Visit to Northern Poetry Library

Where did we go?

On 27th November 2025, CILIP North East enjoyed a visit to the Northern Poetry Library (NPL), which is housed in Morpeth Library. We were hosted by Sarah (Senior Librarian), Michelle (Librarian), and Sarah-Jayne (Library Supervisor), and by poet Hilary Elder. Lauren Sissons and Suzie Williams have co-wrote this blog post to share highlights from the visit.

About the Northern Poetry Library

The NPL is one of the largest collections of contemporary poetry outside of London. Among its treasures, the collection includes first editions, signed copies, poetry periodicals, and a children’s collection.

What happened?

Part 1 – Talk from the Librarian

Our visit began with a talk about the Library’s history from Michelle, the Reader Development Librarian. Michelle spoke of the challenges – financial, spatial, alluvial, and pestilential – faced by the NPL since its opening nearly sixty years ago. It was formed in 1968 by the North Northumberland Arts Group and Northern Arts, with an aim of collecting a copy of every poetry book published in the United Kingdom from that year onwards. It also collected more ephemeral items often missed by bigger libraries, including magazines, journals, and pamphlets. It was housed in Morpeth Library from 1968 until 2015.

The Northern Poetry Library celebrated its 25th anniversary in 1993, holding a poetry festival that featured Simon Armitage, Carol Ann Duffy, Liz Lochead, and many other poets beside. It has since faced challenging budgets, a damaging flood in 2008, dispersed collections, a temporary home at the Chantry from 2015-2024, and a relocation in 2024 to its current premises in Morpeth Library. What also emerged from Michelle’s talk was the extraordinary resilience and resourcefulness of the Library and its librarians, and the special place that this collection occupies in the community and more broadly.

Whilst it hasn’t been possible to collect a copy of every poetry book published in the country each year – the original aim of the collection’s founders – the Library now holds over 17,000 volumes and counting. During the 2000s, the collection was catalogued and is now searchable online. The Library gratefully accepts donations which help build the collection even in times of financial constraint. To aid the Library’s relaunch after the 2008 flood, the Arts Council provided funding in 2014, and the period from 2015 to 2017 saw several projects including poets in residence, the creation of a new website, and the official launch of the collection’s new home in the Chantry on National Poetry Day in 2016.

Fifty years after its founding, the NPL celebrated this milestone anniversary by hosting the first meeting of the UK Poetry Library Network, and by creating the Poem of the North: a living, co-created poem grown with the help of fifty selected poets. The result is available for everyone to read and enjoy. Activities even continued in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns, when the NPL participated in the Haiflu project, arranged virtual workshops, and held a virtual book launch for NPL poet Jan Clarke. The Library participated in the 2022 Illuminated Sheep project which marked the return of the Lindisfarne Gospels to the North East. On 3rd October 2024, the Northern Poetry Library was officially welcomed to its new and current home in Morpeth Library with a launch event which included a poetry competition. The winning poems and entries were published in an eBook, which is available to borrow from Northumberland Libraries’ digital lending system, Borrowbox.

Part 2 – Talk and reading from poet and library user

After learning about the history of the Library, we were given a poet’s perspective from Hilary Elder, a practising poet who uses the NPL regularly. In her reading of three poems written especially for our visit, she guided us through the library, from the experience of looking at shelves as a reader sat before the stacks; to the thoughts of books awaiting readers on the shelves, at once reluctant and eager for visitors to enjoy their words; to a new visitor eager for adventure among the volumes.

Hearing Hilary’s experience, it became clear what a special resource the Library is: describing it as a ‘rare gift’, she reminded us how poetry helps people to connect with each other, and to come to grips with the world and with each other. Poetry has long been a way for people to form a community, to understand their past and their environment, and to explore and express emotions. And not only that, referencing a study by the National Literacy Trust on children’s engagement with poetry, Hilary emphasised the benefits of poetry for children in particular – and especially those eligible for free school meals.

This, of course, makes collections like the Northern Poetry Library a fantastic resource with great potential. And yet, Hilary reminded us, barriers do exist. There are difficulties in searching for books on the shelves and in the catalogue, particularly for casual browsers, unless the poet is well known. Titles might be misleading, or unrevealing, and so opportunities for readers to find what they need might be missed. All of this might lead to a sense of overwhelm. Hilary ended her talk by posing the question - what can be done to open up the collections, and to make it more accessible for readers to embark on their own reading adventures?

Part 3 – Discussion about challenges faced by the library, accessibility of collection/promoting it/encountering it

A Library’s layout, its catalogue, and the books themselves can all present accessibility problems and make it difficult to promote the collection and the space. In our discussion, we spoke about the use of social media and themed collections that coordinate throughout the whole library space, instead of only the floor that houses the NPL, to draw the interest of visitors who might not normally visit that particular area. But, as often is the case, the most effective ways might also be the most simple, and the most effective, in engaging users. 

A particularly popular idea discussed during our visit was to use colourful card to create speech bubbles to put on shelves next to the books, that describe the content of a particular volume, or thoughts from a visitor or member of staff who has read and enjoyed it (a bit like you often see in commercial book shops). Card bubbles and pens could be left out in the library for visitors and readers to add their own contributions to. Including a QR code and short url on the speech bubble could help other library users to follow up on these recommendations. Visitors could be encouraged to add to this collection of speech bubble to share their own experiences of using the poetry collection.

Concluding thoughts

We thoroughly enjoyed our visit to the Northern Poetry Library, learning about its history, resilience, and relevance, and hearing the perspective of a Library user who draws on the NPL in their own practice. The Library is open to all, and we would heartily recommend that you embark on your own adventure through those ‘shelves and shelves of sleeping words’.