to libraries and civil society.