In times long past, no such home did yet exist, for poetic souls.

The idea persisted, that writing is solitary, reading idle. That creativity tolerates only immediate perfection. That the blank page is scary.

That idea needed to be overthrown. Prior attempts, nearly lost to history: Bart van Popering organized a spoken word podium; Terry van Bunder gathered a nameless club of writers. These efforts did not yet fill the abysmal TU/e gap of literature.

However. In the Summer of 2019, they joined efforts to draw up plans for what would be KL!NK with the singular purpose to just sit down and write. And read. And speak words. It all began with the forging of the Great Things; these pillars.
Weekly sessions, Monday evenings high up in the otherwise nearly empty Auditorium building, away from but still aware of other culture associations. Writing: sharing poetic prose, surprise discovery with each word, quickly abandoning the pretenses of oughts and shoulds, embracing the challenging what-ifs. Reading: Gaiman’s American Gods and Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye, marvelling at worlds both vast and small and therefore grand, phrases poetic and mundane and therein grand.

Time passed. KL!NK lived and thrived on the enthusiasm of its members, and on outsiders’ faithful belief KL!NK had a fundamental right to be.
KL!NK lived.

KL!NK subsequently evolved with the organizational skills of Maaike Gerritse, first truthful chairperson.

And KL!NK grew, grew up, and grew into that home for poetic souls. They brave the blank page and the empty stage, and weather ill tidings of people disliking their favourite books.

4th Board: “Klinkende Glazen” (2023-2024)