Spring is almost here and brings
with it new collaborations, new poetry collections, NCLA student competition
wins, details of the Creative Writing Spring School, dates for the Summer
School and an array of forthcoming events.
** STOP PRESS **
With regret, Diana Athill has had to cancel her appearance in conversation
with Jackie Kay on Thursday 3rd March 2011 as she is going into hospital for
an operation. NCLA has sent best wishes to her for a speedy recovery. If you
have paid online your purchase card will be reimbursed. If you have
paid by cheque or cash, Melanie Birch will arrange repayment by cheque.
It is hoped that Jackie Kay will be recording an interview
with Diana in the near future and this interview will be made available via
the website.
The
successful Coming of Age: The Art and Science of Ageing exhibition and
associated events will come to an end on 2nd March. During the
exhibition, NCLA ran a series of well-received creative writing workshops. It
is hoped that these will continue and that the collaboration with the Great
North Museum: Hancock will be extended. Some work produced during the
workshops can be read in the blog. If you enjoyed
this exploration of the relationship between science and creativity, NCLA
continues to explore the theme on this year’s Creative Writing Spring School
and in the collaborative event Farewell Glacier (see below), which also
engages with the University’s new societal challenge theme of
sustainability.
FOLD, a collaboration between artist Irene Brown and
poet Linda France, is a
conceptual map of some of the new public artworks on campus, many of which
are text-based. Inspired by the hippocampus – the site in the brain
responsible for spatial navigation and memory – it opens out in two
directions in terms of both form and content, referencing the Universe and
astronomical maps of planets and stars as well as the themes of paradox and
polarity shared by many of the artworks. Irene Brown’s design creates a
lenticular reading of Linda France’s poem, conveying the wonder of
perception.
FOLD is
available from the Hatton Gallery shop and the online shop.
Professor
Sean O’Brien’s new collection of poetry, November, will be published
by Picador in April 2011. It is a forthcoming Poetry Book Society Choice.
Hear Sean read his specially commissioned short
story about north-eastern light bulb inventor Joseph Swan for Eureka Moments
in Modern Science as part of this year’s Science Festival on
Thursday 17th March at 1pm in the Lit and Phil. Free entry but advance
booking required. To reserve a seat call 0191 232 0192 or email library@litandphil.org.uk
Apostrophe, the
listening and reading station produced by PhD Creative Writing student Stevie Ronnie to showcase work by writers
connected to NCLA has been reinstalled following the refurbishment of the
Percy Building. You can now hear recordings of Seamus Heaney reading
‘Slack’ and Carol Ann Duffy reading ‘Prayer’ complete with author introductions
in recordings made at NCLA live events.
This year’s Spring School entitled Earth, Sea and Sign will take place from 4th – 8th April. Its starting point is our current anxiety about the impact of climate change: whether or not spring means the same as it did ten years ago or how our capacity to write about nature has been influenced. Tutors will help participants to draw inspiration from several different places including the Dove Marine Laboratory at Cullercoats and the Moorbank Botanical Gardens.
For further information please call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
This year’s Creative Writing Summer School will take place from 27th June – 1st July. Further details to follow.
Somali-born
novelist Nuruddin Farah will be returning at the end of March to spend a
month at NCLA completing his Leverhulme Visiting Professorship. There
will be a rehearsed reading of his play Antigone in Somalia on Monday
28th March at 4pm at Northern Stage, Stage 2. This event is
the result of a collaboration with Northern Stage and Nuruddin will be
present to talk about the play. The performance will be directed by Phil
Ormrod and Erica Whyman of Northern Stage and is free although admission is
by ticket only.
Tickets
can be obtained from Northern Stage., Alternatively call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
Nuruddin
will read from his new novel Crossbones (Riverhead, 2011), which is on the topical subject of Somali
pirates, on Thursday 31st March at 7pm in Culture Lab, Newcastle University. Reading at the same event
will be Abdulrazak
Gurnah who teaches at the University of Kent. Abdulrazak has written
seven novels and been shortlisted for the Booker Prize, the Whitbread
Prize and the Commonwealth Prize, winning the RFI Temoin du Monde Prize. This
provides a rare chance to
hear these writers read and be in conversation about their work.
Tickets
(£6/£4) are available online from the shop.
Alternatively, call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
Farewell
Glacier on
Thursday 24th March at 7pm in Culture Lab, Newcastle University
and is the first of the ‘sustainability’ events exploring the new University societal challenge
theme. It is also an ambitious venture into multi-disciplinary
collaboration as it involves a writer, a sound artist and a visual artist
coming together to both demonstrate and discuss the question of how to make
art out of the climate change issue. Joining writer Nick
Drake and artist Matt Clark, as
already advertised, will be sound artist Max Eastley.
Tickets
(£6/£4) are available online from the shop.
Alternatively, call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
In
association with the British Council Tour of Russian Poets, Dmitry Kuzmin, Maria
Stepanova and Lev
Rubinstein will read their work on Thursday 14th April at 7pm
in Culture Lab, Newcastle University. This is a rare opportunity to hear
these highly influential poets’.
Tickets
(£6/£4) are available online from the shop.
Alternatively, call Melanie Birch on 0191 222 7619 or email melanie.birch@ncl.ac.uk
Newcastle University Creative Writing PhD student Christy Ducker is one of the four first stage winners of the Poetry Business Book & Pamphlet Competition. Christy is taking part in the Write Around The Toon project as Writer in Residence at Bessie Surtees House.
Alex Lockwood, also a PhD in Creative Writing student at Newcastle University, has won first prize for his short story, ‘Pod’, in the Leaf Book’s Micro-Fiction 2010 Competition. The story will be included in the anthology to be published later this year. Alex is also involved in Write Around The Toon as Writer in Residence at Dance City.