diff --git a/src/lib.c b/src/lib.c
index a43bb97c..b2f9bf86 100644
--- a/src/lib.c
+++ b/src/lib.c
@@ -9,6 +9,10 @@ pic_make_library(pic_state *pic, pic_value name)
 {
   struct pic_lib *lib;
 
+  if ((lib = pic_find_library(pic, name)) != NULL) {
+    return lib;
+  }
+
   lib = (struct pic_lib *)pic_obj_alloc(pic, sizeof(struct pic_lib), PIC_TT_LIB);
   lib->senv = pic_minimal_syntactic_env(pic);
   lib->exports = xh_new();