New website for Headingley LitFest

 Richard Wilcocks writes:

We decided to replace our old website last year, and now we have done it! It is still more or less in draft form, but will soon have more pages. Take a look - 

https://headingleylitfest.com

George Orwell in Headingley - lots of interest

A large photo of George Orwell was quickly recognised by local people visiting Headingley's Farmers' Market on Saturday (12 February), part of a display about the events on 5 March. Many of them are really surprised that the great author stayed with his sister for a while in 1936 in a street which is very well-known amongst the student population nowadays. Several said the walk sounded like fun. We'll be doing it whatever the weather incidentally, so bring a brolly just in case.

Two Thursday evening events for Headingley LitFest

 TWO THURSDAY EVENINGS

Two Headingley LitFest events are coming up which are not part of Leeds Lit Fest: first at 7pm on Thursday 3 March in Headingley Library/Hub, RAY BROWN will be relaunching his new novel WHOOSH! which according to many readers is hilarious. He'd like you to bring your own memories of what you were doing in 1979 - or maybe what your parents were doing.

Second, DOUG SANDLE will be giving a talk and showing a powerpoint at 7pm on Thursday 10 March in Headingley Library. It is entitled The Poetry of Seeing: Visual Illusions and Ekphrasis. He'll explain that Ekphrasis is poetry about or inspired by works of art and read (and show) some of his own ekphrastic poems. One of them is inspired by this one - Patrick Hughes's Liquorice Allsorts.

Both events Pay As You Feel.

Registration tickets for George Orwell in Headingley on 5 March (click on the event on www.leedlitfest.co.uk) are going fast. Got yours yet?

Wigan Pier. The facts.

 

 

It is an Orwellian joke - Wigan's 'pier' was never a seaside attraction, just a couple of bent-up rails where coal-wagons once tipped their loads into barges. Orwell "liked Wigan very much - the people not the scenery" according to Labour MP Lisa Nandy, who features in this Daily Mirror article from 2017 "We follow George Orwell's Road to Wigan Pier where poverty is now worse than the 1930s". I doubt things have improved much since 2017. Have you got Saturday 5 March in your diary yet? 

 

 https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/follow-george-orwells-road-wigan-5583390

George Orwell in Headingley

 Richard Wilcocks writes:

It's all coming together for our Road to Wigan Pier event on Saturday 5 March! Yesterday, I knocked on the door of 21 Estcourt Avenue in Headingley, a tall, Victorian terrace house, to find who lives there. Happily, the door was opened by Theo, who turned out to be a student of English who knows about the work of George Orwell but who had no idea that he had stayed at number 21 in late 1936 when his sister lived there. It seems Orwell used his time walking to local landmarks like Kirkstall Abbey and collating his extensive notes on his journey round the north of England documenting the great poverty and deprivation he found there.

Theo and his flatmates have said that they will join the crowd outside the house at 1.30pm on 5 March, which is when local actor and musician Jem Dobbs will say a few things about when he lived in the same house for his first nineteen years after being born in it. With luck, he will play his trumpet and he will lead everybody on a short walk to the HEART Centre in Bennett Road.

Jem Dobbs

At 2pm our tribute begins, when Les Hurst from the Orwell Society will talk about The Road to Wigan Pier, which was found to be quite shocking in 1937, when it was published by the Left Book Club. A lot of people who lived in the south had no idea about the adult and child poverty and the awful working conditions in the north. There will be readings from the book - a few of the most memorable bits - and a Q & A will follow. Orwell devoted a substantial section of the book to his idiosyncratic musings on the nature of Socialism, and these will no doubt be addressed in any discussions. Several people have told me that they would like to make a connection with the poverty and general neglect by central government to be found today in the same areas that Orwell wrote about.

If you are unable to join us on the walk, try to make it to the HEART Centre for 2pm. PWYF

Wikipedia entry - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Road_to_Wigan_Pier

RESERVE YOUR PLACE AT THE HEART CENTRE! 

GET A TICKET BY CLICKING ON OUR ENTRY ON THE LEEDS LIT FEST WEBSITE www.leedslitfest.co.uk

Poet James Nash at Ireland Wood Primary School

Sally Bavage writes:

War comes to Ireland Wood

Well, it does when published poet and author James Nash comes.  James was commissioned by Headingley LitFest to run a series of poetry workshops on the WW1 theme with both year 6 classes at Ireland Wood primary school, culminating in a performance assembly in the school hall.  After last year's valiant work totally via Zoom this is so much more real.  Real emotions, real pride in performance, even some real tears.

Covid precautions are still in place and the young people's performances are videoed so that parents, governors and others can see the finale.  We were treated to sixty readings both recorded (compilations of best or favourite lines chosen by the writers themselves) as well as live, nerves soon banished by the supportive atmosphere from all the staff and pupils present. Additionally, classroom assistants put original poems and artwork on display screens for the assembly hall and technical support helped with the slide show and music as well.  As James said ”I never thought in the past that one could work with SO many children so successfully, but the school gives such strong support and the staff are so talented.”  And James doesn't normally use such strong descriptions in his prose – only his poetry!

 James took as his theme a battered trumpet, likening it to a soldier on the field of battle. Empathising with the fallen instrument, the youngsters could write of sorrow and waste, of courage and commitment without becoming maudlin.  Ghosts of dead soldiers were conjured up, you could hear the mournful notes of the trumpet somehow capturing the mood of the troops, yet there was a steady pride in using new vocabulary and producing original work that has somehow entered the souls of the soldiers.

 The year 5 classes came to watch and were extraordinarily attentive and absorbed in the simply excellent quality of the performances – using a mike to talk to 120+ at age ten is never less than daunting.  They were also bursting with contributions to what they had learnt from watching; a forest of hands went up and all agreed they had picked up some really good tips for their forthcoming poetry work.  So four classes altogether got real joy from the work.

 And what about the performed original poems, researched, drafted, re-drafted and crafted by year 6?   Two words.  Wow!  Impressive!   Actually, three - add very.  The year 6 teachers felt that this year, by working over an extended block of time concentrated into less than two weeks, it had made the immersion into poetry even more profound. And by working in the autumn term it would add more depth and understanding to other explorations of poetry in the following terms.  So many wins.

 It would be invidious to single out much individual work because you would be hard pressed to leave any of the sixty finished poems out.  When asked in the assembly what they felt they had gained from the work, again so many contributions directly from the children involved spoke of how poetry moves your emotions around, that different poems (which needn't rhyme, they had been pleased to find) used very different writing styles and that the poems left imagery in your head long afterwards.  Poetry isn't a story but it tells one and can cover years in ten seconds.  Wow. They also appreciated how they had gained experience of performing in front of an audience. As one child declared to Adrienne Amos, year 6 teacher: “So you’ve worked with James Nash for nine years, aren’t you a lucky lady?”

 And the school staff?  Simply blown away by some of the writing and performances shining out from unsuspected hidden depths. So proud of what the young people had achieved.  So pleased to see the development in confidence and self-belief.  This work just keeps on giving.

I wish that I was a human,

To touch my surroundings,

To consume the energy of daylight and dawn,

To be able to feel my soul.

Feel tears, feel joy,

To be able to see.

To have a heart

To be able to be who I want to be.

But without love, there is no rhythm to life.

 

Headingley LitFest is most grateful to the Inner North West Community Committee, whose strong support and funding for this work is so much appreciated.