Soon several if not all of the writers who gathered at Adishakti’s famous Losers’ Table to fling fruit at each other and draw menacing tattoos on their arms in biro will be reunited at a couple of readings.
First up is a series of events in Wales you can find out about here. Basically, Welsh poets Menna Elfyn, Eurig Salisbury, Hywel Griffiths and Karen Owen will spend a week collaborating with the Keralan literary legend K. Satchidanandan, plus our very own Meena, Sampurna and Robin.
This leads to a couple of events: ‘Reading India, Translating Wales’ at the Blue Sky Café, Bangor Sunday 26th June, 7pm (£3/£2 students/unwaged – Tickets at the door). The event will also feature the Welsh launch for the artist’s book What does and doesn’t come to pass (Redfox Press), a collaboration between artist Robert Brandy and poet Jean Portante, both from Luxembourg, with translations from the French by Zoë.
There’s also a poetry dinner on Wednesday 29th June, 7pm at Ultracomida, Aberystwyth (The event, a three course dinner and a glass of wine will be served for a special price of £20. You should book by emailing catrin@walesliterature.org or calling +44 (0)1970 622 544.) This is billed as an evening of innovative performance, movement and language, presented by poet and writer Nigel Jenkins.
On July 1st Zoe Skoulding, Sampurna Chattarji, Meena Kandasamy, Robin Ngnangom and Raphael Urweider will read (oh, and me) in Manchester as part of a double bill also featuring the Keralan poet K. Satchidanandan. Here are the details:
Friday 1st July, 6.30pm
International Anthony Burgess Foundation,
Engine House, Chorlton Mill,
3 Cambridge Street, Manchester, M1 5BY
Entry is free, and here’s a link with further info.
Then in Ledbury on Sunday July 3rd, the same line-up, but minus Robin, will take part in two events: a translation discussion at 2.15 in Burgage Hall; then a reading at 7.30 in Hellens which apparently includes a buffet supper (I knew there was some reason Kulturweider was showing up). The Ledbury site is here.
In other news, the anthology is in production, but as yet we have no publication date. As soon as that changes, we’ll start thinking things like, ‘if we were really efficient we’d probably post something about this on the blog.’
buffet! and coz I am a looser: happy birthday too late!