Author: isgfreelance

Deep Wheel Aberdonia

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I’m looking forward to taking part in this symposium on the 04th May at the University of Aberdeen:

Deep Wheel Aberdonia is an event celebrating writing from and about Scottish islands with special guest Harry Josephine Giles, author of recently published verse novel Deep Wheel Orcadia, in which Orkney and its language are taken on a strange science-fiction journey, carving out a radical new space for Scottish writing.

The event will be chaired by Centre co-director Professor David Wheatley and also feature Orcadian poet Ingrid Leonard, who will read from her recently-published pamphlet Rammo in Stenness (Abersee Press). I will be sharing work stemming from my residency at Island Darkroom which explores how Lewis has helped to shape the work of poets Donald MacAulay, Iain Crichton Smith and Derick Thomson.

More details can be found here.

Poetry Scotland

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I would never consider myself a serious poet, but I do like to dabble now and then, and I am very happy to have my short poem ‘Planets’ included in Poetry Scotland Issue 103.

The magazine has a long and distinguished history, summed up here from the Poetry Scotland website:

“Poetry Scotland began in the 1940s when Maurice Lindsay started publishing books and anthologies of new poetry under this title. There were three issues of Poetry Scotland and a series of slim hardback books by poets of the day, including Hugh MacDiarmid. Then there followed a hiatus until 1997 when, with Maurice Lindsay’s support, Sally Evans and Ian King of Diehard Press began to publish Poetry Scotland as a broadsheet, aiming from the first to be inclusive, encouraging women, minority languages and people from country airts.”

Now under the editorship of Andy Jackson and Judy Taylor, it publishes poems from across the UK, twice-yearly in the A4 broadsheet format of its previous incarnation. You can subscribe and purchase individual issues on the Poetry Scotland website.

Reflections

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“No place remains static and unchanged, frozen in its past, but the past gives us a sense of place and belonging that helps shape our future, and this is what Lewis has shown me.”

Some thoughts on my recent residency on Lewis with Island Darkroom have been posted up on their site. I was very grateful for the opportunity to spend time there in February, and you can read the full account of what I have taken away from it, here:

Island Darkroom Residency

New Piece on Lewis Published.

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‘No land barer; and yet the moor was filled with untapped memory and story, locked away like the carbon stored within the peat…’

Very pleased to have a new piece of writing feature on Paul Scraton’s online blog Elsewhere: A Journal of Place. It has come out of wider work stemming from my recent residency on Lewis with Island Darkroom, and explores the legacy of the island through its impact on the work of poet Iain Crichton Smith. Click on the image above to read.

Talking About Time and Place

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I enjoyed a great couple of hours yesterday walking my local hill with Helen Needham of BBC Radio Scotland, talking about my writing and research; about landscape and place; and the layers of time and memory held in the land. Our conversation will form the basis of a radio programme planned for later this year.