Magic Threshold

This has been an interesting week. On Tuesday I travelled up to London to attended a rather smashing conference at the British Library. Catching the train just after 7 a.m. is for the birds. In fact even the birds were still tucked up in their hen house when I left home. They have more sense than the commuters who make that horrible journey every day. How do people do it?

I was delighted, on arriving at Euston station, to be asked directions by a stranger. Oh goodie. Evidently I must have looked like I knew where I was going.

The BL building is quite superb and a pleasure to admire as an example of great modern architecture, complete with an imposing statue at the front. The sculptor, Eduardo Paolozzi has created an impressive Newton with echoes of that Blake painting we all recognise, but can never remember the name of!

The Library itself houses an unparalleled collection of everything ever printed. 14 million items apparently. If you want to take a look at a first folio of Shakespeare's, a Guttenburg Bible, or John Lennon's song scribbles, the BL is your destination. And it's free.

The conference was called The Magic Threshold - apparently a term coined by Barak Obama to describe Libraries. The seminars were fun and informative but the keynote speech at the beginning was the highlight. It was delivered by former children's Laureate, Michael Rosen. What a fantastic bloke. And I cheered when he criticised that ghastly "thing" that is taught in our schools - Literacy. He is all for the return of the Book to the heart of our schools and the abolition of what he called "bloody worksheets". Hear hear.

In other news this week my talented younger son has been busy with his art, and it's definitely blog-worthy. But that's for another diary date. I need to muck out the chickens now.