Patrick Gale, Eve McBride and truth at the Swindon Festival of Literature

7 May

Patrick Gale and Eve McBride

Patrick Gale and Eve McBride

“I come from a long line of priests. I owe a huge debt to the King James Bible. The language got under my skin. My Father spoke like a King James Bible. Today, I’m a doubter,” said novelist Patrick Gale.

“Mental illness overshadowed my life growing up. Our characters can go just like that from mental illness. I think that’s why I became a writer. I could escape into other people by writing.”

He was in conversation, yesterday, with novelist Eve McBride, fellow truth teller and lover of dogs.

“I suspect we both want to talk about dogs,” said Patrick earlier on Twitter; Eve’s Twitter name is 2bluedanes. “I have a dog in all my books,” said Patrick. Eve’s book, No Worst, There is None, explores the healing of grief from all angles, including by dog. Continue reading →

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Bruce Fogle: Discovering a place in the natural world at the Swindon Festival of Literature

6 May
Bruce Fogle

Bruce Fogle

6 May 2015. Discovering a place in the natural world at the Swindon Festival of Literature or:  Don’t Judge a book by its cover.

“I dressed and went for a walk – determined not to return until I took in what Nature had to offer.”
 – Raymond Carver, This Morning.

Suffering for my art – yet stoic in the execution of my Festival Chronicle duties I arrived at Swindon Arts Centre in a sodden and sorry state after the third drenching of the day and it was still only midday.

I’d been dispatched there by Festival Chronicle HQ to cover the Swindon Literature Festival appearance of Bruce Fogle – and if the name sounds familiar you’re not wrong – but more of that later.

Bruce Fogle is a former zoo worker, practicing vet and best-selling writer. Not on the face of it the kind of ‘thing’ that would be high on my list of things with which to engage – I’m not exactly at one with the natural world at the best of times. And especially not after mice in the conservatory, rats infesting the loft and more than the occasional frog startling me in the garden. Or maybe that’s more a case of me startling the frogs. Anyway. This all goes to prove the old adage about not judging a book by its cover – literally in this case because, despite my trepidation, Mr Fogle’s talk turned out to be an enchanting prequel – his words – to his book Barefoot at the Lake: A boyhood summer in Cottage Country. Continue reading →

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Sandi Toksvig at the Swindon Festival of Literature

6 May
Sandi Toksvig with Matt Holland

Sandi Toksvig with Matt Holland

I do love a good book event. The interviewer and interviewee on stage in comfortable chairs, normally with a table between them. Sometimes there are flowers and glasses of water. There’s always a pull-up thing behind them advertising something else. And last night I got the chance to see Sandi Toksvig in action, doing what she does best, talking at a hundred miles an hour on a myriad of subjects from being short to the King of Sweden. Her latest book, Peas and Queues, is about manners and how to behave properly. Apparently, Sandi got the idea from chastising her daughter who was eating with her elbows on the table. Sandi told her to get her elbows off, her daughter asked her why. She had no idea why. The book topic suits Sandi with her clipped, upper-class accent; I expect her to be a font of all knowledge onthings like this. Her accent tells me so. Continue reading →

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Writing Motherhood at the Swindon Festival of Literature

6 May
Writing Motherhood

From left: Rowan Coleman, Carolyn Jess-Cooke, C L Taylor

The mostly forgotten writer Cyril Connolly thought the pram in the hall ‘the sombre enemy of good art’.

On the face of it I’d agree: good motherhood is generally the enemy of good sleep, good sanity, good brain cells and good bank account. Children come first; not least because they scream louder.

But did Cyril mean this the same as me? Or did he comment with an inherent sexism born of early twentieth century attitudes, implying that the women’s place was in the home with the hallway pram? Hormones and responsibilities meant that women could never aspire to good art? Or was he commiserating with women because the relentlessness of motherhood (especially pre-washing machine era) left little room for anything else? Continue reading →

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Waltzing with Frances and Martine at the Swindon Festival of Literature

5 May
Paul and Hilda and Frances and Martine

Paul and Hilda and Frances and Martine

A piano dominates the stage, a very cosy looking sheepskin or polyesterpelt rug is thrown casually, but accurately, beside it. The Teasmade is on and the knitting has been put to one side …. Just for now.

Frances and Martine, dark, humorous and adventurous creations of Hilda Sheehan, are waltzing tonight and who knows where that glide and swish will take them?

Spotted late but somehow menacing is a metal chair with a seat of words and a back made from the steel of Salvador Dali’s shaven moustache, what will these two opinionated women make of that?
Timing was the key to the performance, with Paul Turner’s piano fracturing the language and creating darker, deeper impressions. Continue reading →

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Sweaty and smells of fish – Nell McAndrew at Swindon Festival of Literature

5 May

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It’s not an admission you’d expect from the 16th Sexiest Woman In the World (FHM Magazine, 2003) but if you meet Nell McAndrew in the school playground, chances are she’ll be sweaty and smell slightly of mackerel.

The original Lara Croft, Tomb Raider – she was the face of the arcade game franchise three years before Angelina Jolie claimed the ponytail in the movie spin-off – and the fourth most popular contestant in the first series of I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here, Nell was at Lydiard Park to talk about her new book, Nell McAndrew’s Guide to Running. Continue reading →

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Adventures with Bevis – Richard Jefferies Museum, Swindon Festival of Literature

4 May

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Chronicler Milo (age eight) enjoyed Adventures with Bevis today at Magic Monday at the Richard Jefferies Museum, a family friendly day as part of the Swindon Festival of Literature. He shares why it’s good for you go to the Museum too…

Are you going mad? Are your kids really sad?
Then come to Richard Jefferies in May, come out for a wonderful day!
Climb a tree up high, reach your hand up to the sky. Continue reading →

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Dawn Chorus – Swindon Festival of Literature 2015

4 May

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Twenty-two, full of vigor, a sunny disposition, so hot flames pounce at the sky and totally up for it at 5:30am, the Swindon Festival of Literature 2015 juggled, joked and sunshined its start at Lawn Woods this morning.

The Sun Arise Choir filled the air with all of the gentle beauty Swindon has to offer, gorgeous harmonies, Park South and the County Ground being the only other Swindon landmarks which come close from that ridge in Lawn Woods where the town slumbered in early morning loveliness.

A packed and cheerful crowd were treated to storyteller Chris Park and tale about a cloak being a story, which for me ended up cloaked in as much mystery as when he started, his huge Irish Wolfhound is amazing though. Continue reading →

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Town with a city heart – Swindon Festival of Literature launch

22 Mar

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The Swindon Festival of Literature has a thing for bracing days, ya know – freezing brass monkeys. It kicks off at a cold dawn in May and Thursday, a biting March day you may have noticed, was the launch, outside in a windy Swindon Central Library atrium.

The Festival likes to stimulate ‘thinking parts’ so maybe all this chilly fresh air enables our brain to fully engage and not lie indolent in the sloth-like embrace of central heating.

So, back inside the warm library, I munched on the lovely homemade launch food and thought how good it is when politicians speak from the heart rather than generic politic speak. Matt Holland, Festival director, seemed to appreciate this too because he expressed his love for guest speaker, Teresa Page, the mayor of Swindon: for her, Swindon is the town with the heart of a city; she only had one book a year at Christmas (a present from her sister); and (a girl after my own heart) she also enjoyed comics Bunty and Judy. No tired ‘cultural desert’ metaphors for the Lady Mayor. Continue reading →

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Swindon Drag Kings, Cwmmy Crab and more

14 Oct

Another take on the Man for A Day poetry sesh by Myfanwy Fox. It was a great day!

Myfanwy Fox's avatarFox Unkennelled - Myfanwy Fox

Dusty in here, isn’t it? Tch. Blog neglect due to a mixture of far more exciting things happening or laziness when things are not happening (and a fair bit of day job intervening, too).

I really should plug things before they happen but here are some recent highlights:

Swindon Poetry Festival’s Drag King finale event, performing with Diane Torr and poets/writers Clare Shaw, Rachael Clyne, Hannah Linden, Jill Abram, Juliet Platt and Louisa Davison. Diane has been running Man For A Day workshops since the ‘80s and her workshop was a tiring but fascinating full day. Men’s clothing (and strategic socks) was the least of our worries. As make up – mainly involving scarily convincing facial hair – went on we became someone different and then found ourselves trying to work out who we were, these almost-unfamiliar men. Most of us had time to visit…

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