Turbines: a poem by Gillian Southgate

TURBINES

 Now stand with me, and contemplate the turbines,

Tall and austere, and standing in a line.

We’ve tried, but haven’t managed to discover

A fossil fuel alternative as fine.

As energy official on the council

I’ve heard it said that coal’s a better bet,

But we feel coal is thoroughly polluting,

And nuclear carries an insistent threat.

So windfarms, splendid windfarms are the way now,

Irresolute in water, hugely high.

Observe the symmetry, remark the order,

The movement of the future on the sky.

The sheep that graze the marshes lend perspective,

They can’t demur, nor can they make reply:

Stern, fundamental, practically silent,

The turbines state their case. We must comply.

  

G M Southgate

Details of an upcoming poetry/music event supplied by Jonty Driver:

 On Saturday 8th July, from 3-4 p.m. in the church of St Mary in the Marsh (TN29 0BX), as part of the JAM (John Armitage Memorial) Festival in the Romney Marshes, I shall be reading some of my sequence of poems, The Journey Back , first published in the 1990s, about my return visit to South Africa after nearly thirty years of exile. A text of the poems will be available for those who, like me, prefer reading to listening.  In between some of the poems, Peter Fields will be playing on my violin (made by the Brothers Carcassi in Florence in 1751) Corelli’s variations known as La Folia. Admission to the recital is free, though there will be a collection for the Hantam Community Education Trust in the Karoo

June 2017 News

Thanks to Jonty Driver for the following account of our June meeting:

I’ve known Vesna Goldsworthy for a dozen years, since meeting her at the Writers’ Centre in Norwich and then in a variety of other contexts. Now, I find it tricky to separate what I’ve learned about her over the years from what I learned when I listened to her talk to the Winchelsea Literary Society when it met on Friday 16th June.  She isn’t a hugely productive writer: an academic study, Inventing Ruritania, then a memoir, Chernobyl Strawberries, then a book of poems, The Angel of Salonika, then the best-selling novel, Gorsky, a post-modern retelling of Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby but now set among Russian oligarchs in London. It was the last of these which provided the ostensible reason for her visit to Winchelsea, though in fact she has close personal links with the area. Her husband’s family had lived in Iden and in Rye for a good many years, and Vesna and her husband had lived here for a year too.

Part of the reason for her meticulous output is her busy-ness as an academic: originally employed by the BBC, she then taught Creative Writing at Kingston University, before becoming head of the Creative Writing department at UEA, and then opting out of the administrative demands of that role to teach at Exeter, though she still supervises PhD students at UEA. Vesna is unusually frank about the demands made on her by family and career; indeed, one of the things I like best about her is her un-English habit of answering questions straight, never obliquely. Her language (now) is English;  I suspect her heart will always be Serbian.

Her intelligence, her sense of a personal style, her self-critical honesty are all remarkable traits;  and I have a sort of hunch that there are some remarkable novels still to come. I hope there will be some poems too; and I shall be surprised if the WLS doesn’t queue up to get her back again.

C.J.Driver

A link to the blog of Marian Molteno, our March speaker:

http://www.marionmolteno.co.uk/marionsblog/2017/reading-to-the-swans/

Storms River: Chaos Theory, by Jonty Driver

This is a "taster" for Jonty's poetry reading on Saturday 8 July (see details above) Click on the text to see a larger print version.

June 2017 Newsletter

Next Meeting:

Friday 16 June 2017 at 7 for 7.30pm

in the Lower Court Hall

Stories of Russian London by Vesna Goldsworthy

Vesna Goldsworthy is a Serbian-born writer and poet. Her books include Chernobyl Strawberries, Inventing Ruritania and The Angel of Salonika (2011).  In 2010 she presented a BBC Radio 4 programme on finding one's voice in a foreign land. Her first novel Gorsky was published in 2015, inspired by The Great Gatsby.

Other Forthcoming Events:

The Rude Mechanical Theatre Co play The Commercial Traveller takes place at St Thomas' School playing field on Sunday 18 June at 7.30pm.  Bring low chairs and rugs and dress for British weather!  Gates open for picnics from 6pm. Tickets available online or from Hilary or the Farm Shop or on the door (but there is a maximum capacity).

Summer garden party, with the theme of Blithe Spirit to take place at Howard's on Friday July 21st at 6.30pm.  Bring a plate of food, savoury or sweet, drinks (some bottles of wine will be available at cost), a reading inspired by the theme and maybe some fancy dress or accessory.

Forthcoming Radio Programmes of interest (by Gillian Southgate) :

On Sundays there is often an afternoon feature on Radio 3 at 6.45pm. This week it was writers involved in Second World War propaganda.

Mondays.  Radio 4 9.45.  Book of the Week. A 15 minute reading of quality fiction, non-fiction and memoir.

10.45pm. Book at Bedtime. Content as above.  Radio 3. 10.45. The Essay. Many of these are on fiction or personal reflections. This week for example, it comes from the Hay Festival.

Tuesdays. Book of the week as above. 4.30pm Great Lives. Matthew Parris frequently discusses the lives of writers. Book at Bedtime and the Essay as above.

Wednesdays. Book of the week as above. Book at Bedtime and The Essay as above.

Thursdays. As Wednesday, but includes Open Book at 3.30. Discussion of literature with the author and Mariella Frostrup. Book of the Week, and The Essay as above.

Fridays. As Wednesday, except for Open Book.

Also, right through the week, each day at 2pm, a book is read on Radio 4 extra, with another one at 2.30 and 3pm. All 15 minute reads recorded some years ago, when diction was important, so none are difficult to hear, and they make a soothing listen when you are doing the ironing or some other chore.  This week the books are Mrs Miniver, The Forsyte Saga, and The Count of Monte Cristo.  They change each week – not all are fiction, but all are worth listening to.

June events at the Rye Bookshop

Saturday 10th June at 6pm - Anwesha Arya, reading from and discussing 'Janani: Mothers, Daughters, Motherhood'

Anwesha is a writer and academic, daughter of the famous Indian film-maker Basu Bhattacharya and the journalist Rinki Bhattacharya. 'Janani' is an extremely moving anthology of pieces by various authors, academics and artists detailing their experiences of being mothers and daughters.

Thursday 16 June 6pm to 7 pm Vesna Goldsworthy will be in the Rye Bookshop,  Vesna is speaking the next day at the Literary Society meeting, (see above)

Saturday 17th June at 6pm - Judith Thomson, reading from and discussing 'The Orange Autumn'

Judith Thomson's fascinating novel is an inspired retelling of one of the most turbulent periods of English history. It reveals the story of the political intrigue and dramatic events leading up to the 'Glorious Revolution' of 1688.

 Saturday June 24th, 2pm onwards - our birthday party!

Please join us to celebrate The Rye Bookshop's second birthday! We're still hammering out the finer details but there will be drinks and nibbles, and hopefully a local author or two, as well as some children's craft events. On a personal note, it will also sadly be my last day at The Rye Bookshop as I'm off to pastures new* in July, so it would be lovely to say goodbye to everyone and introduce you all to the new manager.

(*Lizzie is going to London to work at Daunt Books. Best wishes for her future, and thanks from the Literary Society for the help and cooperation Lizzie has given us over the past two years, including her talk at one of our meetings last year.)

Winchelsea Literary Society Meeting: 19 May 2017

About thirty members met to give readings on the theme of "Perchance to Dream". Most read poems, extracts from books or, in one case, a theatre review. A new attender, Kim Zanes, revived the practice of reading an original piece of writing, that used be a regular feature of Members' Evenings. Thanks to Kim for agreeing to her powerful piece to be published on the blog. I hope it will encourage others to contribute original efforts.


A scream of consciousness: To Sleep perchance to dream  by Kim Zanes 19th May 2017

To wake, to sleep, to wake, to sleep. Scratched by a cat, chased by a pack of wolves. The victim of a car accident, saved by a fire breathing dragon.

Living in London takes a lot of conversation and a lot of concentration. It takes a lot out of you to be safe and to feel safe; you have to always be on your guard, never quiet trusting everyone.

I was there but it is your memory.  Not mine.  It is your description.  Now you have told me, it has affected me and become mine and seeped into my dreams.   It has entered my memory via you.  I don’t own it first-hand it is second-hand and yet it was my near-death experience.

You say I sat in a cubicle in the ER of the Whittington Hospital with a tissue in my hand, drool pouring out of my mouth and I didn’t wipe it away.   How could a nurse know there would be a problem with that?  Only a best friend would know I could wipe a facial fluid with a tissue under water, asleep, drunk beyond movement, tied up in the bondage of lunacy - but not when dying. Finally, at the end, I would let go of such a habit.  You say you froze to the spot watching, watching your best friend die, yet the nurse’s actions reassured you that you were wrong, she was calm as she meticulously kept replacing the ejected needle from my hand. But, as my eyes rolled up into my head and she finally saw and requested the doctors urgently and ushered you out of the room quickly, so that they may bring me back to life - you knew what you had watched was my slipping step off this world.

For the rest of lives we shall have connections that are so silent and yet such emotionally loud screams.  You now hold my death wish memory.

I want it to be mine.  I want to remember it and I don’t.  It is so important to so much that I hold dear as my religion, the religion of the self, my self and I don’t have an ounce of it that belongs to me first, nothing I can touch and use to strengthen my resolve, to use to make me stronger when I am feeling weak, to recall at poignant moments or to regale dinner party companions with. 

All I have is a second-hand view that has been distorted in my mind, making me objectively look like Homer Simpson drooling for food.

I feel as if even my own death memory has been stolen from me.   A description from someone else of something that happened to me.  Just like the day my father left me at the age of 4 or was it 5? Vivid descriptions from my whole family made that memory for me.

It isn’t fair.  I am a believer and yet it never shows its face to me.  I’ve not seen a ghost, I’ve not astral planed, I’ve not touched my own soul.

Am I a fake?  Do I not take life as deeply as I think I do?  Maybe if you don’t believe you are shown in order to help you, and if you do believe then the spirit world decides you don’t need to see and feel it.

I almost died on Saturday 21st February 1998…or was it just a bad dream that you gave me?