Bristol Central Library has always been one of my favourite places. It’s a time machine. I only have to walk up those steps and I’m instantly transported back to the late 70s, being taken there by my parents. That darkened, slightly ominous lobby. A smell like nowhere else on Earth. It was here I rushed to borrow the latest Doctor Who Target novelisations, where I read my first Sherlock Holmes story and where I discovered The Ghost of Thomas Kempe, which gave me nightmare after nightmare, but I loved it all the same.
As I got older, I ventured up into the LP section and stumbled upon comedy albums. The Goons. Fawlty Towers. The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Dad’s Army. Around the Horne. And, wrongly catalogued, The Doctor Who Sound Effect Album – which I admit was pretty funny in its own way
When I need a break from writing from home today, I still head down to the Library. There’s something about the reference library upstairs that gets my creative juices flowing. The hushed scratches of pens against paper and fingers against keyboard, punctuated by the occasional scrape of chair legs.
I’ve lost count of the times that I’ve looked up from those long, joined desks and wanted to climb the roped-off spiral staircases to wander the galleries, off-limits and therefore endlessly fascinating.
Tonight, I got that chance. The writing group I belong to, North Bristol Writers, was given a special behind the scene tour, visiting, among other places, the private Bristol Room, complete with Judge Jeffreys’ tattered chair, and the chief librarian’s office with its strongroom containing a single lock of hair.
We ventured down into the basement (where I resisted the urge to build a Ghostbusters-esque stack of books) and – yes! – up into the galleries above the reference library. Thanks to our tour guide, Andrew, I finally got to look down from those railings.
Afterwards, I was honoured to host a night of readings from the group, with Pete Sutton, Clare Dornan, Piotr Świetlik, Roz Clarke, Suzanne McConaghy, Justin Newland and John Hawkes-Reed stepping up to entertain us.
Nowhere else in Bristol could you hear stories of malevolent plants, stolen novels, exploding air locks, eternally disappointed car salesmen, gargoyles, dodgy Friars and making out in food preparation areas.
Another great memory formed in a building I adore.
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