Authors ~ Storytellers ~ Poets ~ Musicians ~ Acrobats
Discussions ~ Readings ~ Talks ~ Performances
#90B47E
SUNDAY 17th MAY
WRITING WORKSHOP & WRITERS' LUNCH with ALICE JOLLY.
12.30pm – 1.30pm Lunch: where healthy homemade food will nourish you and meeting other writers at table may inspire you!
1.30pm – 5pm Workshop: The Writing Life: Getting Started and Keeping Going.
Lower Shaw Farm
West Swindon SN5 5PJ
Tel: 01793 771080
12.30pm ~ 17th May ~ £35
Writing is a solitary business. Writing well is never easy. How can we produce work which others want to read?
This workshop is aimed at writers of fiction, short stories, novels, plays, or memoirs. There will be inspiring writing exercises, time for thinking and discussion, and plenty of opportunities to ask questions.
Together, we will be looking at four key skills: finding the right details; understanding voice and viewpoint; creating structure; and editing.
Participants will leave with new skills, inspiration, and the confidence to move on with their own chosen writing project.
The workshop is suitable for experienced writers and for those who are just starting out. All are welcome!
Bring a charged laptop or pen and paper.
Workshop leader Alice Jolly is the author of a prize-winning memoir, four novels, and most recently A Saint in Swindon, a story which was written with help from Swindon reading groups. She is also a commissioned playwright and a tutor of creative writing at the University of Oxford.
Is writing well like trying to make trees out of old furniture?
FESTIVAL FINALE – circus theatre, dance, music, poems, stories, and pleasure, in a relaxed cabaret setting.
Court Theatre, Swindon Dance, Town Hall
Regent Circus, Swindon SN1 1QG
Tel: 01793 524481
7.30pm ~ 17th May ~ £10 (£9)
Hannah Ballard and Karen Wynne aka, Sole Rebel Tap, with piano, guitar, voice, and tap, will take us on journeys through movement and music. In Blues & Shoes, which combines their love for rhythm, blues, song, and dance, harmonising voices, instruments, and tap, they tell terrific stories in unexpected ways!
Tjawangwa Dema, former chair of the Writers Association of Botswana, author of two books of poems, most recently The Careless Seamstress, which won the Sillerman First Book Prize, has given readings in more than twenty countries worldwide, including Brazil, India, South Africa, and the USA.
Swindon Dance students from their Centre for Advanced Training present a performance that represents the passion, commitment, and talent required to become one of tomorrow's professionals.
Steve Rooney, whose familiar and friendly face masks an inner sense of irony, from whence he delivers astute observations from the hard shoulder of life’s motorway, has performed to big baying crowds at Latitude and to seven people on the outskirts of Derby. Now, he’s back in Swindon.
Darine Flanagan and Ben Walker perform Me, You, or Us? – a verbal, physical, and musical exploration, through movement, voice, and partner acrobatics, that addresses the pros and cons of whether it’s better to work alone or with others, and the benefits, difficulties, and beauties of both.
And as the Festival draws to a close, be prepared for a few Festival Finale frolics, even surprises!
