The sun is out, the marquees are thronging, the bookshops are primed and there’s a real buzz about the town. Yes, the vibe is unmistakable, it’s Hay Festival time again!
Hay Writers’ Circle is extremely grateful to the Hay Festival for it’s continued, unwavering support of our writing group and the amazing opportunity it gives us to share some of our recent writings with the festival crowd.
We have a growing number of talented authors in our group and those performing at this year’s festival will be showcasing a variety of exciting new works including short stories, poetry and extracts from newly published books. We are positive you will want to be there to enjoy their stirring creations. Check out our programme of readings below.
Event number 230 – Wednesday 31st May 8.30pm.
CLICK HERE to book your ticket for our event from the Hay Festival box office.
To listen to a selection of our previous performances, why not subscribe to Hay Player and get access to a catalogue of audio and video recordings from Hay Festival.
Prize Winning Poems
Following on from our last article concerning the Hay Writers’ Circle Poetry Competition 2023 Winners, we are delighted to showcase the 2nd and 3rd placed poems.
The winning poem, “Spine” by Helen Smith can be read here – SPINE.
Second Prize went to “Brasserie Depuis Ma Fenêtre(From My Window)” by Jon Magidsohn
Our Judge, Alex Josephy wrote, “A clever idea, sustained throughout with inventive wit. This has made me smile every time I’ve read it. The poem nicely oversteps its own constraints here and there, in a way that enhances it – list poems can become too predictable, but his one does not. The descriptive details are very well observed, and it’s laced with little verbal jokes. I especially like the ‘sun’s rays over a closed-loop carpet’, ‘rising moon pie’ and ‘crumbling parapet.’ Each stanza is rhythmic in a slightly different way, so it reads very well aloud (I tried!) and the phrasal and line-length variety are well-judged. There is plenty of subtle word music to enjoy too – ‘Bicycle commuter with a side of Lycra’ is an enviable line. There’s a slight lack of consistency in the punctuation of each stanza heading – i couldn’t find a good reason for this. Perhaps it does not go far beyond description and word joy, but the succession of small telling details adds up to a vibrant portrait of a place, and of an observer’s point of view. It reminds me of the way we watched the world from windows during the pandemic.”
Brasserie Depuis Ma Fenêtre(From My Window) by Jon Magidsohn
Starters
Robin’s breath, with chirps and fluttering Young spring leaves sprouted overnight Speeding Vauxhall running late Chatty mums with school run offspring Bicycle commuter with a side of Lycra Snow flakes Carl takes the bins out, toast in hand
Lunch
Postman’s parcel in parchment Sun’s rays over a closed-loop carpet New spots on double-glazing Neighbour’s birch through the woodchipper Roofers on a break Electric scooter avoiding speed humps Twenty minutes of silent stillness Barking dog told off on pavement Delivery van, double-parked with hazard lights
Dinner Entrées
Shepherd’s delight with red skies Smoked chimney pots on skyline Terraced Victorian home with kerb appeal Cat on the sill Hand-in-hand stroll, squeaky shoes and long shadows Gloaming with cloud cover Whispers in a darkened doorway The usual with evening essence
Dessert
Rising moon pie Ice cream wagon playing ‘Popeye the Sailor’ Crumbling parapet Curtains drawn
Third Prize was attained by Ange Grunsell, with her entry, “Twilight“.
Alex Josephy wrote of this poem, “Very evocative of a time and place. I like the opening invitation to walk with the narrator, and the gentle feeding in of description. Heat and texture are conveyed particularly well – the ‘buckled blue metal’ contrasting with ‘warm mud walls’ and the ’furrowed’, ‘gritty track’ (are there slightly too many descriptors here though?) The move to light humour in stanza two lifts the poem’s tone, and the warm evening companionship in stanza three gives the walk a sense of destination. There are a few anomalies in the punctuation. I especially like the way this poem ends on an air of slight mystery. Who is it star-gazing? Not knowing who the ‘solitary figure’ is, the reader can identify with them. Watching the stars, we are subtly drawn back to the idea of space travel, but in a more personal way.”
Twilight by Ange Grunsell
Leave the yard of the house on the corner where the town begins. Open the tall gate of buckled blue metal, step out into the evening between the warm mud walls onto the gritty track furrowed by Bedford trucks. July 1969. They say someone has walked on the moon, American lie.
The posse of donkey riders bring their loads of dura and grass to market before sunset then hammer out of town again: the evening cowboys of the street legs straight out on either side flip flops swing perilously on the end of their toes. The donkeys’ thin legs flick along in a mass.
The dust cloud settles Groups of boys and men sit tightly packed in circles on the warm sand beyond the Ahmedir swapping gossip telling jokes
A solitary white figure stretches out flat on the sand road Gazing at the stars.
Congratulations to our three prize winners pictured below, Helen Smith, Jon Magidsohn and Ange Grunsell.
As something to look forward to, the Highly Commended poem by Mark Bayliss will feature in our next article.
In the mean time we hope to see you at our Hay Festival performance on Wednesday 31st May 8.30pm at the Hwyl Stage. We may be vying with comedian Tom Allen, but who’s to say our readings won’t be as entertaining!
We are delighted to announce the results of the Hay Writers Circle Poetry Competition 2023.
This popular competition again received a good number of entries from both inside and outside Hay Writers’ Circle and we very much welcome external interest in all our writing competitions.
We must primarily take a moment to thank our wonderful 2023 Poetry Judge, Alex Josephy who single-handedly read all the poems, whittled them down into a long list, then short list, then our ultimate set of winning poems, with one highly commended entry.
Alex said, “Reading and re-reading the Hay competition poems has been a real pleasure, one I’ve been reluctant to move away from in order to select the winners. Poems, I’ve realised, don’t really like being placed in rank order – it’s something they resist at every turn. Judgments are always, of course, subjective and subject to individual preferences. And the poetry scene these days is thrilling because it is so diverse. It grows and proliferates in many, many different directions.
I admired all the poems in one way or another. Each one gave something of interest to think about, and took me into its imaginary universe. It’s one of the hardest things in the world, writing a good poem. You write and re-write. You get to know it by heart. You fall in love with it, a little. You hope it really is a poem. And then there’s the scary moment of sending it off to be read critically. So huge congratulations to all who entered the competition. I read, re-read, and found something to like in every one of the poems.“
All poems which made it onto the Shortlist received an individual critic from Alex, which is so useful for any writer going forward. Thank you Alex for all your hard work, we are extremely grateful.
As with all good competitions, we are announcing in reverse order.
The Longlist
a song for her dying – Helen Smith Bayou wedding (Revenge Poem) – Jean Cooper Moran Encountering goats and Jane Austen – Ange Grunsell Ethel – Celia Harper Brasserie Depuis Ma Fenêtre (From My Window) – Jon Magidsohn Ode to our meadowlands – Michelle Pearce Everything Jakub Schongauer knew – Brian Comber Landscape – Sam Ashton Quake – Celia Harper spine – Helen Smith Taste the Darkness – Mark Bayliss The law according to mermaids – Jean Cooper Moran Twilight – Ange Grunsell
The Shortlist
a song for her dying Bayou wedding (Revenge Poem) Brasserie Depuis Ma Fenêtre (From My Window) Ode to our meadowlands Quake spine Taste the Darkness Twilight
Hay Writers’ Circle Poetry Competition 2023 – Winners!
First Prize – spine by Helen Smith
Second Prize – Brasserie Depuis Ma Fenêtre(From My Window) by Jon Magidsohn
Third Prize – Twilight by Ange Grunsell
Highly Commended – Taste the Darkness by Mark Bayliss
The Winning Poem
Judge’s comments :
“spine – An ambitious and ambiguous poem that invites us to revel in uncertainty. However many times I read it, I can’t quite disentangle the bookshop from the hospital, or work out with certainty what is actually going on, especially the identity of ‘she’ (is she just a random book donor, or more significant than that? I‘m not sure), and what it is that the narrator eventually finds and buys. Perhaps it relates to the loss of the father? I’m not sure that this is always a problem, although a little more clarity in places might make it more approachable. However, the poem takes me on an absolutely intriguing walk. Conscious and unconscious links combine, as in the jump from ‘unboxed’ books to the loss of someone ‘so young, too young’, or the interleaved scents of old books, old patients, ‘chamomile tea, potpourri./ (dead skin and quarantine wings)’. The spines are also wonderfully evocative- spine of a book, of a person, of a story. And I delight in the provocative words ‘easy to get lost here, in the hospital district’ as the reader finds a tenuous path toward the end of the poem. The choice of mainly implicit punctuation and the rambling structure in one long stanza work well, I think.“
The Winning Poem
spine by Helen Smith
the bookshop was a converted hospital in Minneapolis the sky was heavy and the air thick with heat and sweat I pushed damp hair from my cheek drained the last of my water stepped into air conditioning and the smell of new books, paper and ink laid out, freshly unboxed (and so young, too young) I turned away, and the smell changed as I moved through neurology and the acute cardiovascular ward to geriatrics the old books, and the forgotten chamomile tea, potpourri (dead skin and quarantine wings) books thumbed through with memories boxed and cleared from the house of a father she never really knew I touched a spine, vertebra by vertebra traced gilded edges of a disintegrating story words falling from the page like rain as the heavens broke and the distant pavement hammered a tune of violent release I found it then, small and yellowing between Robert Frost and Chekhov hiding under 17th century needlework I paid quickly, in the ICU fumbling fingers dropping coins to the floor remembering strip lights vending machine coffee on the first floor scrubs and silence and I’m sorry I hurried through paediatrics and out into rain that tasted of exhaust and too many people easy to get lost here, in the hospital district fingers clutching a memory I should never have bought a long, long way from home
We will be sharing the other placed poems and judge’s comments later in the week.
Huge congratulations to our winner, Helen, all our placed poets and to everyone who entered our competition. Well done all!
Here’s a last minute shout out for our Writing Historical Fiction workshop taking place Thursday 20th April – tomorrow – 11.30am-4pm. We are once again delighted to have Alan Bilton taking the lead at the inspirational location of The Threshing Barn Llwyn Celyn Cwmyoy Abergavenny. Tickets are £10 each available via Eventbrite (Click Here)
Please take a packed lunch and writing tools – parking available on site.
Alan Bilton teaches Creative Writing, Literature and Film at Swansea University. He is the author of three novels, The Sleepwalkers’ Ball (2009), The Known and Unknown Sea (2014) and The End of The Yellow House (2020), as well as a collection of short stories, Anywhere Out of the World (2016), and books on silent film, American fiction, and the 1920s. He was a jury member for the Dylan Thomas International Prize in 2022, and has appeared at the Hay, Edinburgh and Cheltenham Literary Festivals.
Workshop 2 – Poetry
We are thrilled to announce details of a new workshop taking place in May led by prize winning poet, Alex Josephy.
The Narrow Room: Form and Freedom in Poetry will take place on Tuesday, 16 May 2023 13:30 – 16:30 in our very own Hay-on-Wye Library. This workshop is free to members and those who entered our 2023 poetry competition. £5 for guests. Tickets will be available from 20/04/2023 via eventbrite – CLICK HERE
Inspired by Wordsworth’s poem “Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow room” Alex Josephy will explore form and freedom in poetry.
This short informal workshop is for anyone who writes, or would like to write poetry. It will be practical and joyous. There will be opportunity to learn about Alex’s approach to poetry as well as the chance to try out some techniques for yourself.
The winners of The Hay Writers’ Circle annual Poetry Prize for 2023, where Alex was judge, will also be announced.
Alex Josephy lives in Rye, East Sussex, and sometimes in Italy. She has been a reader and writer of poetry all her life, and has an MA in Creative and Life Writing from Goldsmiths College, University of London. She has worked as a teacher and university lecturer and as an NHS education adviser. Winner of the Cinnamon Press Pamphlet Award 2022 with Again behold the stars. Her most recent collection is Naked Since Faversham, Pindrop Press, 2020. Other work includes White Roads, Paekakariki Press, 2018, and Other Blackbirds, Cinnamon Press, 2016. Her poems have won the McLellan and Battered Moons prizes, and have appeared in magazines and anthologies in the UK, Italy and India. You can find out more on her website: www.alexjosephy.net
Event – HAY FESTIVAL 2023!
It’s that fabulous time of year again where all literary eyes turn towards Hay Festival. As ever the programme is vast, inclusive, and let’s face it, pretty amazing. If you want to check it out for yourself head over the the main Hay Festival website by CLICKING HERE . Tickets are going fast, so make sure you don’t delay!
Hay Writers’ Circle is extremely grateful to the Hay Festival for it’s continued, unwavering support of our writing group and the amazing opportunity to share some of our recent writings with the festival crowd.
We have a growing number of talented authors in our group and those performing at this year’s festival will be showcasing a variety of exciting new works including short stories, poetry and extracts from newly published books. We are positive you will want to be there to enjoy their stirring creations.
Event number 230 – Wednesday 31st May 8.30pm.
CLICK HERE to book your ticket for our event from the Hay Festival box office.
To listen to a selection of our previous performances, why not subscribe to Hay Player and get access to a catalogue of audio and video recordings from Hay Festival.
To listen to a selection of our previous performances, why not subscribe to Hay Player and get access to a huge catalogue of audio and video recordings from past Hay Festivals.
We hope to see you there.
Don’t forget to check out our EVENTSpage for new updates on performances and writing workshops.
– POETRY COMPETITION –
Just a few more days until the submission window closes on our annual Hay Writers Poetry Competition 2023. Anyone can enter and our judge this year is the wonderful Alex Josephy.
1st Prize is £100, with further cash prizes for 2nd and 3rd placed poems too!
Go to our Competitionspage for full competition details and an entry form.
GOOD LUCK!
Don’t forget to subscribe with your email address in the box below.
We are delighted to reveal details of an up and coming workshop on Writing Historical Fiction with Dr Alan Bilton. This workshop is open to everyone who has an interest in writing.
DETAILS : Date : Thursday 20th April. Time : 11.30am – 4pm (bring own packed lunch) Location : Threshing Barn, Llwyn Celyn, NP7 7ND (Landmark Trust property) Booking : Tickets available via Eventbrite – CLICK HERE Cost : £10 Workshop Leader : Alan Bilton.
The past is another country – but what does it mean to visit it? This hands-on, interactive workshop explores different kinds of historical fiction – from the most scrupulously authentic to the playful and parodic – exploring research, worldbuilding, language, voice and character. How do we build a fictional time-machine? How strange or familiar should the past seem? And what is the nature of historical ‘truth’?
As to location, we are again thrilled that the Landmark Trust, Llwyn Celyn property will be our venue again. Set in wondrous countryside, we will spend our time comfortably housed in the converted Threshing Barn. A light, bright and hopefully inspirational place to get the creative juices flowing.
Dr Alan Bilton teaches Creative Writing, Literature and Film at Swansea University. He is the author of three novels, The Sleepwalkers’ Ball (2009), The Known and Unknown Sea (2014) and The End of The Yellow House (2020), as well as a collection of short stories, Anywhere Out of the World (2016), and books on silent film, American fiction, and the 1920s. He was a jury member for the Dylan Thomas International Prize in 2022, and has appeared at the Hay, Edinburgh and Cheltenham Literary Festivals.
Frances Copping Memorial Prize for Fiction -3rd Prize Winner Naomi Parsons.
Naomi is a member of Hay Writers’ Circle and writing a collection of short stories exploring the moments that beauty, shame and magic intersect. She started writing non fiction, but eventually shifted to writing short stories and loves compelling stories that leave a reader with a shift in perception. Naomi is always on the look out for a great short story.
Neighbourhood Watch by Naomi Parsons
After Janice told us what she saw, we knew we had to watch Emmeline. We’re not gossips or anything like that, but you need to know what is going on to keep the town safe. We work in the charity shop and it’s a good way of finding out what people are really like. You wouldn’t believe what some of those snooty country women drop off. Scruffy tweed jackets we look up online and find out cost two hundred pounds. Janice said she was going to put a sign up in the window – we’ll take your Jaeger, but we don’t want your dirty knickers thanks. Yes, you can tell a lot about the people who come into the shop. But women like Emmeline are hard to place. No husband, no children. They shuffle in smelling of beige and fishermen’s friends. A woman like Emmeline goes to the corner shop for a tin of peaches. Or to the post office for their pension. But she knows no one and no one knows her. She is invisible. And if you are nobody’s grandmother or nobody’s wife, it is like you never existed. That’s just the way of it. But Emmeline was different to the usual invisible women. She made us gasp with the things she bought. Canary yellow belts. Chartreuse silk dresses. Once a pink velvet basque for goodness’ sake! Naturally we wondered what was going on. Began to worry about her really.
On Tuesday Janice ran into the shop. She is always on the go, but we could sense she had something to tell us, so we put the ‘back in five minutes’ sign up. Janice is a night owl. She likes chatting on the phone. Sometimes she sits up until midnight knitting. Yesterday evening, she said she was looking out of the window. Her flat is high up for this town on the fourth floor by the clock tower. There was no wind that night, just the soft rustle of a pigeon in the eaves. As the last chime sounded, she saw something. She said it looked like a tatty jackdaw with a broken wing. Then, as it stepped into the streetlight glow Janice told us the creature exploded with colour. It began to move, slowly at first then twirling like a dervish – green chiffon twisted with cerise silk. A cobalt cloak around its shoulders as it spun out its unearthly dance. It remained at each streetlamp and danced before sashaying away to the next.
Janice sipped her tea and looked at us each in turn “Everything the creature wore was from the charity shop.” She paused. “And the creature wearing everything was Emmeline.”
We had wondered what on earth this tiny old lady was doing with the clothes and now we knew. We decided to take turns to watch Emmeline. It’s not right we would say. It’s not safe. Emmeline began to appear every night at midnight. In the morning we would exchange stories of what we had seen. Sometimes she looked like an exotic bird in garish crepe. Or an alien jellyfish in pink mousseline. We began to dream about her and we felt unsettled. We agreed that something really must be done but looked forward to the colder months when surely Emmeline’s night time wandering would end.
Winter came late that year, but when it did it was hard. It was a Thursday when the snow fell. By three o clock we decided to shut the shop. No one had been in for hours. We didn’t think even Emmeline was likely be out in this weather and we were right. Janice said she looked out of the window at midnight but there was no one there. Only a slow, noisy plough drove past, shedding huge heaps of snow onto already high drifts. So, she shut out the cold and went to bed.
The next morning, we woke to gleaming snow that smelt of possibility. We were by the bakery, wondering whether to buy some sponge for elevenses when we saw a group of people stood around a heap of snow. But the snow wasn’t doing what it was meant to do. The snow was moving. Deepest marine blue was rippling around the drift, like a network of rivers. The rivers burst and covered the heap like a Miami pool. Then tangerine capillaries began to appear and just where they met one another, dots of cerise sparkled and burst away. The colours did not mix and murk the way you might have expected them to, they just appeared, one shade after the other. The town people oohed and ahhed for all the world like they were at a bonfire night display. As the sun rose over the mountains that flank our town, the clouds glowed Fragonard pink. Until finally, the colours faded away and we were left once more with a mound of virginal white snow.
We nodded to one another that we had done the right thing. People are easily fooled by fancy.
It was Mike who broke the spell. He crunched over the road returning with an old Canadian rabbiting spade. A delicate tool for teasing rabbits out of burrows. Mike has always been tactful. After some time digging, he put down the spade. Using his hands, he began to stroke the snow away instead. An arm appeared. Alabaster white and smooth as marble. It looked like the frozen flesh of a young girl. We saw faces fall as they imagined who this could be. Mothers’ eyes darted as they tried to remember if they had seen daughters that morning. They inhaled as one as Mike tenderly brushed the snow away from the face. But there, of course, beneath the shimmering flakes we saw Emmeline’s frozen eyes, As shining in death as they had been dull in life, staring back at us.
To say the crowd were disappointed was an understatement. They had just experienced heights of beauty. Some of them felt transported. That all this majesty, this transcendence, could have stemmed from Emmeline of all people seemed all wrong. She was just one of them, an invisible woman. Magic and beauty belong to the young or otherworldly, not an invisible old lady with a fondness for wine gums and Take a Break magazine.
We saw Emmeline’s clothes on the tarmac. The drenched marine silk, pink velvet and tangerine corduroy that had run so gloriously into the snow had pooled to a reddish mud that slopped down the drain. Not so pretty now. A paramedic arrived and took out a stretcher. People drifted away back to their ordinary lives. Police took notes. We stood closely together and told them what we knew. About Emmeline at midnight, a batty old woman who had started to wander. About the snow plough heaping snow to the pavement. A terrible accident we said, but of course the driver wasn’t to know. Just doing their job. Keeping the town safe. We didn’t tell them about the clothes.
Later, those who had glimpsed her face, beginning to thaw as she moved through the town for the last time, said it had been contorted in horror. A grimace. Terrible, they said, shaking their heads. But we were not so sure. We thought she was smiling.
Keeping the town tidy isn’t always a pleasant job, but sometimes people are happier away from it. It’s not that we didn’t like Emmeline. In fact, she has brought us closer together somehow. Emmeline would have liked this, we say, as we fold a crocheted waistcoat or a crushed velvet skirt. We smile as we think about her. And, as we tidy the cupboard, entrusted to us to hold all of the town’s keys, we say a quick prayer for her and lightly touch the snow plough key.
And Finally …
Don’t forget our Poetry Competition is now open for submissions – 1st Prize is £100! Go to our Competitionspage for full details and an entry form.
GOOD LUCK!!
Don’t forget to subscribe with your email address in the box below.
Submissions are now invited for our annual Poetry Competition and we are delighted to announce the judge for 2023 is the wonderful Alex Josephy.
Alex Josephy lives in Rye, East Sussex, and sometimes in Italy. She has been a reader and writer of poetry all her life, and has an MA in Creative and Life Writing from Goldsmiths College, University of London. She has worked as a teacher and university lecturer and as an NHS education adviser. Winner of the Cinnamon Press Pamphlet Award 2022 with Again behold the stars. Her most recent collection is Naked Since Faversham, Pindrop Press, 2020. Other work includes White Roads, Paekakariki Press, 2018, and Other Blackbirds, Cinnamon Press, 2016. Her poems have won the McLellan and Battered Moons prizes, and have appeared in magazines and anthologies in the UK, Italy and India. You can find out more on her website: www.alexjosephy.net
*POETRY COMPETITION – FIRST PRIZE £100*
The Hay Writer’s Circle Poetry Competition 2023 is open to everyone.
The first prize of £100 with additional cash prizes for 2nd and 3rd placed poems.
The closing date for entries is Tuesday 11th April, 2023 Results will be announced mid May.
Original, unpublished poems of up to 40 lines maximum on absolutely any subject.
At our discretion, the winning poems will be published on the Hay Writer’s website. Publication may prevent eligibility for future competitions. All rights remain with the author.
For full competition guide lines and entry form please download the file below :
We are excited to announce the results of our 2022 Frances Copping Memorial Prize for Fiction Competition, named in fond remembrance of our Lifetime President who sadly passed away in 2020.
This popular competition again received a good number of entries from both inside and outside Hay Writers’ Circle and we very much welcome external interest in all our writing competitions.
Our judge this year was the Dr. Alan Bilton. He commented that, “(he) really enjoyed all of the pieces and was extremely impressed by the high quality of the entries, and the demonstration of imaginative ambition on display throughout.”
We are extremely grateful to Alan for all his work judging this competition, including the written comments he made for every single entry – going forward, such useful comments can hone writing skills for the future.
Without further delay, here are the results!
First prize: Michelle Pearce with The Postman
Second prize: Julie Ann Rees with The Sleeping Giant
Third prize: Naomi Parsons with Neighbourhood Watch
Judge’s Comments:
First Prize – The Postman
“Beautifully written and deeply moving, this is a subtle, understated study of loneliness and loss, observing human frailty through a kindly, yet beady set of eyes. The material is muted and low key, but paradoxically the emotion shines through all the more forcefully for this very reason, and the melancholy is never mawkish, but rather feels emotionally true and earned. A really polished, professional piece of work – well done.”
Second Prize – The Sleeping Giant
“Atmospheric, mysterious, and subtly strange, I really liked this piece. We are in the territory of folk horror here, but the menace is skilfully underplayed, and I admired the way in which you toy with the reader’s scepticism and lingering sense of dread. To be able to evoke such a powerful sense of strangeness in such a small space is testament to the quality of the writing – a very fine piece of work indeed.”
Third Prize – Neighbourhood Watch
“Funny, inventive, and constantly surprising, this is one of those tales where you’re never sure what is going to happen to next, but you’re more than happy to accompany the writer on the journey. A mixture of the magical and the mundane, the surreal and the humdrum, this has a truly distinctive voice, balancing beauty and cruelty with great skill. Perhaps the snow-plough keys are a little too neat an ending – a little more ambiguity might have helped open things up rather than close things down at the end.”
Winner – Michelle Pearce.
We are delighted to showcase Michelle’s winning piece here.
The Postman
For all the things she had loved when young and had gone on to lose as she grew old, Sylive cherished Shakespeare still. She always kept a play or a sonnet beside her bed so she could read a little before she slept and allow the poetry to quietly eclipse the troubles of her day. By a process of quiet osmosis, her favourite speeches and stanzas had become instilled within her, learnt by heart without any deliberate intent, and these she would mutter to herself as she did the housework, the lift and lilt of the iambic pentameter somehow keeping her in line with the tasks, making them bearable even when the call rose within to open the door, step out and walk away.
Sylvie’s Shakespeare plays were lined up in order of composition in the spare room, clamped between thirty-five years of household accounts and the small metal safe which held their passports, emergency phone numbers, birth certificates, wills and the small series of letters she had received over the years. They were mostly from her children – Justin who lived some poor shadow of a life in a caravan in Cornwall and Angela with her smart job in the city who had troubles of her own but who still managed to visit a couple of times a year – sometimes with the children, occasionally with a new boyfriend just as unsuitable as the last.
“Morning!”
The postman was a friendly chap and Sylvie often happened to be putting out the empties or lingering over her pots when he called by on his rounds. She liked to take her mail from him personally, delivery by hand seemed somehow important and she would try to think of something novel to say as he made his way up the steps to the front door.
“Lovely morning for it.”
Soft spring; the ornamental cherry tree in unashamed and blowsy bloom.
Or
“Hold your hat!”
Wind cutting in off the sea, hitting hard against the brickwork.
Mail delivered Sylvie would raise her hand in a half-wave as he trotted off down the steps. When he reached the bottom, he would twist around, cock his head and send her up a slightly disjointed back-handed reply. Then off he would go, marching around the close like a man half his age, posting letters through boxes with beautiful efficiency and a decent measure of good cheer. Sometimes Jasmine from number 8 would be out with her pram, and he would bend down and coo at the baby she’d had with that funny fellow who came for a while in a blue van but who now seemed to have gone for good.
“Sylvia!
That voice from upstairs,
“Sylvia! Who’s there?”
falling down on her like stones.
“No one’s there – I’m – Making – Tea – ”
Sylvie went silently into the sitting room, drawing aside the nets just enough to see the postman service the houses opposite, lifting the flap, posting the letters and every now and then handing over a parcel. It always stung a little when he had a parcel for someone else but she only had to look at his smart red van parked outside her house to feel a warm rush of gratitude that every day she was chosen above all the others, and if she allowed herself the luxury it truly wasn’t hard to believe that he had just come home from work and was dropping in on a neighbour.
“Sylvia!”
After lunch it went quiet upstairs and more often than not, Sylvie would sit at the telephone table in the hallway. It wasn’t that she was expecting a call, just that of all the places in the house she liked the hallway best. It had four doors leading off it to other places, stairs which went up – that seemed a positive thing – and the glass front door which led out onto the doorstep, the only place where she could see the sky without craning her neck and let her hair be lifted for a moment by the wind.
The telephone itself was an old-fashioned thing with a curled wire connecting the handset to a stout cream base with their very first phone-number still clipped securely in the centre of the dial – Hastings 35051. The phone had seemed very modern when they had it installed in the Victorian terrace they rented on Manor Road, a rambling house set over four cold and inhospitable floors. But this was the place where she had brought up the children, and in spite of the lack of money, the plagues of flies in summer, mildew in winter – she was happiest there. Julian and Angela were small and vital, squirming and slippery when she washed them in the old basement bathtub then she’d set them down, clean and perfect in their pyjamas, smelling of soap, hair neatly combed, to watch Blue Peter before bed. It was her favourite time of day and unless he was home early, nothing could spoil it. She would make herself a last cup of tea and sit with them with the curtains drawn against the winter cold, against the sharp seaside sun of summer and dream of nothing more.
“Sylvia! Sylvia! Where are you?”
Sometimes the postman seemed to have a little more time. He would lean on the railings and linger longer than a bank statement truly warranted, and it was then, more than ever that Sylvie longed to invite him in for tea. Or coffee. Yes, perhaps he was more of a coffee-drinker. She had it all planned, how she would lay the occasional table by the French windows and sit him on one of the rattan chairs whilst she warmed the pot – or the cafetiere of course – and sprinkled a little cress on the sandwiches. Nothing posh just the usual ham and cucumber, cheese and tomato, tuna mayo, but bearing in mind it was a special occasion, a slice of cake wouldn’t be amiss. Of course, she would get out the trolly-cloths and use tea leaves rather than bags and if the conversation faltered, she would talk about the silver tea-strainer which had belonged once to her mother and had somehow survived the Blitz. How fascinating. Did he take sugar? Was that one lump or two?
“Sylvia!”
She can hear him lumbering about the bedroom, never a good sign –
“Sylvia!”
She opens the cutlery draw and sets the knife and fork neatly on the tray. The plate is warmed. A packet pie, a few peas, a small pile of mash on the side.
“Sylvia!”
He’s on the move. Blundering into furniture, wrenching at the door.
“It’s all part of the disease, sadly.” The dementia nurse had told her. “It’ll get worse with time.”
“Sylvia!”
She carries the tray carefully upstairs, moving quietly towards the bellowing and the banging.
“Sylvia? Is that you?”
With night the house becomes so quiet she can hear each tick of the clock and each of his breaths, heavy and steady in the bedroom above. These are her metronomes – the clock tells her she is alive and its punctual little chime cheers her up; his snoring says that he is asleep and that within these four walls and for just a little longer she is in some respects at least, free. She does some on-line shopping, not really minding what she buys so long as it come special delivery, that it will be there by morning. She reads a little Shakespeare, then switches off the light, drifting around in the resonant wake of the words, letting them roll through her like waves, softening the blows. Tomorrow she’ll be deadheading the petunias when the postman comes up the steps. He’ll have a parcel for her. They’ll stand on the doorstep, not three feet apart. They’ll talk a little most probably, but more important than that they will breathe. Breathe together. The same morning. The same moment. The self-same air. He will give her his pen and she will take her time and write her name on his screen.
We are excited to announce details of a new workshop event taking place next month.
Date : Monday 6th March. Time : 11am – 4pm (bring own packed lunch) Location : Threshing Barn, Llwyn Celyn, NP7 7ND (Landmark Trust property) Booking – Tickets available via Eventbrite – CLICK HERE Cost : £10
“Simple Words to Moving Pictures is a workshop from Shane Anderson exploring the art of the screenplay, how it differs from more literary forms and what writers who may have little or no knowledge of the medium might gain from such an investigation.
Film is not only a visual medium, but a highly collaborative one and as such makes very specific demands on those creating its blueprint: the screenplay. It is a spare, ‘less is more’, art form where the cinematic potential of its story must always be not only evident, but exposed with immediacy and momentum. Does this mean, however, that all opportunity for poetry, symbolism and articulacy is lost? Far from it.”
As to location (location, location!), we are thrilled that the Landmark Trust, Llwyn Celyn property will be our venue. Set in wondrous countryside, we will spend our time comfortably housed in the converted Threshing Barn. A light, bright and hopefully inspirational place to get the creative juices flowing.
Shane Anderson – Is an accomplished Writer, Director and Producer – Winner of numerous script writing awards since 2014 including, ScriptSlam and Sandalle 5 ’n’ 10 monologue/duologue. Devised, directed and storylined ’City Road’ and ‘Anamnesis 25:12’, the latter described by Wales Arts Review, “as one of the ‘stand-out pieces’ (of Mercury Theatre, Cardiff ) and ‘a hilarious farce’.
Some of Shane’s full length scripts have been longlisted by the BBC Writers’ Room, Papatango New Writing Prize and The Verity Bargate Award. In the same year 4 of his scripts were shortlisted for the London Screenwriters’ Festival’s, Create 50 ‘The Impact’ competition.
The short screenplay “Bronwyn Goes Dancing” was a semi-finalist in the L.A. based Bluecat (Short) Screenplay Awards, 2017; by 2021 this short film had been produced and showcased at the prestigious Lewes-based WOFF Festival (Women Over Fifty Film Festival) under the ‘Best of The Fest’ banner, as well as it’s partner festival ‘Leytonstone Loves Film’
2018 “Zip and the Fly Boys” reached the BBC Drama longlist and described Shane as ‘BBC Writer of Interest’. 2018 full-length radio play ‘A Cold Calling’ was shortlisted for the Irish national broadcaster RTE’s P. J. O’Connor Award.
You can view the short film, Bronwyn Goes Dancing by CLICKING HERE
Please note – workshop numbers are limited, to avoid disappointment please book your place via this eventbrite link – CLICK HERE
As we plough headlong into the third week of the new year, we are delighted to relay some news.
Hay Writers’ Circle member, Alan Oberman’s forth coming book, “Ellie and Sapiens“, has been accepted by Arkbound publishing. Arkbound specializes in supporting authors from disadvantaged backgrounds and works dealing with environmental and social issues. As you may have read from our previous article, Alan’s new book deals with climate anxiety in young people.
The book will be published next spring.
Huge and well deserved congratulations to Alan, and to the members of the Work In Progress group too. As Katy Stone, HWC Chairperson writes – “It’s testament … to the genius of the buddy system of our little Work in Progress Group, so a Brava! too for Marianne (Rosen’s) tenacious support and encouragement as well as dreaming up the group and buddy concept.”
CLICK HERE to read the previous HWC article on “Ellie and Sapiens“.
More Good News!
We are also delighted to reveal that another Hay Writers’ Circle member and winner of the 2022 Hay Poetry Prize, Michelle Pearce, has secured a commission of six poems for the Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales, in conjunction with it’s work with Green Connection Powys projects. Congratulations Michelle!
We will share more news on this exiting endeavour as it progresses.
In Other News …
Thank you to everyone who entered our Frances Copping Prize for Fiction Competition. Submissions are now closed for this year. All entries are currently with our judge, Alan Bilton, and we can expect news of the winning entries in due course.
Few climate-fiction novels feature those who benefit from wrecking the planet. Think of a young, Trump-like millionaire profiting from exploiting oil in Bolivia. Charismatic, dynamic, ruthless, that’s Muelo, the anti-hero of Alan Oberman’s forthcoming novel, Ellie and Sapiens. When Muelo makes a bid to become city mayor, a stepping stone to greater power, school-student Ellie must summon up the courage to oppose him. She’s supported by her friends Imran and Ava, and by the mysterious historian, Sapiens, who takes them on humankind’s journey to our present looming catastrophe. Would you deny the truth to achieve climate goals? That’s the agonising decision Ellie and her friends have to make in the thrilling climax to this novel of hope through activism. Ellie and Sapiens will be published in 2023. For a brief preview of Ellie and Sapiens on this website, click on ‘About Our Authors’ tab and then scroll down to Alan Oberman, clicking on the relevant link. Look out for further news of this exciting and extraordinary book.
Dream Fiction and Magic Realism Workshop with Dr Alan Bilton
16 Writers Dreaming! What a great workshop on Magic Realism and Dream Fiction from Dr Alan Bilton , on Monday 5th December. The Hay Writers were joined by guests including past members and some very welcome members of the Marches Poetry Group – 16 of us plus Alan in total. We wrote while snug in Cusop Village Hall floating ideas, delving into our dreamy minds, slicing reality and listening to imaginative anecdotes. We left enthused, brains buzzing with possibilities and plots! Thank you Alan!🤩
Fiction Competition
Don’t forget there’s still plenty of time to put your writerly pen to paper and enter the Frances Copping Memorial Prize for Fiction. 500-1500 words on any fictional theme by Tuesday 10th of January, 2023. Details on our Competitions page or download them by clicking the link below :-
THE HAY WRITERS 