list.co.uk/books Friday 16
Glasgow ✽✽ Aye Write! Mitchell Library, North Street, 353 8000. Times vary. Prices
vary (free–£15). If officially decorated poets are your thing, today’s event with Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, Scots Makar Liz Lochhead and National Poet of Wales Gillian Clarke will be unmissable. Aside from that there’s the promise of Chris Brookmyre and Mark Billingham being indiscreet, and, as ever, much, much more. See feature, page 45.
Edinburgh An Irish Jaunt Scottish Storytelling Centre, 43–45 High Street, 228 1155. 7.30pm. £6 (£4). Join charismatic Claire McNicol, mighty Alexander Mckenzie and dauntless David Campbell, along with the acclaimed piper Hamish Moore, who invite you to an Irish celebration of story, music and song. Part of Ceilidh Culture
St Andrews ✽✽ StAnza: Scotland’s Poetry Festival 2012 Various venues centred on the Byre Theatre in Abbey Street. Times vary. Prices vary. Start the day with a poetry breakfast featuring Gerry Cambridge and Andrew Roberts, gorge yourself on workshops and readings with the likes of Keston Sutherland, William Bonar, Claudia Daventry, Jane McKie and Alastair Cook all day long, and round things off with a turn at the late-night poetry open mic.
EVENTS Books
Saturday 17
Glasgow ✽✽ Aye Write! Mitchell Library, North Street, 353 8000. Times vary. Prices
vary (free–£15). With the arrival of the weekend comes a massive explosion in the size of Aye Write’s offering: among the many authors appearing today are Tam Dalyell, Andrew Greig, Bidisha, Alistair Darling and Marina Warner, Tom Devine, and there’s a special event celebrating the work of Angela Carter, who died 20 years ago, too.
St Andrews ✽✽ StAnza: Scotland’s Poetry Festival 2012 Various venues centred on the Byre Theatre in Abbey Street. Times vary. Prices vary. Saturday includes appearances from Chase Twichell, Matthew Hollis, Young Dawkins, Theresa Muñoz, Andy Jackson, Pippa Little, Jackie Kay and Christopher Reid, as well as surprise poetry theatre ‘interventions’ in the Byre foyer and the StAnza Slam.
Sunday 18
St Andrews ✽✽ StAnza: Scotland’s Poetry Festival 2012 Various venues centred on the Byre Theatre in Abbey Street. Times vary. Prices vary. The final day of StAnza starts with a breakfast session on poetry translation, a poetic response to Hitchcock’s Psycho and the festival finale, with folk music and merriment making into the night.
Begin your adventure with Burns Discover the man, his work and his life at the Robert Burns Birthplace Museum Alloway, Ayr KA7 4PQ Call 0844 493 2601 www.burnsmuseum.org.uk
PREVIEW POETRY FESTIVAL STANZA Various venues, St Andrews, Wed 14–Sun 18 Mar
It always helps a festival event to have some kind of theme in order to bring together many different strands and give the whole shebang a proper focus. Perhaps spoilt for choice, the organisers of StAnza (aka Scotland’s Poetry Festival) have gone with two themes for their 15th annual outing. For the first, The Image, there is an exploration of the importance and relevance of the image in poetry, as well as in psychology, religion, visual art, and photography. The second theme, Poetry by Degrees, looks at the relationship between verse and education.
While StAnza is centred on the town’s famous Byre Theatre, other venues include Parliament Hall, the Preservation Trust Museum, Zest and Balmungo House. The rooms will house a total of 88 participants including a number of headline poets such as Jackie Kay, Kathleen Jamie, Christopher Reid and Lavinia Greenlaw.
Among the tasty-looking events are a celebration of Philip Larkin’s love of jazz featuring the Dave Batchelor Quintet and David Hayman (Byre Theatre, Wed 14), an intimate table reading with John Burnside (Green Room, Thu 15), Joe Dunthorne appearing in one of the Border Crossings translated poets events (Town Hall, Sun 18) while there’s a screening of Submarine, Dunthorne’s debut novel directed by Richard Ayoade (Byre Theatre, Thu 15) and Karen Dunbar performs A Drunk Woman Looks at the Thistle (Byre Theatre, Sun 18). A piece about national identity and the future of Scotland’s culture, this is author Denise Mina’s acclaimed theatrical response to MacDiarmid’s 1926 poem, ‘A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle’. (Brian Donaldson)
THE MOST SIGNIFICANT BURNS COLLECTION IN THE WORLD TO ENTERTAIN, DELIGHT AND SURPRISE YOU.
The National Trust for Scotland for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty is a charity registered in Scotland, Charity Number SC 007410
1–29 Mar 2012 THE LIST 49