The Nottingham Festival of Words
took over Nottingham Trent University’s Newton Building for the weekend. NottsLit went along on the Sunday. Here’s
an account of my day:
The venue was impressive and immediately
brought on nostalgic memories of university days. With a day pass stuck to my
wrist I dashed to the first event, a performance from The
Theatre Royal’s over 55s Creative Writing Group, or as they now wish to be
called, The Royal Writers. What
followed was an entertaining hour of prose, poetry and monologues. After
an opening limerick, Robbie Rob sang the blues, complete with a chorus line:
‘I have a good life, completely absent of pain,
I have a good life, completely absent of pain,
If it carries on like this, will I ever sing the blues again?’
The variety and pace didn’t let up as we eavesdropped upon a teenage
conversation, scripted by Chrissy Thornhill, with The Boyfriend. Shut
Up! Innit.
The Frances Cornford poem, To a Fat Lady seen from the Train, is
answered individually in the form of romance, poignancy and surprise, before
another limerick, this one on the theory of relativity, brought us full circle:
‘…set out one day, in a relative way, and arrived the previous night.’
Act two was introduced by Ann Hill, who succinctly put it, ‘We all
love words and that’s why we’re here.’ Marvelous. And, from the evidence of
this, they all love performing, too.
Sue Pickles spoke of a hemorrhaging shed, a shed with indigestion, in an
expertly constructed tale of four parts and numerous interjections – a piano
away from Victoria Wood. Photography successfully accompanied many of these
performances, not least when a huge spider made an appearance; Jenny Holliday
informing us that it is an Australian arachnid, or, as the Aussie’s call it, a
lawn bandit or an ambulance chaser.
The final act welcomed three more writers to the stage and began with
some punchy role play, set amid a break in. Robbie Robb may have stolen act one but it was
Pamela Senior that stole the hour. After an inspired comic turn she later
delivered a deeply moving piece about dementia.
 |
| Chrissy Thornhill, Pamela Senior, Wendy Haynes, Particia Stoat, Ann Hill, Robbie Rob, Jenny Holliday, Barbara Watkins, Cathy Grinrod, Sue Pickles, Margaret Christopoulus |
All of the work on show
was produced under the guidance of Cathy Grindrod, the workshop leader. Cathy,
a former Derbyshire Poet Laureate, clearly has a great relationship with the
group and has helped them to showcase their talent.
I stayed in my seat for the
next event, a talk from the crime writer Steven Dunne.
In 2008 the Derbyshire author self published his first crime novel, The Reaper. After gaining good reviews
and generating respectable sales, he was approached by the publisher Headline. The Disciple quickly followed and now, Deity, his third novel to feature DI
Damen Brook, is achieving critical acclaim.
Steven opened his talk at NTU with a series of slides, featuring him and
his books like a parent might show off baby photos. There’s no doubt about it,
this affable author is enjoying his success and he is, quite rightly, very
proud of Deity. A part-time secondary
school teacher, he explained how he called on his work experience to write
about the difficult in-between years. Steven was interested in the process
today’s youngsters go through when they lose their sense of invincibility and
realise the world does not revolve on their terms.
 |
| A self confessed smug grin - and why not? |
As the opening chapters of Deity were read out we heard what all the fuss was about. Four Derby College students go missing, an internet film purporting to show them committing mass suicide. If it's real, why did they kill themselves? If the suicides are faked, why the set up and where are the students? Intriguing stuff.
Questions were welcomed and there was even a rare opportunity to hear
from an author’s partner. When asked about Steven's writing process his wife admitted that this was the most she’s heard him speak in weeks. Between writing
and teaching there’s not much time for reading, explained Steven who, unlike
most crime writers I know, doesn't read many contemporary crime novels. His
main influences include Gore Vidal, Arthur Conan Doyle, Truman Capote and
Joseph Heller, and he recently dispatched formulaic fiction into Room 101.
After the revealing Q&A there was even time to hear a world exclusive
reading of Steven’s fourth novel in the series, The Unquiet Grave, with its tagline Even the dead need answers. With Deity doing so well and the new
book set for a summer launch it’s easy to see why Steven’s living the dream.
After Steven’s talk I walked
out to a busy lobby as five events all finished at 12 noon. It seemed that the Asian
Writers’ poetry reading had been packed. The other events, not so. I applaud
the festival for laying on so much choice but they were, perhaps, victims of
their own success. With so much going on at the same time some events suffered.
This was the case with my first afternoon visit, with four poetry activities kicking
off at 1.30pm, the Rainbow Performance failed to get the audience it deserved.
The superb Lecture Theatre 5 hosted
the Nottingham
Sapphist Writers and Rainbow Writers in a collaborated to deliver an hour of
performance poetry. The event aimed to showcase the best of Nottingham’s
lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender writing.
The compère Russell Christie opened the bash with the confident assuredness of a
seasoned performer. Without the use of a script or cue cards he spoke from
memory, and he spoke from the heart, touching on his experience of life and
love as a gay man.
Nicki Hastie from the
Sapphist Writers used the festival’s themes of love and lace to compose a poem
about connections. An engaging speaker, Nicki spoke of how we are all interlinked,
much more so than a spurious Kevin Bacon inspired notion. Her wordplay remained
fun whilst offering in-jokes and her account of childhood added depth. In
opening herself up, Nicki showed the heart of a poet but if vulnerability was
perceived, strength was certainly defined. The honesty continued with the poem,
Land of Online Dating; her one and only attempt at online courtship was
ripe for poetry.
Next of the Rainbow Writers
was Tony Challis. He walked on with a black folder jammed with poems. I got the
impression it was his version of Bob Monkhouse’s joke book, a life’s work
jotted down for future referral. Tony picked out several short poems to read.
The first of which, about a caterpillar, he introduced thus ‘it’s my silliest
poem but people seem to like it.’ There was nothing silly about his take on
Allen Ginsberg’s Sweet Boy Give Me Your Ass. A versatile poet, an
elegant collection.
Hands, written and read by David
Kershaw was a compassionate four parter. There was no emphasis on performance,
no showing off, no playing to the crowd. It felt personal. Here was poetry that
came from the soul.
From the off, Rachel
Phillips announced that couples, regardless of their sexuality, all argue about
the same four things: Money, Sex, Housework and Personal habits. Her cynical
view of relationships continued with Recipe for Disaster. Fun and keenly
observed, the poem inventively took the form of a recipe. Like all the poets
before her, Rachel allowed the festival’s theme to permeate her poetry but in Prozac
– a love story she exposed a different kind of relationship.
At various points Russell
Christie returned to delight us. He sees poets as fisherman, castings out their
words in the hope of catching love, the love of the audience. His bait included
a response to the Mayor of San Francisco’s decision to close the gay bars
during the 80s, in a reaction to AIDS. Russell’s time in the USA is recounted
once more with Driving from Cleveland to Los Angeles. A chance meeting
in a roadside bar – the hustle is on, and it’s not just pool balls! Information
Fulfillment is, perhaps, his most personal piece with lines such as ‘I have
hoarded the codes of my life and read them in my heart.’
An hour of frank prose,
laced with sincerity and love.
 |
left to right: Rachel Phillips, Nicki Hastie, Russell Christie, David Kershaw, Tony Challis
|
At the end of the Rainbow I
headed to the EMBA panel.
Kathleen Bell, sitting in
for John Lucas, began by explaining what the EMBA is. In case you didn’t know,
it stands for East Midlands Book Award. Now in its third year, the EMBA is an
independent, annual award, given to a writer of fiction, creative non-fiction
or poetry, currently living in the East Midlands. It aims to promote the best
literature coming out of the region and to reward exceptional work.
Joining Kathleen on the
panel were two previous winners and a couple of shortlisted writers. In a kind
of chronological order we meet Leicestershire’s Mark Goodwin, the first
recipient of the award back in 2011. Mark read three poems, one of which was
from Shod, the poetic adventure that was a surprise winner of that
inaugural award. Active in the poetry scene for many years, Mark has worked in
schools as well as for the mental health services and, as you’d expect, his
delivery is polished. The poetry itself is vivid, clean and powerful. It has an
element of controlled anger.
Paula Rawsthorne,
shortlisted for the EMBA in 2012, was the next to read from her work. Her YA
novel The Truth About Celia Frost, concerns a friendless, freaky kid who
suffers from a disorder that leaves her in constant fear of bleeding to death.
Paula’s reading leads up to a dramatic hook, with Celia about to come a
cropper, before the book is closed. There was enough fear, tension and
desperation in that sample chapter to grab the audience. A clever marketing
ploy if ever there was one. A Liverpudlian, Paula now lives in Nottingham and
praised the support of the Nottingham Writers’ Studio.
Shortlisted for his poetry
book An Ordinary Dog, Nottingham’s Gregory Woods stood up and belted out
three poems. It was a pleasure to hear the homo-phonic masterpiece I’d first
heard at the festival’s launch night. Another gem previously aired that night
at Antenna was Messages, an angry poem that seems to fit Greg’s attitude
to love. ‘How I’d rejoice even to hear an insult in your voice.’ Acerbic and
precise, the poems were passionately performed.
Winning the 2012 award was
Anne Zoroudi, author of the Mysteries of the Greek Detective. The fifth book in
her series (of seven), The Whispers of Nemesis, took the prize. The
Derbyshire author’s story tells of desperate measures and long-kept secrets, of
murder and immortality and of pride coming before the steepest of falls. Anne
sees her books as morality tales and picks ‘metaphysical crime’ as her genre.
This is no typical procedural detective story, partly due to the detective
Hermes Diaktoros, and partly because of the book’s otherworldliness. The author
might live in the Peak District but her heart is in the Greek islands and the
country’s mythology seems to provide much of her inspiration.
The panelists ended with a
brief Q and A, expressing a varied response to the density and profile of the
region’s literary scene at which, as expected, Nottingham fared better than
north Derbyshire. Another difference of note was in how the novelists and poets
saw themselves. Somehow the EMBA have to compare the two’s technical merits.
Overall, it was a brilliant
day. Between talks there was a free-to-attend book fair with local publishers,
book shops, groups and children’s activities competing for attention. There was
plenty of space for relaxing, chatting about books and enjoying refreshments, all in a
nice atmosphere.
The whole festival had been
superbly promoted and I can only think that the disappointing attendances at some events were down to the huge
variety on offer (although I did hear grumblings about the price). If it had
been possibly to be in three places at once I would have also attended the Broadway
for the Woody Guthrie do and tagged along on the Nottingham Literary Trail. Roll
on next year.
Meanwhile, check out this
summer’s Lowdham Book Festival June 21-29 and the Gedling Book Festival July
12-14.
If you are interested in
joining The Royal Writers, please contact David Longford, Education Manager for
the Theatre Royal & Royal Concert Hall on 0115 9895531 or email him
david.longford@nottinghamcity.gov.uk
For more information
about Cathy Grindrod, visit www.cathygrindrod.co.uk
Steven Dunne’s website is www.stevendunne.co.uk
The Sapphist Writers are a
network of lesbian and bisexual women in the East Midlands. Their next meeting
is on March 11th at Nottingham Women’s Centre. Please email sapphistwriters@yahoo.co.uk
The Rainbow Writers will
next be meeting at Nottingham Writers’ Studio, 7.30pm, 21st March.
The shortlist for this year’s
EMBA will be announced at ‘States of Independence’ a free event celebrating
indie publishing at De Montforth University on Sat March 16th. The
winners will be announced in June.
