Ladies and gentlemen, good evening and welcome.
My name is Chris Fletcher and I'm head of Western manuscripts here at the Bodleian Library.
When our founder negotiated an agreement in 1610 for the deposit in his library of a copy of every book printed in the land,
his one great concern was an influx of what he called idle books and riff raff in short English literature.
Well, we revere Thomas Bodley and his legacy, but these days we don't mind English literature.
Nor do we mind archipelagic literature of the kind published by Andrew Mcneilly.
In fact, we collect both as a manuscripts mine.
This is a red letter day for me. I'm very proud on behalf of Sarah Thomas, of these librarians,
to invite you to listen to an extraordinary group of writers reading from their work in this magnificent room.
But I'm also delighted to invite you afterwards to look at some of the work itself drawn
from the archive of Andrew's Plutarch Press and set out here before us in these cases.
Manuscript's writers, readers and lovers of literature.
What could a library possibly hope to add to this mix?
Why would you serve in our community?
When I arrived in the city not so long ago, I asked the poet Lucy Newlin to give me some hot literary tips.
You must talk to Andrew McNeely, she said. I'm glad I did.
And here he is.