Saturday 27 July 2019

An excuse for a holiday!

Looking along the Mawddach Estuary to Barmouth Bridge

We may be taking a break from The Writer's Room over the summer but there's certainly no break from writing for the radio. I've just  started putting together a series of short programmes on travels in Wales. It's proving a really enjoyable project - the research especially! It's such a pleasure to revisit old haunts, explore new ones and unearth the photos, notes and diaries kept by previous travelers, my own family included. The great weather of recent days has definitely shown the country to advantage - because, o bod yn onest (to be honest) the odd damp day here is not unknown - how else are the hills to be so striking, the valleys so verdant?!

A few years ago the wonderful, now sadly late Nigel Jenkins really enthused me with his writing and teaching on psycho-geography. Perhaps you've come across Seren's "The Real .." series, books like Nigel's "The Real Gower", "The Real Port Talbot" by Lynne Rees or "The Real Newport" by Ann Drysdale; they're guide books with a difference, seeking out and investigating the oddities, the everyday, the unexpected places and people that conventional books ignore. I'm hoping that our radio series can take and present a similarly slant view, can surprise and interest those who don't know the country, can be celebrated by those who do.

So last week a visit to Aberdyfi took in the standard trips (Port Meirion, Cader Idris etc) and the "roads less taken" - listening to a talk on the work of the local branch of the National Search and Rescue Dogs Association (so often deployed in Snowdonia), watching fledglings make their amazing first flights at the Dyfi Osprey Project, investigating the history of Ballast Island in Porthmadog Harbour, trekking to the tiny church at Llandecwyn, part of the Small Pilgrim Places Network. Time and funds will only run to more local research in the next month or so, I'm afraid, but we're so lucky living here in south east Wales as well - with the Wye Valley literally on our doorstep and the Brecon Beacons and Black Mountains within the hour, I'm not complaining!

The nature reserve at Dol Idris

Tuesday 9 July 2019

Poetry, pastries and projects



Unfortunately, life is too busy at the moment to manage more than two days at this year's Ledbury Poetry Festival - a real shame, as there are some great events I would have liked to have got to. But Sunday and Monday both saw really good sessions which I much enjoyed.

Our "Poetry Breakfast" (with some fabulous pastries) saw poets from all over the country and from as far afield as Vermont reading the "hill" poems selected for Ledbury's on-line project begun by Jean Aitken, the "Troubadour of the Hills". The event was held beneath Ledbury's famous black and white Market Hall; although the weather brightened up later, it was an early session and several of us almost lost contact with our toes - we had to repair to a coffee shop afterwards to warm up! Later I went to hear Hannah Swingler reading from her debut collection; although performance poetry is not really my thing, I was very taken with some of her work, especially "Mrs. Tiggy Winkle has fallen off the shelf again", a moving tribute to a grandmother living with dementia. Then it was a "Walking Workshop" with Phoebe Power after lunch, looking at walking and poetry - which definitely is my thing!

I loved this in a shop window display!



Hannah Swingler

As with last year, I really enjoyed yesterday's Community Showcase, with readings from members of several groups covered by Ledbury's poetry outreach programme - older people in residential care, members of "Rose Tinted Rags" (a social enterprise group), Hereford MIND, Segments (a group who work with historical artefacts) and my own Women For Women group. Then it was off to nearby Trumpet (great name for a village, isn't it?!) for an afternoon with The Malvern Writers Circle. It wasn't a group I'd met before but everyone was extremely welcoming and there was a very interesting open mic - to say nothing of the cakes provided by the Trumpet Tearooms! I don't know what it is about food and poetry but there's a definite connection ...