What can one do for Poetry Day? I wondered a few weeks ago. Then before I realised it Poetry Day was the next day and I panicked. I got an email from a friend about an evening event and quickly searched to find it. With a sign of relief I sat down to do my bit for the cause.
At 5.45pm I entered the foyer of the theatre and asked the girl at the counter of the theatre shop for the poetry event. “Take the lift to the sixth floor”, came the answer. This I duly did and the lift opened to a scene of tea and cakes. Friends were greeted with a smile and a hug, water poured into a cup and the cup then balanced in an effort to acquire a piece of rice cake (I had not had lunch and thus needed substinance).
My poor effort for the was evening written on a piece of A4, while others had bookmarked well worn editions of poetry favourite collections, which were now in their hands and their expressions were of nervous anticipation. I sat down at a small table and looked at my piece of paper.
Did it rhyme? Should it rhyme? Would it make sense? “She’s rehearsing her poem”, I hear someone say. This comforted me, at least someone realised my feelings. We all sat in a corner of the Upper Gallery Vestibule, seats arranged in a semi circle, then the poetry began. The first was a vast historic poem on the authors’ hero Nelson. It described the battle of Trafalgar and the death of Nelson and was performed with gusto and a real feeling for the event. A grand opening to the proceedings.
A verse from Camus was read in Japanese then English and whose philosophy was understood by all those present in both languages. Then John Betejemin whose tale of ‘Miss Joan Hunter Dunn’ gave a joyous mirth to the event. Then a poem by Milton on the meaning of life, which gave everyone present food for thought. All were entertained by expert readings of famous and not so famous poems.
Somehow I acquired courage to stand up and read from the page in front of me.
Some words were not on the page, but at least I made some of those present laugh. And they do say that sometimes, laughter is better than tears.
The evening was closed with a reading of Martin Luther Kings’ speech
‘I had a dream’. A fine ending to a fine evening.
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September 15, 2009 · 1 Comment
by Violet Rook
A rabbit ran across the path and 
into the bushes followed by a a little girl laughing and giggling with delight and her mother timid, but amused. I was walking through the gardens of the local town hall and civic centre. The gardens were lush with greenery and flowers. I had seen rabbits in the early evening nibbling the grass on the wide expanse of the gardens, the flags outside the building blowing in the breeze and the noise of the traffic filling the air. I stood at the Pelican Crossing and waited for at least five minutes for the green man to flash. Buses passed, lorries stopped and started. Impatient motorists blew horns. The mother collected her child before she and the child got to the rabbit and they both proceed into the rent office arm in arm discussing the adventure.
On other occasions, I’d seen another mother proceeded by her brood in the same area. This time it was a duck with five duckling in pursuit, waddling from the pond beneath the council chamber up the few steps and into the low pond in the courtyard of the building. This was all done while 
seagulls circled above watching the family in anticipation of a good meal. Here in the very centre of the city an island of magical proportions. While the motor car and the traffic rule the lifestyle of everyone travelling about the area, these little creatures seem to live out their lives, breed and give pleasure to those who observe and the innocent who behold them.
At times I am afraid to mention the sightings for fear of gossip spreading and perhaps some cruel deed might be done. Yet the gentle sights of nature are something to behold and discuss. On other occasions the garden area is occupied by sun worshippers while on their lunch hour. The trees give shade, while the people eat. It is a useful place which seems to adapt to its occupants.
Perhaps like in a ‘Midsummers Dream’ there are lots more sights and sounds in this green space which surrounds the building whose main reason for being is civic life. Most people pass by and don’t seem to notice the rabbits and the ducks, the towering trees full of nests the butterflies and bees. At night the area is bathed in a purple-blue glow which sets the imagination alight. Could it be a magical castle, a green gem set in a silver sea, which defends and maintains life in many forms?
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Arvon Friend Kate Rew – who has, very inspiringly, just published Wild Swim – presents a short film for the Guardian website, where she swims in Ted Hughes’s home waters, Lumb Falls. Arvon writers will be all too aware of the link with our West Yorkshire writing house, Lumb Bank.
Watch the film
Categories: Arvon in the world
Another point to the BLDGBLOG, this time for their interest in the bioluminescent properties of dead herrings. They quote from the wonderful W G Sebald, too, who is a great inspirational writer for lots of us – so we thought we’d post the quote here as well. I wonder if, when it gets dark enough, people who write creatively…glow?
An idiosyncrasy peculiar to the herring is that, when dead, it begins to glow; this property, which resembles phosphorescence and is yet altogether different, peaks a few days after death and then ebbs away as the fish decays. For a long time no one could account for this glowing of the lifeless herring, and indeed I believe that it still remains unexplained. Around 1870, when projects for the total illumination of our cities were everywhere afoot, two English scientists with the apt names of Herrington and Lightbown investigated the unusual phenomenon in the hope that the luminous substance exuded by dead herrings would lead to a formula for an organic source of light that had the capacity to regenerate itself. The failure of this eccentric undertaking, as I read some time ago in a history of artificial light, constituted no more than a negligible setback in the relentless conquest of darkness.
Categories: Arvon Friends · Arvon in the world · The Arvon magic · writing
Geoff Manaugh is the blog and book writer for BLDGBLOG. In a revealing moment in a recent interview, quoted below, Geoff asks an important question – what do novelists (take that to be writers in general) think about the buildings around them? Well – we would like you to tell us. Since Arvon is all about buildings (writers come and spend a week in our four historic and beautiful writing houses each week), this is a very crucial question for us. This is open to any writer – whether you’ve been to Arvon or not. Reply to this blog post and we’re going to send a copy of the BLDGBLOG book to a randomly selected winner if we get more than 50 posts!
Amazon.com: The wider culture tends to tell stories about architecture (like about everything, I guess) that are organized around the Great Creators: the Gehrys, the Wrights, the Pianos (the Howard Roarks). Your stories, by contrast, are much more impersonal–if there are any heroes they are as much the people who explore their environment–the Michael Cooks. Where do people fit into your designs?
Manaugh: Well, I don’t have that many designs as such–being a writer–but I think the everyday users of buildings are almost always more interesting than the actual creators of those spaces. For instance, what do janitors or security guards or novelists or even housewives–let alone prison guards or elevator-repair personnel–think about the buildings around them? What do suburban teenagers think about contemporary home design, when their own bedrooms are right next door to their parents–or what do teenagers think about urban planning, when they have to drive an hour each way to get to school? These sorts of apparently trivial experiences of the built environment are often far more important to hear about than simply learning–yet again–how a certain architect fits him- or herself into a self-chosen design lineage.
So perhaps we should stop talking to Frank Gehry and start interviewing valet parkers in Los Angeles–or crime novelists, or SWAT team captains. They all have an opinion about the built environment, and about the way that cities function, but no one tends to ask them what those opinion might be.
Categories: Arvon in the world · The Arvon magic · writing
by Violet Rook
The drawer opened and I found a notebook, green and dusty. A relic of 1917. Clear honest handwriting, expressing love, hope and a view of the future. Small sketches of friends with signatures of good luck. Tears were being repulsed, hard swallowing occurred to prevent a sudden rush of emotion.
The words brought such forceful but sad feelings. The little book could have been written a few weeks before, the words were so fresh with impressions and poems. Words often connect to the time and place of events with a collective image. The view was of water, sand, sea, surf and sky with the colours changing every second from reds to darkest blue.
Monet painted this scene g
iving a new word to the world of artists.The chalk cliffs of this Normandy coastline standing to attention across from the White Cliffs at Dover. This was the idyllic vision of one part of France scared by other events in the 20th century ,a scene painted by the TV programme ‘Coast’ just after the news of the death of last soldier of the First World War. He looked so frail; did those feet really run across muddy fields to the sound of thunderous guns facing those dark scenes of blood, guts and death where now in the holiday season tourists might be heading.
Harfluer was headlined with its similar views six hundred years before, a famous play and films telling the tale. Its scenes with many sequels, the actors change but not the story. What will be the prologue in 111 years time? An old man perhaps shouting his tale to the wind and rain, full of sound and fury. Can feelings be transmitted in time via words. The notebook was an insight into a world which should have been desolate, yet the words and the handwriting were of hope.
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The John Betjeman Young People’s Poetry Prize is now in its third year. The competition was inaugurated in 2006 to celebrate the cente
nary of one of the nation’s best-loved poets. The competition is open to 11-14 year olds living anywhere in the British Isles and the Republic of Ireland. Entrants are limited to one poem each about their local surroundings or any aspect thereof, whether it be a house, a street, a garden, a park, a city or a wider landscape. The spirit behind the competition is to encourage young people to understand and appreciate the importance of place.
The inaugural prize was presented by the Poet Laureate Andrew Motion to 12-year-old Jamal Msebele in front of a packed congregation at the church of St Mary Redcliffe, Bristol. Since then Jamal Msebele has been a guest on Radio 4 and has become quite a star.
Following its success, John Murray (Publishers) have offered an annual prize of £1000 (£500 to the winner and £500 to the English department of their school).
The winning poems for the 2007 competition were announced at a special poetry event at the Cheltenham Festival of Literature, where a sell-out crowd heard the poems read by leading actors including Edward Fox, Phyllida Law and Daniel Stephens.
If you would like to enter this year’s competition, please visit www.johnbetjeman.com/comp. For all enquiries, please contact the prize’s administrator Justin Gowers (email: justinagowers@yahoo.co.uk)
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A lighthearted piece by Philip Cowell, Arvon’s marketing and development officer.
Arvon’s London office – where things like fundraising and events are managed as well as where advocacy and marketing take place – has moved to the new Free Word centre in London’s fashionable Farringdon. We’ve moved in to a new literature and freedom of expression house – the first of its kind in the UK. It’s a building for London, the UK and more internationally as well: a hub for writers and readers working at all the different stages and areas in these interesting, and in many cases urgent, sectors, based on a Norweigian model of the same name – Fritt Ord.
The building hasn’t been officially opened yet – that comes in September – but the cafe is! Do come along and read a book with a cup of tea or meet a friend. And if you’re an Arvon Friend, or just interested in Arvon, buzz us and we’ll come down and say hello.
I just “wordled” the description of the Free Word centre on their website. A wordle is something like this – a visual representation of a piece of text, based on frequency of word use. It’s a great tool for writers, actually – particularly as it will show back to you how often you’re using a word, which might make you re-think (or not) your own words. Have a go at “wordling” your creative writing. I think this is a lovely way to look at text – sideways, as it were, or perhaps more accurately from up above – as if we’re peering down from a skyscraper into the city of our text.
Everyone at Arvon is really excited about the potential of the new Free Word space – with its lecture hall, auditorium and gallery space – and we hope you are too. It’s the first time we have a front of house space in London to be able to talk to people about what we do in our special historic writing houses around the UK. For that reason alone it’s been worth the move.
Categories: Arvon in the world · The Arvon magic · Words · writing
Another useful resource for Writers 2.0 – a website full of websites for writers! Intrigued? Go see…
Categories: Arvon in the world · New Writing · Words · writing
A really interesting website for writers with “practical advice and productivity tips” from a Sheffield-based creative (and copy) writer. Go visit!
Categories: Arvon in the world · Books · Words · writing
By Millie Pavitt
The BBC’s Poetry Season invites you to vote for the Nation’s Favourite Poet! http://www.bbc.co.uk/poetryseason/
Watch and listen to poetry on BBC iPlayer and read some wonderful poetry by well known poets including Ar
von tutors Simon Armitage, Carol Ann Duffy and Patrick Neate.
Famous people make their own celebrity choices and cast their vote for the Nation’s Favourite Poet. Hear English actress Sunetra Sarker discuss our new Poet Laureate and how she has “always been affected by the female solidarity on show in Carol Ann Duffy’s poems”. Carol Ann Duffy is currently tutoring Arvon course Poetry for Children: Princesses, Bangers and Mash this week at Moniack Mhor, Inverness-shire.
You can also read Patrick Neate on Duffy’s splendid anger and poetry slams in his Spoken Word column Anger Management. Patrick will be tutoring Fiction: So How’s it done? The Hurst, The John Osborne Arvon Centre in October. http://www.bbc.co.uk/poetryseason/spoken_word.shtml
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The International Literary Quarterly was founded in November 2007 as an eclectic review dedicated to publishing the best in contemporary fiction and poetry, as well as literary criticism and works in translation.
InterLitQ’s editors are all writers themselves, Arvon tutors Mimi Khalvati and Jill Dawson are among them!
Read Issue 7 now!
www.interlitq.org/
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I was up at Moniack Mhor last week in glorious sunshine. While I was there Centre Director Hamish MacDonald unveiled Moniack’s new picnic table, surely staking its claim for the most stunning seminar spot at an Arvon centre. Amid the soaring chant of skylarks and the scent of the heather, Hamish sits at the table and contemplates his holidays in South Uist.
Ruth Borthwick
7 July 2009
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