The Itinerant Poetry Library

Since May 2006, The Itinerant Poetry Librarian has been travelling the world with a library of ‘Lost & Forgotten’ poetry, installing the library & librarian and archiving the sounds, poems and poetry of the cities, peoples and countries she meets. Welcome to the project's blog . . . Our Itinerant Poetry Librarian lives wherever her library is - come join the cause!

FAQs: • Yes we carry our entire life and the library with us as we go • Yes, it is quite heavy • No, we're not mad. As Charles Simic said, 'But what if poets are not crazy?' That's the spirit boyo!

We exist to: remind people of the importance of free public libraries...subvert mainstream channels of distribution...remind people that access to knowledge should be free and not dependent upon economic wealth hierarchies... show people that poetry/art can provide answers to questions we ask of life...experiment in existing outside of 'the market' – thereby, instead, investing in social capital, social innovation and community.

We aim to make life taste better. Word.

Where have we been . . . ?

(2006) Amsterdam, Berlin, Dresden, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Munich, Paris, Barcelona, London, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, Norwich, York, Antwerp, (2007-2008) San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, Leipzig, (2009) Ulm, Chemnitz, Rotterdam, Huntingdon, Callander, (2010) Cork, St. Andrews . . . Where'd you like us to go? Can you help? Get in touch!

What We Are Up To Right Now . . .

Archive

Monday, 14 August 2006

How to wake up to Reggae . . . (and don’t forget we are STILL live on air in Ruigoord, Amsterdam)

. . . the easiest way is to fall asleep in the Radio tent and wake up with the JourneyMen Soundsystem at full blast on the decks, booming out some Reggae man to the Ruigoord site. Not that anyone necessarily is taking any notice, as it seems that quite a few people, who we bumped into last night slash this morning, on our recording travels, had no idea there was a live radio station broadcasting (on 90.3 fm) and streaming live from the Ruigoord site. Nevermind. At least the radio DJs are having a good time. So, well, we have had erm, maybe six hours sleep, and have already been out capturing August 13th sounds . . . which included bagpipes, a saxophone, and a visit to the cosy corner where some accordion and singing was taking place. We also need to work out how the hell to get out of here as we are supposed to be installing The Poetry Library at The Poetry Society Cafe at 22 Betterton Street, in London, on Wednesday, so we need to find out how to move our librarian, and library, back to the UK. . . we’ll figure it out. In the meantime we are going to take advantage of some audio editing which provides us with desk space in the radio tent and access to the wi-fi, so here are some more sounds from the site recorded by our trusty librarian. Here we go:


The end of a children’s theatre show

A Dutch poet in the Dichtertent on August 11th 2006



The Fake Scottish McBastard clan member1 – we thought we heard the sound of Bagpipes somewhere on site . . . August 13th 2006



We also heard this dude on saxophone when we woke up and went to find some coffee on site . . . August 13th 2006



And finally . . . last night in the bar tent we stood by the mixing desk and heard this . . .

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