Friday 5 September 2014 –
Saturday 6 September 2014
1.00pm–3.00pm
Bennachie Centre, Chapel of Garioch
Outdoor opera by Joe Stollery and Catriona Yule
EVENT CANCELLED
Thursday 11 September 2014
6.30pm
Books and Beans, Aberdeen
Olivia McMahon, Gerard Rochford and Louise Counsell
Saturday 13 September 2014
1.30pm
Bennachie Centre, Chapel of Garioch
Guided walk and performance by Petra Vergunst with the Dee String Quartet
Sunday 14 September 2014
2.30pm
Glenbuchat Hall, Glenbuchat
Poet and composer Haworth Hodgkinson performs a curious mix of words and sounds
Sunday 21 September 2014
2.00pm
Carmelite Hotel, Aberdeen
Readings by poets from the celebrated online community
Sunday 21 September 2014
7.00pm
Peacock Visual Arts, Aberdeen
Poetry, prose and music, brimming with vim and vigour
Wednesday 24 September 2014
7.30pm
Huntly and District Ex-Servicemen's Club, Huntly
Ian Crockatt launches his new collection of translations of Rognvaldr from the Orkneyinga Saga
Thursday 25 September 2014
6.30pm
Books and Beans, Aberdeen
Richie Brown reads from his debut poetry pamphlet, with support from Mark Pithie
Friday 26 September 2014
7.00pm
Better Read Books, Ellon
Come along to listen or bring a poem or two to read
Saturday 27 September 2014
9.00pm
Cellar 35, Aberdeen
The most unpredictable spoken word night in Aberdeen is back!
Tuesday 30 September 2014
7.15pm
Station Hotel, Stonehaven
A showcase of new writing from Mearns Writers
Review: Open Poetry Night
Come along to listen or bring a poem or two to read
Friday 26 September 2014
Better Read Books, Ellon (map)
Original listing
What attracts people to book shops and, in particular, good book shops? It's the
books – certainly – and definitely the service provided by the helpful
proprietors. Maybe it's the smell! Come on, how many of you have lifted a book to
your nose and indulged in the heady aroma of literature? Well on Friday evening
it was the promise of listening to a full programme of poetry and prose that attracted
an audience of over thirty eager fans to Better Read Books on Ythan Terrace, Ellon.
As part of the New Words Festival 2014, Bill and Euan Kelly of the aforementioned
establishment threw open the doors of their wonderfully stocked shop to the large
but very welcome audience. Never thrown off balance of course, extra chairs were
found, cups of tea and glasses of wine procured and everyone soon settled down for
the evening's entertainment ahead.
Hosted by festival director Haworth Hodgkinson, the evening soon established itself
as a classic of its type with poems that encompassed a wide range of subject matter,
from a puddock (a frog) read by Frances Jaffray, to a poem by John Keats (Fred Crawford).
Ian Anderson read his poignant Elrick Hill and Me and Mrs Jones, a
riotous tale of a rubber band chewing (ex) work-colleague. Yvonne Heald read Wild
Deer from her anthology Unrequited Love, a collection jointly written
with Pamela Shand, and Paul McKeown read his excellent When Lavinia Went to Lidl
and Wave.
Other poems in the programme included Catriona Yule's No Distractions (read
by Michael Robb) from the Guiding Lights anthology and Where I sit
a new poem by Bernard Briggs. Emma O'Connor read poetry from her debut collection
The Insomnia Poems (No. 1 best seller on Kindle) and Pamela Kelly read
some Pam Ayres, always a sure-fire winner! There were many poems in English (sadly
too many to list in this review), in Scots, and to satisfy the most demanding of
tastes, even a Doric poem about leeches! Great fun!
Poetry lovers didn't get things all their own way though. Introducing a nice change
in the evening's dynamic, John Sawkins (in attendance also to publicise the Scottish
Mental Health Arts and Film Festival) read a first rate short story entitled Taxi
Driver from his book Defragmenting the Soul.
As always, at their events, Bill and Euan provided an excellent range of refreshments
during the break, which was well received by the assembled crowd and as the curtain
fell and folks started to drift out, chatting, into the fresh night air, it was
considered to have been an excellent evening of rich and varied content. Once again
Better Read Books and the New Words Festival had delivered a great night of entertainment
and one that, no doubt, will be long discussed and remembered.
Review by Bernard Briggs
Photos by Euan Kelly
North East Writers and its partner organisations undertake to produce
all events in the New Words festival as advertised, but we can accept no
liability for details that are changed due to circumstances beyond our control.