Varuna’s librarian, Barbara Palmer, and the joys of volunteering

Barbara at a Varuna Open Day event

by Vanessa Kirkpatrick

If you’ve come to Varuna for a residency, it’s likely that you have met Barbara Palmer, the Varuna librarian, quietly cataloguing books or working on other projects. Or perhaps you have attended a Varuna Open Day, and you’ve had Barbara as your guide to the house and gardens. If you’ve spoken with Barbara, you will know that she not only has a wealth of knowledge about literature, but also about the Dark family and Varuna’s unique heritage.

Barbara first heard about Varuna when she moved to Katoomba in 2001. She attended book launches and other events, and got to know the Varuna team. By the time she was contracted in 2008 to value the book collections at Varuna, she already had a keen understanding of Varuna’s history. Since that time, Barbara has volunteered as Varuna’s librarian, taking care of the extensive library, as well as sorting through documents and photographs so that the distinctive history of Australia’s only national residential house dedicated to literature can be preserved.

Barbara is passionate about volunteering and has always seen it as a vital part of life. She not only spends at least one day a week at Varuna, but she also volunteers at the Mt Victoria Museum and assists in the library at the retirement village where she lives. In fact, Barbara has volunteered throughout her adult life. For several decades, the focus of her volunteering energy was on women’s rights and she made significant achievements in this field both in Australia and across the world.

However, it is with Varuna’s focus on books, reading and research that Barbara feels truly at home. The spirit of Varuna, which was donated to the writing community by Eric and Eleanor’s son, Mick, is in tune with Barbara’s own ideas about volunteering – that it is simply part of giving back to the community. She loves Varuna for its history and beauty, its quiet warmth and the stimulation that comes from contributing towards this unique environment which nurtures creativity and honours writing.

For Barbara, the rewards of volunteering are in itself: the quiet meditative tasks of cataloguing books, sifting through historical documents and preserving the gems such as Eleanor Dark’s letter from Manning Clark and her two Australian Literature Society Gold Medals. There’s also the social aspect of being part of a community that values literature: helping at the Writers’ Festivals, connecting with postgraduate students about the life and writing of Eleanor Dark, and mentoring young people in library skills. Barbara comments on the pleasure she experiences through her volunteering role, saying “Volunteering is the joy of making a contribution to an organisation or cause with the skills I have learned over the years.”

Barbara brings people together with her humour and warmth, and inspires many other people to come and volunteer at Varuna in different capacities. Something I am very much looking forward to about the end of lockdown will be to share a cup of tea with Barbara in the garden at Varuna.