News
Get involved with Slam! Young People set mic alight
8 months ago
by Birmingham Book Festival
in News
If you are young person aged 13+ interested in poetry and creative writing and would like to get involved
in our poetry slam which is taking place on Saturday 8th October 2011 please get in touch!
We are looking for young people from across the region who will be mentored by some of the young poets who are involved with RoguePlay’s regular Rhymes night. Throughout the afternoon our poets who include Becki Head, Kesha Campbell and Jordan Westcarr will mentor the young budding slammers as well as performing their own sets and the afternoon will be culminated in a performance and poetry slam. The public will then vote for their favourite team.
The mentoring will take place from 1pm and the peformances will happen between 4pm – 5pm at the Library Theatre, Birmingham Central Library.
The day will be compared by former Birmingham Young Poet Laureate Matt Windle.
If you are interested in getting involved in this, please send us a message via the contact page by clicking here.
Bodies In The Library
8 months ago
by Birmingham Book Festival
in News
We would like to invite you once again to experience Bodies in the Library, a free evocative audio tour of Birmingham Central Library.
Commissioned by Theatre Writing Partnership and Writing West Midlands, BODIES IN THE LIBRARY by Sibyl Ruth is a poetic and evocative audio journey exploring the past and present of Birmingham’s Central Library. Reflect on the pain and pleasure of its architectural idiosyncracies with some of its inhabitants, both real and imagined.
In 2013, the new Library of Birmingham will be open for business. Nevertheless, before indulging in that fantastic new construction, you now have the chance to go behind the concrete walls of its predecessor and look at the old library with new eyes. Author Sibyl Ruth takes you on a poetic journey through time and library space by telling you the building’s untold stories. It is a good-bye to a building from the past, just before we delve into the future. Reflect on the vision and promise of the building when it first opened, with some of its inhabitants – both real and imagined. Discover intimate corners and wide vistas as you tread familiar paths in a long farewell.
To enjoy it you can use your own mp3 enabled device or borrow one from Bodies itself. The audio project is available to experience now and will continue to run throughout the Birmingham Book Festival 2011.
For more information follow visit www.theatrewritingpartnership.org.uk you can also follow theproject on Twitter( @ears_wide_open)
This project is a partnership between Theatre Writing Partnership and Writing West Midlands.
Follow the progress of Boy You Turn Me
8 months ago
You can now follow the progress of our specially commissioned sound installation called Boy You Turn Me on a blog. The installation by contemporary classical composer Ailis Ni Riain and writer David Gaffney will be situated in a vacant shop unit within the Pavilions shopping centre for the duration of the Birmingham Book Festival 2011 (6th – 16th October)
You can view the blog here www.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/1463010. To find out more about the project please click here.
There is also a Facebook group that you can join http://www.facebook.com/pages/Birmingham-Book-Festival/97775632519#!/groups/213492258688104/?id=237525156284814¬if_t=group_activity
Boy You Turn Me, Thursday 6th – Sunday 16th October 2011, Unit 10, Pavilions, Birmingham, B4 7SL
Supported by: 
The Writers’ Toolkit: Annual Writer Networking Conference
8 months ago
by Birmingham Book Festival
in News
Saturday 19th November 2011
South Birmingham College,
High Street, Digbeth,
Birmingham, B5 5SU
A conference for Writers, agents, publishers, producers, teachers, development workers and practitioners from across the literature sector.
Sixteeen sessions to choose from, plus time to network in between.
For full details and booking please visit http://www.writingwestmidlands.org/develop/the-writers-toolkit-2011/ or call 0121 246 2770
Art & Writing: Launching The Barber Trail
9 months ago
by Birmingham Book Festival
in News
Thursday 13th October
6.30pm – 8.30pm (Viewing from 5.30pm)/ Free
The Barber Institute of Fine Arts,
University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B15 2TS
Join us for an evening or prose and poetry readings inspired by the Barber’s magnificent collection of painting, sculpture, and decorative art. The Barber’s first ever writer in residence, Philip Monks, along with academics from the University of Birmingam’s English Literature department, will delight the audience with new and original pieces as well as classic works by the greats such as John Donne and Alexander Pope. A twilight tour of the collection will be supported by an Art and Writing trail highlighting a selection of artworks accompanied by specially produced literary labels.
This event is supported by a series of free creative writing workshops: No need to book, just drop in.
Friday 7 October, from 2pm-5pm
Saturday 8 October, 11am – 12noon (adults), 2.30pm – 3.30pm (adults) and 1pm – 2pm (children) Wednesday 12 October, from 2pm-5pm
Resident word-artist and playwright Philip Monks will show you how to put your love of art into words, as well as producing his own literary work in response to the Barber’s collection, architecture and people.
For more information about The Barber Institute of Fine Arts, please visit their website www.barber.org.uk
Tickets: Free
For more information and to book a place
email education[at]barber.org.uk or telephone
0121 414 2261/7335
Boy You Turn Me
9 months ago
by Birmingham Book Festival
in News
Thursday 6th – Sunday 16th October 2011
Pavilions, Unit 10, Lower Ground Floor,
38 High Street, Birmingham, B4 7SL
Boy you turn me is a specially commissioned sound installation for Birmingham Book Festival 2011 by contemporary classical composer Ailis Ni Riain and writer David Gaffney. Situated in an empty shop in the Pavilions shopping centre it uses a unique structure of an inner and outer layer of sound to explore the feelings and thoughts of those who used to work in this vacant retail space. The two layers of music and text can be heard separately or at the same time by moving inside and outside of the specially created space.
It explores two aspects of Birmingham, the public and the private, the image and the reality, by producing two layers of music and two layers of text which can be heard separately, or at the same time, by physically moving inside and outside of the space. It consists of a specially commissioned piece of music and text piece by contemporary classical composer Ailis Ni Riain and writer David Gaffney, and is based on interviews with people in the city, the history of the Pavilions and the high street, and the experiences of the people who used to work in the empty shop where the piece has been installed.
The space inside the shop will have two separate areas – an inner area and an outer space. The outer layer will be most audible in the exterior environment, while the inner ‘secret’ layer will be most audible in the interior space. Audience members will be able to enter the inner space, in ones or twos, to experience close up the inner, hidden element of the work. The outer work will be heard at the same time seeping in though the top and under the sides.
Boy you turn me will be one single piece, a consistent whole, each of the two layers being always audible along with the other, as the sound from the inner space and the sounds from the outer space bleed into each other, like a yin and yang.
This inner and outer structure for a musical composition has not been explored before.
‘Listening to it stops me in my tracks. This is a composer who can get right under the skin.’
Journal of Music in Ireland.
‘Sad, funny fables recalling evanescent moments of connection and
happiness.‘ The Guardian
Opening Times:
Monday – Saturday: 9.30 – 6pm (Open till 7pm on Thursdays)
Sunday: 11am – 5pm
For more information and to keep up-to-date with the installation please visit the following websites:
Join the Facebook group www.facebook.com/groups/213492258688104/
Or follow it on Twitter @BoyYouTurnMe
There is now also a blog up and running which is following the progress of this sound installation, you can read it here: www.a-n.co.uk/artists_talking/projects/single/1463010
The recording of the script was made possible through the generous assistance of Joseph Chamberlain Sixth Form College staff.
Boy you turn me is supported by the National Lottery through Arts Council England, PRS for music foundation, Pavilions Birmingham and is commissioned in partnership with Birmingham Book Festival.
http://www.birminghambookfestival.org/
www.artscouncil.org.uk
www.prsformusicfoundation.com
http://www.pavilionsshopping.com/contact/findus/
The Birmingham Book Festival 2011 Programme Coming Very Soon
9 months ago
THE TIME IS ALMOST UPON US…
The Festival programme is complete and will soon be winging its way to you (if you are on our mailing list) and will be available as a pdf here from Wednesday 10 August 2011. You will also be able to peruse the events diary and click through to our box office here, or go to our box office directly once events are on sale. We are using MAC’s ticketing services – and we are confident that this will make your booking experience smooth and cost effective – there are no booking fees!
Once the programme is released look out for special offers, giveaways and more – follow us on twitter (@bhambookfest) and like our Facebook page to get the latest.
WIN TICKETS TO SEE OUR FESTIVAL BOOK AUTHOR, JENN ASHWORTH.
We are delighted to be featuring Jenn Ashworth’s second novel, Cold Light as our Festival Book. This means we will be featuring Jenn in the festival and talking about the book here. We’d love to know what you think of Cold Light.
We are offering you the chance to win tickets to meet Jenn and hear her talk about the book on 16th October 2011. To win, send us your review of Cold Light, (no more than 300 words, please) via joanne@birminghambookfestival.org. The best two reviews will win a pair of tickets to meet Jenn at the event, get your books signed and ask her any burning questions you have about Cold Light! You have until 1 October 2011 to submit your review.
If you don’t have a copy of Cold Light, you can buy one here.
Good Luck!
The results of the Poetry Relay are in!
9 months ago
- The final team, finished at last
- Deborah Alma brings her props
Saturday’s relay was a great success. We careened around the West Midlands in a minibus, racing through high streets and across parks to perform our poems in relay. All of our poets made it to their alloted destinations, all of them wrote their 20 lines, and we released ten pigeons from the brilliant Project Pigeon who raced back to Birmingham and determined the final order of the poem.
- Philip Monks takes the baton at Burton
- Emma Purshouse gets things going at Stoke on Trent
As the day wore on we lost time, gained it 
back, grabbed cups of tea where we could, infiltrated cinema queues and park festivals, performed live on Touch FM, entertained a pub garden full of walkers on the Malvern hills, and delighted the security guards and station managers at Stoke station. Kids on bikes helped us release our pigeons, elderly wanderers took a quick rest to listen to us in Bromyard, and dog show enthusiasts got more than they bargained for in Polesworth.
It was a fantastic day of surprises, laughs, rushing around and excellent poetry. All of our poets responded to their task in different and interesting ways, and the words we got to know well by the end of the day seemed ever more relevant as the band of merry poets grew.
Live on Touch FM at Polesworth
- Unsuspecting walkers at Malvern
However, a relay is still a race, and we must tell you the results!
Our ten pigeons arrived safely back on saturday evening, and once they had a quick rest they revealed the order in which our poems returned. The full poem will be written up for you soon, but here is the final order as they flew in…
- Hatton Country World’s poem by Helen Yendall came in first.
- Second was Bromyard’s ode, by sack-racing Deborah Alma.
- Next in was Burton-On-Trent’s ode to beer, by Philip Monks.
- Fourth was Telford Odeon’s poem about the art of queuing by aptly dressed Dave Reeves.
- Fifth was Adrian Johnson’s poem for the Malvern Hills about cycling.
- Sixth was Polesworth, with Malcolm Dewhirst’s poem for the park.
- Seventh was the place it all began, Stoke on Trent, with Emma Purshouse’s imagining of Platform Diving.
- Eighth was our final venue, Stafford, with Roz Goddard’s offering on pies and snorkelling.
- Ninth was Worcester’s stain glass making ode, by Rohit Ballal.
- Tenth was Kurly McGeachie’s poem for Highley, hot coal shovelling!
The pigeons take flight
A bus full of poets!Here are a couple of pictures of the day, but watch this space as the team from Monty Funk , who followed us around for the entire 12 hours recording, will be producing some audio/interactive content for us – to mark the day and build a lasting legacy as we head towards London 2012.
Gracious thanks to all of our venues, poets (special mention to Emma P, who was first on the bus and performed her poem no less than TEN times) and team – we all had a wonderful day, and the weather held.
Particular thanks to London 2012 and Arts Council England for inspiring and supporting the venture.
Relay Time!
9 months ago
Tomorrow we embark upon the maddest event we’ve ever attempted (and we are known for having odd ideas).
The Great West Midlands Poetry Relay is a big ask, but we are so excited to be doing it. We want to thank, and wish luck to, everyone who has agreed to be involved.
Our poets, Emma Purshouse, Philip Monks, Malcolm Dewhirst, Helen Yendall, Rohit Ballal, Adrian Johnson, Deborah Alma, Kurly McGeachie, Dave Reeves and Roz Goddard – we can’t wait to hear your poems and hope you’ve packed your sandwiches and got your comfortable travelling clothes on ready to step onto the poetry bus. The bus will be packed with snacks, pens, paper and other things required to keep ten poets alive for twelve hours.
We’re also delighted to be working with the guys over at Monty Funk who are coming with us and recording audio all day that they will then edit into a series of podcasts about the Relay – you’ll be able to experience the poems long after the day’s events are over. They will be available online and even mapped so you can download them in the places they were created.
Thanks are also due to our friends at Project Pigeon
We also want to thank our venues, all ten of them, without whom this wouldn’t be happening. We can’t wait to see how the shoppers at Hatton Country World or the cinema goers at Telford Odeon react to our bus rolling up and the inevitable outpouring of poets.
Lastly, thanks are due to Arts Council England and the Cultural Olympiad Open Weekend team for supporting the event.
We will be LIVE BLOGGING tomorrow on this site – as often as we get signal, we will be updating to let you know where we are along the route, how big and unruly the poem is becoming and who has been travel sick.
Lastly, we’ll be on BBC Radio WM tonight after 9pm, on the Loyd Williams show, and on BBC Radio Stoke tomorrow at 7.15am talking about the Relay, so listen out for us.
That’s it for now – we’re off to polish the megaphone and pack the bus!
Are you Birmingham’s next Poet Laureate?
10 months ago
Birmingham Poet Laureate Roy McFarlane performs with Amsterdam City Poet Frank Starik
It’s that time of the year again. Birmingham Libraries are currently seeking the next Birmingham Poet Laureate.
The new laureate will compete for the title against other hopefuls, performing around the city on National Poetry Day (6 October) and ending up at our Festival Launch for a special live announcement that evening.
Full Details about the scheme and how to apply can be found here. The deadline is 12th August 2011.
This is a unique opportunity to get involved with the writing community in Birmingham and promote poetry in the city. Good luck!
