Article
An interview with the Itinerant Poetry Librarian
June 15, 2011
The Itinerant Poetry Library (TIPL) is a non static, special collections public library of poetry. For free, for everyone, and for everywhere, or at least, everywhere we can get to. From May 2006 until September 2009 the library operated continuously and was, quite literally, carried by myself, The Itinerant Poetry Librarian, which involved hoicking the collection of physical books through 11 countries and 23 towns and cities, providing a free public poetry library service in each spot I got to.
Operating without the confines of a building of its own, but within parameters of typical library systems, including free membership for all, circulation procedures, library regulation and the overseeing of the library’s collection by a librarian in situ, the project fundamentally explores, and encourages users to explore, our perceptions of what a library might be. It’s part public library, part life-experiment and part live art, and by September 2009 The Itinerant Poetry Library had signed up over 1000 members, and collected and acquisitioned new poetry titles in each place the library had operated in, so the collection now has more than 12 languages represented and has been open in more than 200 locations worldwide.
For me, personally, the project is about facilitating people to examine and enrich their lives, their communities, their cultures, in the context of the wider world, by accessing both the library as a live art performance experience, and as a real public library experience – that is, joining the library and sitting down and reading one of the poetry items in the collection. The act of reading, and specifically the act of reading poetry, and even more specifically the act of reading poetry in translation or indeed reading any other of the library’s “lost & forgotten” poetry items facilitates this very process. And it’s this very process which enables us to grow as individuals, and to understand our shared future . . . Because, as the poet Louise Glück has written: “contact, of the most intimate sort, is what poetry can accomplish. Poems do not endure as objects but as presences. When you read anything worth remembering, you liberate a human voice; you release into the world again a companion spirit.”
Running The Itinerant Poetry Library was a full time occupation from 2006 through 2009, and as it provided little or no income (by virtue of the project’s ethos of free open access) this was sustainable only by performing radically new ways of living, such as eating out of the food-bins at the back of supermarkets, sleeping on stranger's couches, and learning how to heft more than my own body weight in paper-based items (and all my meagre life-belongings) on my back, using public transport along the way to move me from one library location to the next. Since September 2009, the project has continued to operate on a part-time basis, as otherwise I would have wasted away and become too fragile to woman-handle the library around, and this has enabled me to spend more time reflecting on the undercurrents at play in my project, and specifically, to work towards uncovering a philosophy of the public library.
Fundamentally, my project is here to issue a clarion call, or, indeed, going back to the Doric Greek, a ‘paean’. Or if you’re not so much into that war stuff: a hymn to public libraries, in fact. Its modus operandi has been all about exploring ways of being, sustainable ways. Ways that address some of the core issues of our time: the limits of our world resources, the limits of a capitalist, market-driven, consumer-led philosophy. I think that poetry, and in particular, the public library have a very important part to play in helping us address these issues and that the public library philosophy, if it can be truly uncovered, will shine a light on how we should proceed.
The Itinerant Poetry Library was installed at the Poetry International Festival in Rotterdam in June 2009. How many new members did you sign up in that time? What were the festival highlights for you?
We signed up an amazing 59 new Valued Patrons of the Library (otherwise known as VPLs) at PIF 2009, which was a feat in and of itself for such a short period of time, and we were also delighted to acquisition a number of fantastic new Dutch poetry books to the library at the same time too. Festival highlights for us were the donation of a Japanese scroll of an Allen Ginsberg poem to our collection; riding on the back of a bicycle while perched on-top of the library suitcase late at night through the streets of Rotterdam; and hearing the amazing lineup of poets read their work during the festival itself – it was a privilege to be able to hear poetry in so many different languages.The ultimate highlight of PIF 2009, however, was signing up our 1000th VPL right on the last day of the festival itself! That was an amazing experience for me for personally, as it meant that for the last three years, exactly every 24 hours, I'd signed up a new member to The Itinerant Poetry Library, and I couldn't quite believe it was possible to have performed such an amazing act! My hand was shaking as VPL number 1000 was signed up to the library and given a special “1000th VPL” certificate.
Where has The Itinerant Poetry Library been since 2009? Has it been to other festivals?
Since 2009 we’ve managed to provide a library in some amazing spots, as our motto is “reaching the parts other libraries have yet to reach”. These have included operating the library on a boat on a loch in Scotland (Callander); running the library in a public park in Romania (Valcea); running the library on a mobile library van in both San Francisco (USA) and Lochinver (Scotland); running the library in a tent in a field at the Secret Garden Festival (UK); opening up in front of thousands of real live librarians at the American Library Association’s annual conference in 2010; opening up the library on someone’s front porch in Boston, MA (USA); and one of our favourites from last year, in particular, was opening the library up in a cemetery in Boston, with the daily theme for the library being, of course, “dead poets”! Usually, the way we work is that we don’t bother waiting for an invitation, we just turn up in your town anyway and start providing a free public library of poetry for all the good citizens there. However, since 2009, we’ve become a little more well known and have started to receive invites to some places. This meant that we provided a library for the good citizens of Cork (Ireland) in 2010, during the Cork Literary Festival, which saw us run the library in a café, a restaurant, a bar, and a hotel amongst other spots, while St Andrew’s (Scotland) also got us running the library in their town via an invitation to the StAnza poetry festival, and we ran the library in one of St Andrew’s public library branches while we were there too – one of our favourite meta library-in-a-library installations!
What exciting new acquisitions might visitors to the festival in Rotterdam this year expect to find?
We are particularly excited to be able to bring a selection of Romanian poetry to PIF 2011, which was donated by some amazing librarians from the Valcea Central public library, where we gave a talk (and ran The Itinerant Poetry Library) in July 2010. We’ve also got a whole load of new American poetry titles, which were donated in Washington DC in August last year, including a David Bowie-inspired handmade haiku booklet, as well as some Diane de Prima previously unpublished works which were donated in San Francisco literally last week! As per usual, TIPL’s daily selection of available titles will be themed, and we’re particularly looking forward to showcasing the chaos and order of our poetry collection!
What should a TIPL member do if they’ve lost their library card but want to borrow books from you in Rotterdam?
There is, of course, a very typical regulating procedure for this very issue! People who are already VPLs should obviously IMMEDIATELY dig through their pockets and extract from the lint and chewing gum their original TIPL membership card: this entitles you to lifetime membership and once you wave the card in front of the Librarian you’ll be good to borrow hot off the library table any day or time you find us open at PIF. If, however, you have neglected to arrive at TIPL with your card, there are two procedures you can endure. The first is just to undergo the Identification Verification Procedure (IVP), which will enable you to have immediate library access for the following 24-hour period. Once that period is up, and if you still don’t have your original member card to hand, you'll have to undergo said procedure again – as we have to check you really are who you think you might be – that does and can change overnight you see. If, however, you really think you've ACTUALLY not forgotten but just LOST ENTIRELY your membership card, then we’ve now got a procedure in place to provide a replacement card for you! Just ask and see! The Itinerant Poetry Library will be installed in and near the Rotterdam City Theatre from 15–19 June 2011. Don’t miss it!
Sara Wingate Gray speaks to Sarah Ream about The Itinerant Poetry Library, which is returning to the Poetry International Festival this year.
What is The Itinerant Poetry Library?The Itinerant Poetry Library (TIPL) is a non static, special collections public library of poetry. For free, for everyone, and for everywhere, or at least, everywhere we can get to. From May 2006 until September 2009 the library operated continuously and was, quite literally, carried by myself, The Itinerant Poetry Librarian, which involved hoicking the collection of physical books through 11 countries and 23 towns and cities, providing a free public poetry library service in each spot I got to.
Operating without the confines of a building of its own, but within parameters of typical library systems, including free membership for all, circulation procedures, library regulation and the overseeing of the library’s collection by a librarian in situ, the project fundamentally explores, and encourages users to explore, our perceptions of what a library might be. It’s part public library, part life-experiment and part live art, and by September 2009 The Itinerant Poetry Library had signed up over 1000 members, and collected and acquisitioned new poetry titles in each place the library had operated in, so the collection now has more than 12 languages represented and has been open in more than 200 locations worldwide.
For me, personally, the project is about facilitating people to examine and enrich their lives, their communities, their cultures, in the context of the wider world, by accessing both the library as a live art performance experience, and as a real public library experience – that is, joining the library and sitting down and reading one of the poetry items in the collection. The act of reading, and specifically the act of reading poetry, and even more specifically the act of reading poetry in translation or indeed reading any other of the library’s “lost & forgotten” poetry items facilitates this very process. And it’s this very process which enables us to grow as individuals, and to understand our shared future . . . Because, as the poet Louise Glück has written: “contact, of the most intimate sort, is what poetry can accomplish. Poems do not endure as objects but as presences. When you read anything worth remembering, you liberate a human voice; you release into the world again a companion spirit.”
Running The Itinerant Poetry Library was a full time occupation from 2006 through 2009, and as it provided little or no income (by virtue of the project’s ethos of free open access) this was sustainable only by performing radically new ways of living, such as eating out of the food-bins at the back of supermarkets, sleeping on stranger's couches, and learning how to heft more than my own body weight in paper-based items (and all my meagre life-belongings) on my back, using public transport along the way to move me from one library location to the next. Since September 2009, the project has continued to operate on a part-time basis, as otherwise I would have wasted away and become too fragile to woman-handle the library around, and this has enabled me to spend more time reflecting on the undercurrents at play in my project, and specifically, to work towards uncovering a philosophy of the public library.
Fundamentally, my project is here to issue a clarion call, or, indeed, going back to the Doric Greek, a ‘paean’. Or if you’re not so much into that war stuff: a hymn to public libraries, in fact. Its modus operandi has been all about exploring ways of being, sustainable ways. Ways that address some of the core issues of our time: the limits of our world resources, the limits of a capitalist, market-driven, consumer-led philosophy. I think that poetry, and in particular, the public library have a very important part to play in helping us address these issues and that the public library philosophy, if it can be truly uncovered, will shine a light on how we should proceed.
The Itinerant Poetry Library was installed at the Poetry International Festival in Rotterdam in June 2009. How many new members did you sign up in that time? What were the festival highlights for you?
We signed up an amazing 59 new Valued Patrons of the Library (otherwise known as VPLs) at PIF 2009, which was a feat in and of itself for such a short period of time, and we were also delighted to acquisition a number of fantastic new Dutch poetry books to the library at the same time too. Festival highlights for us were the donation of a Japanese scroll of an Allen Ginsberg poem to our collection; riding on the back of a bicycle while perched on-top of the library suitcase late at night through the streets of Rotterdam; and hearing the amazing lineup of poets read their work during the festival itself – it was a privilege to be able to hear poetry in so many different languages.The ultimate highlight of PIF 2009, however, was signing up our 1000th VPL right on the last day of the festival itself! That was an amazing experience for me for personally, as it meant that for the last three years, exactly every 24 hours, I'd signed up a new member to The Itinerant Poetry Library, and I couldn't quite believe it was possible to have performed such an amazing act! My hand was shaking as VPL number 1000 was signed up to the library and given a special “1000th VPL” certificate.
Where has The Itinerant Poetry Library been since 2009? Has it been to other festivals?
Since 2009 we’ve managed to provide a library in some amazing spots, as our motto is “reaching the parts other libraries have yet to reach”. These have included operating the library on a boat on a loch in Scotland (Callander); running the library in a public park in Romania (Valcea); running the library on a mobile library van in both San Francisco (USA) and Lochinver (Scotland); running the library in a tent in a field at the Secret Garden Festival (UK); opening up in front of thousands of real live librarians at the American Library Association’s annual conference in 2010; opening up the library on someone’s front porch in Boston, MA (USA); and one of our favourites from last year, in particular, was opening the library up in a cemetery in Boston, with the daily theme for the library being, of course, “dead poets”! Usually, the way we work is that we don’t bother waiting for an invitation, we just turn up in your town anyway and start providing a free public library of poetry for all the good citizens there. However, since 2009, we’ve become a little more well known and have started to receive invites to some places. This meant that we provided a library for the good citizens of Cork (Ireland) in 2010, during the Cork Literary Festival, which saw us run the library in a café, a restaurant, a bar, and a hotel amongst other spots, while St Andrew’s (Scotland) also got us running the library in their town via an invitation to the StAnza poetry festival, and we ran the library in one of St Andrew’s public library branches while we were there too – one of our favourite meta library-in-a-library installations!
What exciting new acquisitions might visitors to the festival in Rotterdam this year expect to find?
We are particularly excited to be able to bring a selection of Romanian poetry to PIF 2011, which was donated by some amazing librarians from the Valcea Central public library, where we gave a talk (and ran The Itinerant Poetry Library) in July 2010. We’ve also got a whole load of new American poetry titles, which were donated in Washington DC in August last year, including a David Bowie-inspired handmade haiku booklet, as well as some Diane de Prima previously unpublished works which were donated in San Francisco literally last week! As per usual, TIPL’s daily selection of available titles will be themed, and we’re particularly looking forward to showcasing the chaos and order of our poetry collection!
What should a TIPL member do if they’ve lost their library card but want to borrow books from you in Rotterdam?
There is, of course, a very typical regulating procedure for this very issue! People who are already VPLs should obviously IMMEDIATELY dig through their pockets and extract from the lint and chewing gum their original TIPL membership card: this entitles you to lifetime membership and once you wave the card in front of the Librarian you’ll be good to borrow hot off the library table any day or time you find us open at PIF. If, however, you have neglected to arrive at TIPL with your card, there are two procedures you can endure. The first is just to undergo the Identification Verification Procedure (IVP), which will enable you to have immediate library access for the following 24-hour period. Once that period is up, and if you still don’t have your original member card to hand, you'll have to undergo said procedure again – as we have to check you really are who you think you might be – that does and can change overnight you see. If, however, you really think you've ACTUALLY not forgotten but just LOST ENTIRELY your membership card, then we’ve now got a procedure in place to provide a replacement card for you! Just ask and see! The Itinerant Poetry Library will be installed in and near the Rotterdam City Theatre from 15–19 June 2011. Don’t miss it!
© Sarah Ream
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