Creative Writers - Starting Young!

Week Two is upon us, and started well with a lovely evening celebrating young creative writers in Birmingham.

The second annual Write On Adventures In Writing Awards recognised the progress and enthusiasm of the participants of the Summer Term's Write On Project.

Write On is a Birmingham Book Festival project, and it focuses on placing professional writers in schools across Birmingham and the West Midlands. Its aims are not academic, rather inspirational and aspirational, bringing to life The Writer as a career choice, and the writing as a valuable way to express imagination.

The four prize winners were:

Elijah Madourie and Adelle Raymond of Holyhead Secondary School, Ophelia Wilkinson of Holy Trinity Church of England Primary School and Megan Courtney-Jones of Tiverton Primary School.

The children all read from their work and joined Write On writers Roz Goddard and Philip Monks on stage for a chat about the project and how their writing has evolved.

Each child has shown great promise and enthusiasm for writing, and their work was excellent. It was humbling and warming to hear such 'new' writers generously giving of their work.

Well done all! From the Birmingham Book Festival/Write On team.

Tristram Stuart - Waste - Special Video Report by William Shaw

Here is a great video of Tristram Stuart's Waste event, last Thursday 8th October.

Day Two - John Boyne, Janette Jenkins and a weird and wonderful Ophelia story...

John Boyne & Janette Jenkins


The Festival was delighted to welcome John Boyne (Boy In The Striped Pyjamas) to the Festival. John's work has been on our radar for a long time, and we were pleased to finally manage to invite and welcome him this year. Even better was his introducing us to friend and fellow novelist Janette Jenkins (Angel Of Brooklyn), who, like John, studied creative writing at the University of East Anglia and has had several successful novels since.

The conversation soon turned to labels and the feelings each writer harboured about being slapped with a particular genre. Both, technically, write historical fiction, but only in the sense that the stories they fell in love with the idea of writing were set in the past, rather than from a great desire to write (or rewrite) history.

Both talked of the process of writing and getting published and offered some great advice for aspiring writers.

Let Me Tell You : Ophelia In Her Own Words



This strange and beautiful Ophelia story came to our attention months ago thanks to its author Paul Griffiths, who sent us a copy and explained his idea, which was to rewrite the story of Ophelia using only the 492 words Ophelia was given by Shakespeare in his Hamlet.

Helen Monks, Archers actress and former young poet laureate for Birmingham was a perfect Ophelia, performing sections of the book to an audience last night, bringing to life the text and the craft of weaving the limited vocabulary into a coherent narrative.

A unique, interesting and thoroughly enjoyable event.


Tonight : KATE MOSSE, TRISTRAM STUART, POSTGRADUATE POETRY PLATFORM, TINDAL STREET BOOKER TRIO, WRITE ON SISTER.

Tickets available on the door or on 0121 303 2323.

Fabulous First Night

The Festival's first night began with the excellent, lively (sometimes raucous) final of the BBC Radio 4 Poetry Slam.

Slamming Style:

BBC Radio 4 Producer Sara Davies introducing the event.

Festival Director Jonathan Davidson opening the evening.

The Slam attracted a huge audience of friends, family and poetry fans for a recording of the finalist battling it out for the elusive top spot. The winner, to be announced on National Poetry Day, tomorrow (Thursday 8th October 2009), showed great talent and personality and was the eventual successor of a very good field.

Judges, contestants and audience alike enjoyed almost two hours of pure poetry and performance, all of which promises a great broadcast. Don't miss it, 11pm, Thursday 8/10/09, BBc Radio 4.

Excellent fiction:

Elsewhere at the Festival, the first of our brilliant collection of great literary names arrived in Birmingham. Outcast novelist Sadie Jones, whose new book, Small Wars, is out now, was in conversation with author Kate Pullinger, whose latest novel Mistress of Nothing follows numerous other great works, including one of my favourite books, A Little Stranger. Both novelists have an understanding of the nuances of emotional destruction, particularly in a domestic or familial context, and this brought together their writing experiences in a great conversation.

You may have seen Sadie Jones before, at our Orange Readers Day back in May, where she joined other literary authors including Catherine O'Flynn (appearing at the Festival on Thursday 8th October as part of the Tindal Street Booker Trio celebration, as a contributor to Paint A Vulgar Picture - the anthology inspired by the music of the Smiths on Wednesday 14th October and as a guest on BBC Radio 4's A Good Read on Tuesday 20th October).

And if you missed this, Kate Pullinger will also be a guest on A Good Read, along with Catherine, David Edgar and novelist Helen Cross.

Tonight is now fast approaching, and we are gearing up to welcome Boy In The Striped Pyjamas author John Boyne, in conversation with Angel of Brooklyn author Janette Jenkins at the Birmingham Conservatoire. There are still tickets for this, available by calling 0121 303 2323 or on the door.

WIN FREE TICKETS! BE THE FIRST TO CLAIM!

Tomorrow we are excited to be welcoming Orange Prize founder and great novelist Kate Mosse, with a brilliant new book. We are offering free tickets to this event for the first twenty people to email us : if you would like a pair of tickets, email sara@birminghambookfestival.org now!

Guests and Books announced for A Good Read, 20th October 2009

The BBC Radio 4 recordings of A Good Read on Tuesday 20 October 2009 at the Birmingham Book Festival will feature the following guests, and their chosen books:

EDITION ONE:

Sue MacGregor - The End of the Affair by Graham Greene, Vintage Classics £7.99
David Edgar - The Warden by Anthony Trollope, Penguin Classics £6.99
Helen Cross - The Treehouse by Naomi Wolf, Virago Press £8.99

EDITION TWO:

Sue MacGregor - Chicago by Alaa Al Aswany, Harper Perennial £7.99
Catherine O'Flynn - Alma Cogan by Gordon Burn, Faber & Faber £7.99
Kate Pullinger - White Noise by Don DeLillo, Picador £7.99