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 3 July 2006

The Libarian arrives in Vienna . . . finally

So we have managed to make it to Vienna, despite the machinations of a rowdy and mutinous crew aboard the fair ship boat where we were couchsurfing (exceedingly literally in this case, ahem) for the last half week of our library stay in Prague. We became known as the Libarian on the basis of . . . not sure. However, it stuck, it sticks and we quite like how it is vaguely similar to barbarian...bare...liberian. Probably in that order also. We can emphatically announce that Prague was our favourite library installation, on the basis of: the wonderful places we got to set up the library (Cafe Metropole, Shakespeare & Sons, Eric’s house The Boat; the number of new library members we signed up (23; the free SPINACH meal English chap Nick provided us with; the awesome Nuclear Bunker music session with a heart-breaking rendition of Blue Moon by The Duchess (soon to be posted in our Prague podcast); and the first contravention of our Bye ByeLaws which resulted in Eric being catalogued and added to the Library (ref. Bye ByeLaws 15 & 25). He has to make his own way to where we are next set up however, in order to be put on display and potentially borrowed. So, we are in Vienna for the rest of this week, and interviewing the Director of the Schule Fur Dichters, Ide Hintze, and we are about to leg it out of this internet cafe and on over to persuade some Viennese bookshops/cafes/flat surfaces that they need a travelling poetry library set up in their vicinity. As soon as we have the addresses folks, we’ll post them here so you can come on down and borrow our poetry books. Speak soon!

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