Finding Inspiration in Libraries & Archives

At a recent poetry tutorial, the tutor told me that I was fortunate to have a specialist vocabulary from my day job (as a librarian / library academic) to inform my poetry, and this got me thinking about specialisms and how they can add something exotic to writing.

Today I received an email from the “Knitting Club” at work, and that reminded me of the hours I used to spend poring over patterns with my mother and grandmother as a child. I was particularly absorbed by my mother’s knitting machine (a more modern and versatile model than the one in the video) and have already referenced winding wool for my Grannie in the Tate’s online anthology.

Winchester School of Art holds the Richard Rutt Collection of books used in his ‘History of hand knitting’. Some of his nineteenth century books are available on the library website. Browse through them to get a feel for the language of knitting, or, if you’re a complete novice, watch this video from cyberseams on the basics.

Three choices of prompts:

* Write a poem about knitting, using the vocabulary of these and other sources

* Write about clothing yourself, whether through handicrafts or shopping

* Write a pattern poem using your own specialist language. A pattern poem is like a recipe poem, except that in the end you have a product. So I might write a pattern for making a book, or a library, or a website, and a plumber might write a pattern for a kitchen sink.

Or, of course, respond to any of the images and digital resources in your own way.

2 years ago 1 note

September has thirty days, so it’s time for another 30/30 poetry challenge. I’m happy to be responsible for the Friday posts again, and as agreed with other group members, I’ll be posting on Thursday evenings so everyone has (at least) the whole day on Friday to write something.

This week’s prompt follows on from Seni Seneviratne’s prompt on 1 September, to write a response to Jane Hirshfield’s poem ‘The Poet’ after making notes about our own favourite writing spot.

I moved office this week, and had to set my desk area up again. It’s a little bit different this time, but all of the same key elements are there: notebooks, postcards, posters, and lots and lots of pens. A scrawl of too many computer leads.

Taking this picture (which is one of several I took to share with my family, showing my move), reminded me of the excellent series The Guardian ran, ‘Writers’ Rooms’. Even the most minimalist people have a few things on their desk that could speak volumes about them.

Today’s prompt: pick between 2 and 5 objects on your desk that have a story to tell - the more obscure the better. If they could talk to each other, what would they say? Would they be surprised / outraged / ambivalent that the others were competing for space on your desk? Write …

2 years ago View high resolution

This week the Library of Congress announced it has placed its collection of Gottlieb jazz images on flickr - “no copyright restrictions known”. There are 219 pictures from which to choose, but, of course, I wanted to share this great shot of Billie Holiday.

This week’s prompt, though, is an aural one: listen to her famous protest song Strange Fruit and respond … any way you can.

2 years ago 1 note

In honour of Library Day in the Life, which has been running all this week, I thought I’d post a prompt based on one of my major preoccupations this week - locating, reading and writing about Georgian Poetry, the series of anthologies published between 1912 and 1922 which defined an era we now tend to forget.

This week’s prompt is “stolen titles” - grab one of the following suggestions and write from it. Don’t look up the original poem; just go wherever it takes you. Afterwards, you may wish to change the title of your piece, or keep it - this is just a way to get started:

From Georgian Poetry 1911-1912

Days Too Short / William H. Davies
The Hare / Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
Devil’s Edge / Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
Child of Dawn / Harold Monro
In the Poppy Field / James Stephens

From Georgian Poetry 1913-1915

A Town Window / John Drinkwater
The Old Ships / James Elroy Flecker
The Gorse / Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
The Wife of Llew / Francis Ledwidge
Overheard on a Saltmarsh / Harold Monro

From Georgian Poetry 1916-1917

The Fifteen Acres / James Stephens
Music Comes / John Freeman
Stone Trees / John Freeman

From Georgian Poetry 1918-1919

Witchcraft : New Style / Lascelles Abercrombie
The Nightingale Near the House / Harold Monro
A Hollow Elm / Edward Shanks
A Man Dreams that he is the Creator / Fredegond Shove

From Georgian Poetry 1920-1922

Miss Thompson Goes Shopping / Martin Armstrong
Unknown Country / Harold Monro
On a Friend who died suddenly upon the Seashore / J.D.C. Pellow
To my Mother in Canada / Frank Prewett
The Quails / Francis Brett Young

2 years ago 1 note

Today I’m in Manchester leading a training session at the wonderful John Rylands (University of Manchester) Library. If there’s time, I’m hoping to make it to the Manchester Art Gallery to see a very special photography exhibition.

Showing the work of photographer Dorothy Bohm, there’s a great web presence that’s actually looking for help to identify the subjects of some of her portraits.

Today’s prompt is simple: pick a photo from the website and write - narrative, descriptive, wherever it takes you!

2 years ago

One of the great things about libraries, especially public libraries, is the community work they do, like this children’s art project:

“When a koala is born it is the size of a jelly bean.” — Laura.

“The color of a chicken’s earlobe determines the color of their eggs.” — Sean.

“Did you know that if threatened the ostrich will kick its enemy.” —Bradin.

“From a group of photos … of Clay Animals made by 5th grade students at Creekside Elementary School in Boulder, Colorado as part of their annual readathon celebrations (teacher, Donna Ellman) … on display from February through March [2010] at the Reynolds Branch Library.” ~ flickr photo description.

Today’s prompt is to take inspiration from some of the facts the children chose to make their animals, and from any other things children say.

Have fun!

Image: copyright GRB Library

2 years ago

I’ve fallen a little behind with June’s 30/30 challenge, but wanted to share today’s prompt as it’s book-related, and I love the cover.

Esther Poyer asks

“What is the title of the book nearest to you?

Open it to page 23.

Use the first line of the second paragraph to write a poem.

You do not need to use the whole sentence (if it is a novel, or prose), use the first line, where the line breaks to a new line.”

For me it’s Margaret Atwood’s ‘The Robber Bride’ (Virago, 1994), because of course, as a librarian my shelves are alphabetical by author :).

The line will be a tricky one to write from, I think:

“Tony’s office is large, larger than it would be in a modern buil-|ding”

Something for tomorrow, perhaps.

2 years ago 1 note View high resolution

For June’s 30/30 I’ve been allocated the Friday prompts, which is handy as it’s the day I normally post my weekly prompts here: synergy is all :)

Today’s prompt was triggered by a sentence in the novel I’ve just finished reading, Nick Hornby’s ‘A Long Way Down’ (Penguin, 2006):

“She smiled the whole time we were speaking, but it was as if she’d only discovered smiling that afternoon.” (p. 222)

Then, in another act of synergy, I came across this video:

A robot that’s learning to smile. MIT Technology Review, 13 July 2009.

So, I thought it would be good to write about smiling, or learning to smile - from the Hornby quote, from the robot video or from the beautiful lady in the photo.

Image: Sukanto Debnath (Creative Commons: some rights reserved)

2 years ago

Thanks to Karen McCarthy’s organisation, we are continuing the 30/30 challenge throughout all the months with 30 days.

The first prompt, inspired by an image from the Wellcome Library’s collection, asks us to write a poem in which a body part features in each line.

The 30/30 challenge group is closed, but you can read Karen’s full prompt on her website, Open Notebooks.

Image: Dissection of a man’s chest. Illustration of the partial dissection of a man’s chest, with arteries indicated in red, by Friedrich Tiedemann (1781 - 1861). Credit: Wellcome Library, London.

2 years ago 2 notes

The BFI’s recently-restored and freely-accessible Alice in Wonderland (1903) relied on then state of the art special effects to show Alice’s shrinking and growing after drinking from a bottle she found bearing the words “drink me”. This week’s writing prompt plays with issues of taste, danger, and magic.

1. What is your favourite taste? Chocolate? White wine? The particular mixture of after-shave / perfume and sweat on your lover’s skin? Free-write for three minutes.

2. If you could change anything about yourself, what would it be, and why? Alice wanted to make herself small enough to fit through the doorway to Wonderland. Imagine you are actually able to make that change without any hard work, just through taking a magic potion, like Alice. What would it be like? Make a list of ten things you would enjoy about the change and ten things that might not be so good after all (for example, Alice suddenly grew again and thought she was trapped, until she remembered she had the mahical fan in her pocket to shrink again.

3. How would the change happen? Would it be a potion, a cake, a scent you breathed in, or even a magical fan? Would there be instructions, like “drink me” or an incantation or spell? Free-write for another three minutes.

4. Now read through your notes, and decide if you are writing a narrative or an imagistic piece. Do you want to focus on what it feels like to make the change, or to write an incantation? Do you want to write a recipe for how to change, based on your notes, or a morality tale on how the grass is always greener on the other side and the relief of changing back to yourself again (Alice wakes up just before the executioner obeys the Queen of Heart’s instruction “Off with her head!”).

5. Write!

Image: Curious Feeling by pareeerica (Copyright Commons, some rights reserved)

3 years ago 1 note

Finding Inspiration in Libraries & Archives

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