Geopoetics News May 2014: Stravaig Issue 3

Stravaig Issue 3 is now online at https://www.geopoetics.org.uk/online-journal-stravaig/stravaig-3/. It’s bigger and better than ever with 8 essays and 14 poems on the theme Geopoetics in Practice ranging from Aberlady Bay to Saudi Arabia, from Illinois to Iona. Many thanks to Steve Pardue and all the contributors for making it such a fine issue. We were going to charge non-members for it but have decided on this occasion to make it free to all again. If you like the journal and want it to continue please join us: £10/£5 unwaged: see how under Membership below.
Submissions for Stravaig Issue 4, especially images to go with essays and poems, on the theme of Intellectual Nomads are invited by 1 October 2014 to Elizabeth Rimmer at burnedthumb@gmail.com and Norman Bissell at normanbissell@btinternet.com.

International Geopoetics Conference, Paris 12-13 June 2014
L’Archipel, the co-ordinating body of international geopoetics groups is organising an international conference on the theme of The Town and Geopoetics at the Centre culturel canadien, at 5, rue de Constantine, Paris 7e on 12-13 June 2014. If you would like to take part and wish more information, contact Rachel Bouvet at bouvet.rachel@uqam.ca or Norman Bissell at the above e-mail address.

Kenneth White Books
Three books by Kenneth White Ideas of Order at Cape Wrath: a collection of essays on cultural politics, Latitudes & Longitude: a new collection of poetry, and The Winds of Vancouver which charts his travels in British Columbia and Alaska are still available from the Research Institute of Irish and Scottish Studies at Aberdeen University RIISS at: http://www.abdn.ac.uk/riiss/publications.shtml.
Further information about plans for the publication of his Collected Works can be obtained from Professor Cairns Craig, cairns.craig@abdn.ac.uk. For fuller information on White’s work, with commentaries and criticism both in English and in French, see his bilingual site: http://www.kennethwhite.org/accueil/index.php.

Tessa Ransford’s new book – Made in Edinburgh, Luath Press, is a collection of poems inspired by Arthur’s Seat and Holyrood Park in Edinburgh enhanced by photographs by Michael Knowles. http://www.wisdomfield.com/

James McCarthy’s The Diplomat of Kashgar: A Very Special Agent – Sir George Macartney to be published by Proverse Publishing is the joint winner of the Proverse International Prize.

Martina Kolb’s Nietzsche, Freud, Benn, and the Azure Spell of Liguria, University of Toronto Press, about the influence of the Ligurian coastal area of Italy on three seminal German-writing modernists – Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud, and Gottfried Benn – is still available from http://www.abebooks.co.uk/book-search/author/MARTINA-KOLB?cm_sp=brcr-_-bdp-_-author.

Gerrie Fellows has just launched her fourth collection, The Body in Space (Shearsman), which is concerned with the living presence of place, in particular the landscapes of Scotland and what is written over them by history. The poems bring together people and places – family relationships enacted through webs of intimacy or distance, the dead remembered in interleaved images of art and medicine.

Members’ Events

Nancy Campbell

Vantar/Missing Exhibition of new work by visual and performing artist in residence 2013-2014 Nancy Campbell at Lady Margaret Hall, Norham Gardens Oxford OX2 6QA from 6-17 May. www.nancycampbell.co.uk

Alyson Hallett
Alyson will be reading from her new poetry collection Suddenly Everything with Victoria Field at the Charles Causley Festival on Friday 13 June at 4.00pm in the Launceston Guildhall Tickets: £4. More details at: www.charlescausleyfestival.co.uk.

Mavis Gulliver
Mavis Gulliver & Jan Fortune launch their new poetry collection Slate Voices: Cwmorthin & Islands of Netherlorn:
Monday May 19th The Clapton Laundry, London
Wednesday 21 May 7 pm Hen Bost, Bleanau Ffestiniog
Thursday 22 May 6 for 6.30 pm Penrallt Books & Gallery, Powys
Friday 23 May 7 pm Palas Print Bookshop, 170 High St, Bangor
Saturday 14 June 7.30 pm Poetry, slides, songs & refreshments Cullipool Hall, Isle of Luing
Sunday 15 June 11 am poetry workshop and 3 pm poetry safari, Cullipool, Isle of Luing
Tuesday 17 June 7pm Seil Island Hall 7.30pm
Thursday 19 June 11am & 2.30pm Poetry Walks on Seil and Easdale
Further details: http://bit.ly/1kMmw6K.

Richard Meyers: PICNIC for RICH: Remembering Richard at Islington Ecology Centre 191 Drayton Park London N5 1PH on Saturday 26 July, 2014.
Richard was a self-taught naturalist who was instrumental in initiating and managing for periods the wild part of Alexandra Park and Railway Fields in Haringey and Gillespie Park with its Ecology Centre in Islington. He contributed much to so many through conducted walks, his vast knowledge and enthusiasm for the flora and fauna of our urban world, and awareness of how people can be in this world. He worked with Gordon Peters to develop a geopoetics network in southern England and ably led some of our walks in the area. He died last October and his life will be celebrated at this event.
11 am Poems by Richard Meyers + readings and hints on living with the natural world in the city from Ruth Meyers and Gordon Peters.
12.30 pm Lunch inside or picnic outside in the Park (£5 per head).

Christian McEwen: Summer Isles Retreat on Tanera Mor 30 August – 6 September 2014 A Week in Paradise of art making, writing, poetry and reflection. Full details and booking: http://www.wildtiles.co.uk/world_enough_and_time.php.

Susan Richardson: Writing Root & Claw 17-19 October 2014
A Weekend Workshop with Susan Richardson & Em Strang in the Haybergill Centre, Cumbria. A stimulating weekend of writing and discussion around ecological themes. Further details at http://bit.ly/1mCNgZK.

Atlantic Islands Writing Day and Geopoetics AGM 18-19 October 2014
Mandy Haggith will lead a writing workshop & evening performance on the Isle of Luing on Saturday 18 October 2014.

Our SCFG AGM will take place on the Isle of Luing on Sunday 19 October 2014 at 12 noon. The venue will be the Atlantic Islands Centre if it has opened by then or Cullipool Hall if not.
If you would like to come to these events please contact Norman Bissell at normanbissell@btinternet.com for more information.

Other Events

Mary Morrison Exhibition Fonn – “A song of land, held in mind” 10 May -24 June An Lanntair Gallery, Stornoway, Lewis.

The gaelic word Fonn has various definitions relating to ‘land, music, state of mind, longing’. Writer Jay Griffiths describes the rich meanings of the word as suggesting, ‘a song of land, held in mind’ which echo the lines of enquiry in Mary’s practice. Mary Morrison’s work is largely informed by the Atlantic archipelago.

Membership
Please join or renew your annual membership (£10/£5 unwaged) by sending a completed application form from our website and cheque made out to the Scottish Centre for Geopoetics to Elizabeth Rimmer 18 North Street, Cambuskenneth, Stirling FK9 5NB. You can also pay online by PayPal at https://www.geopoetics.org.uk/online-store/.

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