We have enjoyed a variety of literary events this last fortnight. We celebrated
National Poetry Day (or '
Week' in South Wales) at
Number 5 Cwmdonkin Drive, birthplace of Dylan Thomas. Thanks are due to Annie and Geoff for laying on a number of events, and to Peter Thabit Jones of
The Seventh Quarry for organising a programme of readings for last Saturday night.
It was good to meet
Ian Griffiths of the Suffolk Poetry Society and
Geraldine Green from Cumbria. Singer-songwriter, Maria Lindström from Sweden, was on tour, and read some of her work bilingually. We were sorry not to coincide with
Susan Richardson, who was performing on a different evening. Peter Thabit Jones directed - and acted in - a performance of his verse drama, '
The Boy and the Lion's Head'. David and I read alongside fellow Quarry Poets, Jean Salkilld (Tuesday Poets) and Lynn Hopkins (author of '
Creatures of a Dead Community', Seventh Quarry Press). Jill Goodwin-Croke read poems by Dylan and Caitlin's daughter,
Aeronwy Thomas, including one about walking in her father's shadow in a literary kind of way.
'
Games' was the assigned theme for this year's National Poetry Day, so I chose my poems with this in mind, reading 'The Ocean's Tears' (a Tercet Ghazal about a children's tide fight) and 'Lament of a Lewis Chessman' - about chess (just in case you were in any doubt!).
A lot seems to have happened since then!
We spent this afternoon in
UCS at a lecture by
Faber novelist,
Louise Doughty, sponsored by the
Suffolk Book League. Louise's latest novel, 'Whatever You Love' was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Prize and longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. Louise, however, is also well known for her
how-to book, '
A Novel in a Year' - and I was pleased to buy a signed copy from her before she left Ipswich.
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| University Campus Suffolk, Waterfront, Ipswich - venue for Talk by Louise Doughty |
