The Inaugural Jennifer Palmer Lecture - Portico Library, Manchester

I felt truly honoured when, earlier this year, I was invited to give the inaugural Jennifer Palmer Lecture at the wonderful Portico Library, right in the heart of Manchester. Jennifer was a very well-read crime enthusiast who moderated a panel of which I was a member on my very first visit to the Portico. She died - far too young - last year, and her estate has funded a series of lectures on her favourite subject.

The Portico is, like Gladstone's Library and the Lit and Phil in Newcastle, a wonderfully atmospheric independent library. These are places to be cherished and supported - as Jennifer cherished her association with the Portico.and gave it enthusiastic support to the end of her life. 

My subject was (surprise, surprise) The Life of Crime, and the host was my fellow author Matthew Booth. The event was a sell-out and it was great to see some familiar faces in the audience, most of all Stuart Palmer. The main concern for me was that Stuart should be happy with the evening and thankfully all went well. Kudos to Debbie and Thom and their colleagues at the Portico for all the arrangements. I also did an interview for local radio at the end, so it was a varied evening in a stunning setting and one I really enjoyed.

And here is a photo of that first event at the Portico (after I'd spent a day working in my firm's then nearby Manchester office) which I've just retrieved. Next to me on the right is Kate Ellis. Jennifer is talking to her, and beyond her are Dolores Gordon Smith and Cath Staincliffe.

Classic Libraries

I love libraries. Perhaps that should be a statement of the obvious when made by any writer or avid reader. But of course, in dark economic times, public expenditure on libraries is apt to come under the microscope, with potentially alarming consequences. I was greatly impressed with the new central library at Newcastle, at which I was delighted to appear last summer, though I share the anxiety of those who fear that there will be few if any new major libraries like it built in the next ten years.

But let’s celebrate libraries, private as well as public. I’ve mentioned some of my favourites before. They include Manchester's Portico Library and John Rylands Library, the library at Liverpool’s Athenaeum Club, of which I’m fortunate enough to be a member (strictly, ‘proprietor’) and the wonderful Lit and Phil, again in lucky old Newcastle, at which I appeared in 2008.

The Bodleian is, of course, in a class of its own, although I was never too keen, as a student, on the newish law library in the St Cross Building. To my shame, I have yet to visit the revamped British Library in London. Speaking of the capital, I know some people who rave about the London Library, but again I’ve never visited it.

I’m looking forward to the launch of The Serpent Pool in St Deiniol’s Library in Hawarden next month. When I received the invitation to appear there, not long after I featured this remarkable residential library on this blog, I was truly delighted. And I’ll be taking the opportunity of an overnight stay. To sleep in a library! Can’t be bad.

Private Libraries

Private libraries – the older the better – enthral me. There’s something very special about these places, which are usually oases of calm in the middle of a bustling city. For about fifteen years, I have been a proprietor (that is, member) of the Athenaeum in Liverpool, which has a truly fabulous library, full of antiquarian curiosities. And last year, I did a Victorian mystery event at the Lit and Phil in Newcastle, a place I found deeply impressive (especially because of its wealth of obscure crime novels.)

This last week, I added an excellent new private library to my list. This is the Portico Library in Manchester. I’ve walked past it many times, but never been inside before. This changed when Jennifer Palmer, of Mystery Women, invited me to take part in a panel discussion.

My fellow panellists were two long-time friends, Cath Stainclife and Kate Ellis, and another local crime writer, Dolores Gordon-Smith, whom I first met at Crimefest last year. I’ve never done an event with Dolores before, but she proved to be a lively and entertaining speaker, and I felt the combination of the four of us worked well (even if I am a rather unlikely Mystery Woman...)

The Portico organised a first-rate buffet, and the ambience was fantastic. You really had the sense of history, in a room where people have read and studied for a couple of centuries. There was a thought-provoking exhibition about myth and legend in literature, very well illustrated, that I enjoyed reading. And I loved the heading above one set of bookshelves: ‘Polite Literature’. Couldn't help wondering how many have searched in vain for the Rude Literature….