Cake, architecture, Edinburgh World Heritage site, poems.

The Scottish Poetry Library,  Edinburgh: Malcolm Fraser Architects

OK maybe you will disagree with the order of importance in the heading,  but Thursday 7th October 2010 is National Poetry Day.

@PoetryDayUK

http://www.nationalpoetryday.co.uk/

To mark the occasion, the Scottish Poetry Library  @ByLeavesWeLive on Twitter, which I think (well actually I know!) is my favourite post-war building, is hosting a tea party (cake!!!) at 3pm.

Tea, cake, and poetry (theme of Home) in one of Edinburgh World Heritage Site's  most iconic 20th century buildings (for the cognoscenti dahlings...) is my idea of bliss.

Cake, photo my copyright not to be reproduced without permission


I hope to be there, I hope you will be there also.

Right, the links.

Scottish Poetry Library

http://scottishpoetrylibrary.wordpress.com/2010/09/30/bookish-blog-2/

Thursday 7th October, we’ll be stopping for tea at 3pm. Although we are keen tea-drinkers, this particular tea party will be for a Higher Purpose (oh yes!) and we invite you all to join us in celebrating National Poetry Day with a cup of warming tea and a poem about our theme, ‘home.’ You can join in by coming along to our tea party at the library at 3pm, by stopping to read a poem about home wherever you are, or by tweeting @PoetryDayUK or @ByLeavesWeLive.


Postcards will be available by post from the SPL (send us a self-addressed ordinary letter size envelope with 1st or 2nd class stamp marked NPD 2010), to pick up at the SPL, and online as e-cards from 7th October. Postcards will be available from lots of other places around the country: email us at reception@spl.org.uk to find yours.

It’s been all hands on deck this week in the build up to National Poetry Day, particularly for our Reader Development Officer, Lilias Fraser, and our Education Officer, Lorna Irvine. Postcard orders for schools have now closed, resources for teachers and education professionals are up on GLOW (look for a national group called ‘poetry’) and everyone at the library would like to thank them for their hard work with a cup of tea, coffee or Earl Grey… how’s 3pm, Thursday 7th October?

Malcolm Fraser Architects

http://www.spl.org.uk/about/building.html

I look on this building as a poem that we've made together, composed from light, view, rhythm, embrace, movement, gathering, colour, texture and metaphor to express the joy of poetry, and optimism for its future within our culture.

Malcolm Fraser

Designed by Malcolm Fraser Architects, the building was financed principally by a grant from the Scottish Arts Council National Lottery Fund. The Scottish Poetry Library has won several awards, and was shortlisted for Channel 4's Building of the Year 2000.


As well as general reading and study sections, it has facilities for listening and performing, and special children's and members' areas.

http://www.malcolmfraser.co.uk/projects/?contentid=257&parentid=248


Edinburgh World Heritage

http://www.ewht.org.uk/

A national celebration of poetry in a fantastic building in one of the most wonderful of cities. All this and cake too. How much more bliss can life hold?

Nem

A selection of past posts on similar subect matter:

http://nemesisrepublic.blogspot.com/2010/02/hug-for-poetry-and-unesco.htmlunesco.html

http://nemesisrepublic.blogspot.com/2010/02/edinburgh-old-and-new.html

A hug for poetry and UNESCO

I'm really chuffed– it's like having my name in lights above a theatre. And what a theatre Douglas Dunn on our plans to project his poem @carryapoem Twitter  http://www.spl.org.uk/

Update Feb 15th - here it is, from yesterday, courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisdonia/4354548980/in/pool-1279846@N25 where it can be viewed extra huge

Update Feb 19th it seems one couple got engaged in front of the carryapoem projection! Fabulous!

http://carryapoem.com/2010/02/19/love-in-a-carry-a-poem-climate/

and this is astounding - a 360 panorama of the castle, Princes Street and the 'carry a poem' line projection:

http://www.macneill.co.uk/castle_fl/

As I mentioned earlier this week, February is 'Carry a Poem' month in the first UNESCO City of Literature, the World Heritage Site city of Edinburgh.

http://carryapoem.com/

http://allextremelyprecarious.blogspot.com/2010/02/edinburgh-carries-poem.html

The promo film is magnificent, and I particularly like the starring role of the Edinburgh Police Box, designed by the once City Architect, the splendidly named Ebenezer MacCrae.



So, not one to allow an opportunity to pass to blog about architecture connected with poetry, first of all here is my 'carryapoem' for St Valentine's Day, as kindly sent to all Twitter Followers by @carryapoem and I trust that it brings pleasure to those who have come upon it new, although I suspect it is an old friend to many.

It's reproduced in a number of places on the internet, so I hope I'm not too badly breaching copyright to repeat it here, in the additional hope it might be more widely loved still.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/poetry-tess-gallagher-troubadour-cafe-1586641.html

There is a delightful little poem called The Hug. "Some kind of hardcore poetry people wanted me to take it out... In the United States, if you have any jollity in a poem, it can't be a poem capital P." A line at the end goes, "When you hug someone, you want it to be a masterpiece of connection." Tess reads this with a wicked sense of full-blooded fun in her eye, raising those pencilled-in Modigliani eye-brows of hers - not centralised by romantic love any more, but still in the hope zone.

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/g/tess-gallagher/

The Hug is also anthologised in what is one of my favourite reads, STAYING ALIVE - real poems for unreal times, Ed Neil Astley, Bloodaxe.

http://www.bloodaxebooks.com/personpage.asp?author=Tess+Gallagher


The Hug

A woman is reading a poem on the street
and another woman stops to listen. We stop too,
with our arms around each other.The poem
is being read and listened to out here
in the open. Behind us
no-one is entering or leaving the houses.

Suddenly, a hug comes over me and I'm
giving it to you, like a variable star shooting light
off to make itself comfortable, then
subsiding. I finish but keep on holding
you. A man walks up to us and we know he hasn't
come out of nowhere, but if he could, he
would have. He looks homeless because of how
he needs. "Can I have one of those?" he asks you,
and I feel you nod. I'm surprised,
surprised you don't tell him how
it is - that I'm yours, only
yours, exclusive as a nose to
its face. Love - that's what we're talking about, love
that nabs you with "for me
only" and holds on.

So I walk over to him and put my
arms around him and try to
hug him like I mean it. He's got an overcoat on
so thick I can't feel
him past it. I'm starting the hug
and thinking, "How big a hug is this supposed to be?
How long shall I hold this hug?" Already
we could be eternal, his arms falling over my
shoulders, my hands not
meeting behind his back, he is so big!

I put my head into his chest and snuggle
in. I lean into him. I lean my blood and my wishes
into him. He stands for it. This is his
and he's starting to give it back so well I know he's
getting it. This hug. So truly, so tenderly
we stop having arms and I don't know if
my lover has walked away or what, or
if the woman is still reading the poem, or the houses -
what about them? - the houses.

Clearly, a little permission is a dangerous thing.
But when you hug someone you want it
to be a masterpiece of connection, the way the button
on his coat will leave the imprint of
a planet on my cheek
when I walk away. When I try to find some place
to go back to.

Photo found at: www.myspace.com/hugperformance

A performance installation series by Julie Troost (worth reading the site).

So, a hug to all who read this, and a hug to poet Douglas Dunn especially, whose work I have admired for many years.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/8513232.stm

A line of romantic poetry is to be projected onto the rock beneath Edinburgh Castle for Valentine's Day.

The words "Look to the living, love them, and hold on" will shine on the north face of Castle Rock.

The line is from the poem Disenchantments by the award-winning Scottish poet Douglas Dunn.

The spectacle, which will last five-and-a-half hours on Sunday evening, is part of the Carry a Poem campaign run by the City of Literature Trust.

Ali Bowden, director of the Edinburgh UNESCO City of Literature Trust, said: "We are delighted that Historic Scotland is supporting the Carry A Poem campaign, and joining us in bringing poetry to Edinburgh Castle, the iconic cultural image of Scotland's capital city.

"This one-off projection joins five other poems shining throughout the city - two onto the City Chambers, the new extension of the Usher Hall, the National Library of Scotland and at the foot of Leith Walk - all of which can be enjoyed until March."

Robyn Marsack, director of the Scottish Poetry Library, said: "Douglas Dunn's lines are so appropriate: they say that love endures, like the Castle Rock which they'll illuminate for a night."...

http://www.contemporarywriters.com/authors/?p=auth137

Indeed. Joyful and enjoy!

And a small plug again here for this:

http://www.scottishcf.org/events/3-million-pound-arts-prize/

The Scottish Community Foundation can now reveal the Scottish Book Trust, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop and Edinburgh College of Art as the successful projects to progress to Stage 2 of the £3M Arts Funding Prize for Edinburgh.

The three short-listed projects fought off competition from 10 other Edinburgh based arts organisations to be in the running for the £3M prize. The prize – administered by the Scottish Community Foundation on behalf of an anonymous donor - is to create an arts facility of cultural and architectural merit in the Capital, in either a new or refurbished building.

I'm rooting for this:

The Scottish Book Trust’s proposal is to significantly improve the Trust’s premises at Sandeman House, off the Royal Mile. With a more useful space, the Trust hopes to work collaboratively with neighbours and colleagues in the literature sector, such as the Edinburgh UNESCO City of Literature Trust, the Scottish Storytelling Centre and the Scottish Poetry Library, to create Scotland’s Literary Quarter. The Trust also aims to create an education centre within the nearby historic Trinity Apse (currently the Brass Rubbing Centre).

Marc Lambert, chief executive of the Scottish Book Trust, said: ‘This is a really important step for us. Whether we win or lose, we’re delighted our proposal stood up to the competition. To progress to the next stage of the competition is not only exciting for the Scottish Book Trust, but for all those who have a stake in literature in Scotland, including readers, writers, publishers and our colleagues in the literature sector.’

The initial funding came from Edinburgh World Heritage and the architect is Malcolm Fraser:

http://www.ewht.org.uk/New-Plan-to-.aspx

http://www.malcolmfraser.co.uk/projects/?contentID=385&parentID=248

The category C listed building largely dates from 1916, and was intended for the use of the congregation of the Moray Knox Free Church, but it also incorporates parts of an earlier tenement on the site which dates from 1849.

Amongst other improvements to the building, the proposal suggests an extension to the front elevation of Sandeman House. This would enable level access to the building via Trunks Close, and also give the Scottish Book Trust more of a presence for passers-by. The scheme also proposes a redesign of some of the internal spaces of the building, enabling the Scottish Book Trust to increase their programme and grow as an organisation over the coming years.

With the Scottish Storytelling Centre, Canongate Books, The List, the Scottish Poetry Library and Edinburgh City of Literature all based nearby, improving access to Sandeman House could bring new life to the close and enhance this fantastic grouping of cultural organisations as well as Edinburgh’s offering to visitors.

...by leaves we live... quote from Patrick Geddes, entrance to the Scottish Poetry Library http://www.spl.org.uk/


Nem

'Edinburgh, Old and New'

Symson the Printer's House, Edinburgh (click to enlarge) http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jane_Stewart_Smith03.jpg

This morning I was browsing the Capital Collections website and this entry caught my eye:

http://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/capitalcollections/mfraser/mfraser.html

I don't altogether agree with Malcolm Fraser that we 'traditionalists' should all be lumped together as naysayers, and some of us do have a little idea of the history of construction and the wide variety of architectural styles and forms that existed in the past (and Malcolm, your beautiful, intelligent, award winning Scottish  Poetry Library didn't get the thumbs down did it? It has that similar vigour and the sense of accretion...) although I won't argue that certain recent additions to the glorious city of Edinburgh are not all that we might wish.  Today, I'll be kind and not name too many names.

http://www.edinburgharchitecture.co.uk/scottish_poetry_library.htm (thumbnails - click to enlarge pics)

http://www.spl.org.uk/

Scottish Poetry Library, Edinburgh, pic credit MFA http://www.malcolmfraser.co.uk/projects/?contentid=257&parentid=248

See also * bottom of post

However, I thought I would do a short blogpost to bring to the attention of  those unaware of its existence,  the online website Edinburgh Old and New

from which the above image is taken (click to enlarge).

Cassell's Old and New Edinburgh by James Grant was printed as a periodical in the 1880s and is now seen as a set of three or six volumes, and describes its history, its people, and its places by using anecdotal historical text with endless illustrations. These volumes were a gift from my uncle, Bill Smith. As someone who has lived in Edinburgh for more than 50 years, the illustrations still thrill and excite me no matter how often I look at them. For this reason I wanted to put them online in such a format that Edinburgh school children and students might easily download the images or text whilst researching the history, architecture, society of Edinburgh's Old or New Towns.

—Hamish Horsburgh

Thank you Hamish Horsburgh, for that fine and generous thought; I have derived so many hours of pleasure from browsing and hope others will also.

Here is the link:

http://www.oldandnewedinburgh.co.uk/

That's not the sole pleasure from that site; there's a link to other digitised books:

You can now browse and search the complete collection of John Kay's Original Portraits and Caricature Etchings, Memorials of Edinburgh in the Olden Time, and Edinburgh Past and Present on the Edinburgh Bookshelf

http://www.edinburghbookshelf.org.uk/

and a list of other useful links:

http://www.oldandnewedinburgh.co.uk/links.php

(click to read)

Another website full of useful and fascinating information, including the House Histories news and a number of podcasts, is that of Edinburgh World Heritage, although it takes a wee while to find all the treasures hidden there:

http://www.ewht.org.uk/Home.aspx

Here's a small sample:

http://www.ewht.org.uk/House-Histories.aspx

http://www.ewht.org.uk/Stevensons-Edinburgh.aspx

http://www.ewht.org.uk/Stories-in-Stone.aspx

http://www.ewht.org.uk/Sense-of-Place.aspx

and further links:

http://www.ewht.org.uk/Links.aspx

including one to where this all began:

http://www.ewht.org.uk/Capital-Collections-Goes-Live.aspx

And of course there is this:

http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/search_item/index.php?service=RCAHMS&id=120878

and the excellent photographs here:

http://www.henniker.org.uk/

and here:

http://www.edinphoto.org.uk/

and

http://www.geo.ed.ac.uk/scotgaz/towns/moretpix337.html

For further reading, I recommend Hamish Coghill, Lost Edinburgh:

http://www.birlinn.co.uk/book/details/Lost-Edinburgh-9781841587479/

I steal this poem from the website of Valerie Gillies, a past Edinburgh Makar, in the hope she won't object as it seems so fitting here:

http://www.valeriegillies.com/edinpoem.html

It was written on the occasion of the opening of the new Edinburgh District Council building, Waverley Court, in 2007 (of which building the least said the better...)

To Edinburgh

Stone above storms, you rear upon the ridge:

we live on your back, its crag-and-tail,


spires and tenements stacked on your spine,

the castle and the palace linked by one rope.


A spatchcocked town, the ribcage split open

like a skellie, a kipper, a guttit haddie.


We wander through your windy mazes,

all our voices are flags on the high street.


From the sky’s edge to the grey firth

we are the city, you are within us.


Each crooked close and wynd is a busy cut

on the crowded mile that takes us home


in eden Edinburgh, centred on the rock,

our city with your seven hills and heavens.



Happy reading!

 
Nem

*PS More poetry: Carry a Poem  http://carryapoem.com/  Great stuff happening in Embra this month! @carryapoem on Twitter

This is just to say...

I am working on a slightly longer blog, honest, one about buildings, but thought I'd bring more Festive Cheer in the meanwhile.

So: here's @fatcharlesh latest blog on er... bogs:

http://fantasticjournal.blogspot.com/2009/12/trumpet-blowing.html

But it's the RIBA ones so that's OK.

Here's the best Advent calendar of the year:

http://www.framleyexaminer.com/advertcalendar/

I like the idea of a game of family Squabble after the stuffing and roasties.

And I'm not sure how I lived without an executive plum warmer...

although of course here's a cue for

a) a favourite poem

b) a ref to architecture

Dr. William Carlos Williams (sometimes known as WCW) (September 17, 1883 – March 4, 1963), was an American poet closely associated with modernism and Imagism. Williams has a theatre named after him in his hometown Rutherford, called “The Williams Center”

This is just to say...

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast.

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold.


Which reminds me to tell you to add @byleaveswelive to your Twitter lists (The Scottish Poetry Library Embra http://www.spl.org.uk/)

Malcolm Fraser's small but beautifully formed, a haiku of a building in fact, Scottish Poetry Library, Edinburgh World Heritage Site, (it's an outbreak of Christmas peace... ) courtesy of Geograph and is © Copyright Brian D Osborne and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons Licence http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/51023  for larger version and for more pictures and writing and stuff http://www.malcolmfraser.co.uk/projects/?contentID=257&parentID=248

Here's the website of the Williams Centre, a rather fetching historic theatre and cinema once called the Rivoli:

http://www.williamscenter.org/

Do read the history, even if you turn off the 'soothing' muzak, although for the fraught in need of soothing it's just the thing.

All that remains of communities and civilizations, all that remains of their worth and dignity exists in the arts they leave William Carlos Williams

More Christmas lights, Disney's Hollywood Studios. Fab.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_8oET4WWcI

Just don't think of the carbon emissions...

and here's all the latest news from the North Pole:

http://santaupdate.com/

Nem