While we’re sad that Sindiwe Magona is leaving us this month, we’ve greatly enjoyed having her as Visiting Fellow here at NCLA. Stepping into the breach is Leverhulme Visiting Professor Nuruddin Farah, and we also welcome Fiona Sampson for the 2010 Bloodaxe Poetry Lecture Series.
NCLA is delighted to welcome acclaimed novelist Nuruddin Farah as Leverhulme Visiting Professor. He will be with us until mid June and will return to Newcastle for a further visit in March 2011. Originally born in Somalia, Nuruddin spent most of his adult life in exile in Europe, America and South Africa (where he now lives). He returns to his native land in his writing in order to represent the ‘unnameable’ nature of Somalia’s experience of colonialism with its contradictions and violence. As well as probing the realities of power and politics, his novels are mysterious and poetic, drawing on African oral traditions as well as European modernism to create a particular haunting quality. He has written 11 novels including From a Crooked Rib (1970), Sardines (1981), Maps (1986) and Secrets (1998). In 1998 he was the winner of the prestigious Neustadt International Prize for Literature.
Nuruddin is currently at work on a new novel, the third part of a trilogy on the Somali civil war that began with Links (2004), continued with Knots (2007) and ends now with Crossbones. During his time in Newcastle Nuruddin will also rework a play, which he plans to produce under the auspices of the Centre. He says he is looking forward to spending time with creative writing students and staff and those who work on postcolonial fiction, although he is adamant he will not talk much about his own writing:
‘Once I’ve published a novel, the text becomes the property of others, who may do with it what they please, interpret it in their own way. I am also looking forward to the opportunity to work on a new play and discussing what is involved in the transition between the page and getting a play on to the stage. I am hoping there will be opportunities for discussions with both creative writing students and students who work on postcolonial literature. However, I’m not happy about talking about my own work. When it is finished I feel I no longer have ownership over it. It belongs to other people.’
Nuruddin Farah will give the Leverhulme lecture on Thursday 20th May at 5.30pm in the Percy Building, Newcastle University. He will also give a literary reading on Tuesday 25th May at 7pm in Culture Lab, Newcastle University. For further information, or to buy tickets, please call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
According
to a year 5 teacher who took the course: ‘The sessions were inspirational.
It’s not just that I enjoyed them; they made me think in new ways. I know
that I will be able to use this with the pupils.’
Tailor-made for primary and secondary school teachers, this course provides practical training in how to introduce creative writing into the classroom and aims to increase the skills and confidence of teachers in this area.
The next course runs from 28th April - 2nd June 2010, Thursdays from 3pm – 5pm.
Enquiries welcome from individuals or from schools. For further information, or to book, please call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
This year’s Creative Writing Summer School is themed ‘The City’ and runs from 28th June - 2nd July 2010. It is an intensive 5-day course comprised of exercise-based workshops in the mornings, discursive workshops with guest tutors in the afternoons and a variety of evening events.
Workshops will be offered in the fields of poetry, fiction, memoir and screenwriting, giving students the opportunity to sample all of these styles of writing.
The work produced during and after the course will be worth 20 credits which could contribute towards a 60 credit Postgraduate Certificate in Creative Writing (which must be applied for within a year of taking Spring or Summer School).
Course fee: £300 (to include refreshments, lunch, and evening events including dinner on Friday night).
For further information, or to book, please call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
The Bloodaxe Poetry lecture series returns this year on Wednesday 28th April, Thursday 29th April and Wednesday 5th May. In this innovative annual series of lectures, a leading contemporary poet speaks about the craft and practice of poetry. All lectures will take place at 5.30pm in the Herschel Building, Newcastle University. They are free and there is no need to book.
This year’s speaker is Fiona Sampson. Her latest books are Common Prayer (2007), Writing Poetry (2009) and A Century of Poetry Review (PBS Special Commendation, 2009). She has won the Newdigate Prize, been shortlisted for the Forward single poem and T.S. Eliot Prizes and in 2009 received a Cholmondeley Award. Her ten books in translation include Patuvachki Dnevnik, awarded the Zlaten Prsten (Macedonia). Forthcoming are her next collection, Rough Music (May 2010), and the Faber Poet-to-poet Shelley (summer 2011). She is the Editor of Poetry Review, contributes regularly to the TLS, Guardian, Irish Times and Independent newspapers and is Distinguished Writer at the University of Kingston.
Fiona Sampson will end the Bloodaxe Poetry Lecture Series with a poetry reading on Thursday 6th May, 7pm in Culture Lab, Newcastle University. For further information, or to buy tickets, please call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
Did you miss one of our recent lectures or readings? Perhaps you enjoyed them so much you’d like to revisit the experience. The online archive of audio and video recordings is being constantly updated with new material with recent highlights including Andrei Kurkov and Sindiwe Magona. Visit the archive section of the website for free access to all the recordings of past NCLA events.
The UK’s first interdisciplinary creative practice postgraduate conference, Creating Friction will be held at Culture Lab, Newcastle University, on Thursday 22nd April. A day-long seminar with presentations from creative practice PhD students from across the UK, registration costs £15 and includes lunch and a ticket to the André Brink reading in the evening. This event is open to the public as well as postgraduate students. Full programme, speaker details and online registration is available on the conference website.
Also on Thursday 22nd April, the next round of short courses begins with classes on Memoir Writing, 3D Poetry: Text as Public Art, On Form, Improvisation & Adaptation.
Following the conference and the short courses one of South Africa’s most distinguished authors, the novelist, essayist and memoirist André Brink will be reading at Culture Lab at 7pm.
As mentioned above Fiona Sampson’s Bloodaxe Poetry Lecture Series takes place on Wednesday 28th April, Thursday 29th April and Wednesday 5th May and is followed by a reading of her own poetry on Thursday 6th May.
Continuing the poetic theme, Fleur Adcock and Chase Twichell will be giving a poetry reading on Thursday 13th May at 7pm in Culture Lab, promising wit and psychological insight.
Nuruddin Farah’s Leverhulme lecture on Thursday 20th May and reading on Tuesday 25th May will end the month with themes of exile and imagination.
For further
information, or to buy tickets, please call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or
email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
Congratulations to current Creative Writing PhD student, Kachi A. Ozumba, whose debut novel The Shadow of a Smile (2010) has been longlisted for the Desmond Elliott prize. Kachi read from his novel last month in a joint reading with Sindiwe Magona, hosted by NCLA.
The first part of a science fiction mystery story by Fiona Smith, another Newcastle University Creative Writing PhD student, will be appearing in this month’s edition of Aquila magazine, followed by the second part next month. Fiona has had a number of other short stories for children published in Aquila including ‘The Wheelchair Wonder’ and the two-part ‘Murder in the Deep.’
Any alumni or current students of Newcastle University with news of publications, writing awards or prizes they would like to share should fill out the online form in the alumni section of the website.