Library of Avalon Residency: the Launch
Today I launched my new residency at Glastonbury's Library of Avalon . I am grateful to Dearbhaile Bradley and all of the volunteers and trustees involved at the Library for organising the event and for reading some choice texts from the shelves by way of an introduction. I read a few poems that I felt were at home in that space (' Catwoman ', 'Dunstan' and 'The Annual Visitor'), and afterwards ran a taster workshop for those present who chose to stay for it. For the workshop, I invited the 5 writers in the room (plus me) to find a book on the shelves that got their attention. We straight away had a real mix - a book of folklore about Merlin, a pulp science fiction novel, Nichelle Nichols ' memoirs, one on prehistoric London... you already start to get a picture of the breadth and the particular nature of Avalon's bookshelves. The writing exercise I led involved choosing a word from a random page in each book, and inviting each writers t...