How To Get Published - a writers network event for Dumfries and Galloway

This is a free event for those with a professional interest in the literature sector to share their experiences and knowledge of getting published. Author and Publisher Keith Charters and Poet, Writer and Editor John Hudson will speak about their individual experiences of the literature sector.
This will also be an opportunity to meet our new Literature Development Officer, Carolyn Yates.

How To Get Published is at The Midsteeple, Dumfries on Tuesday 23 February 6pm to 8pm.

Book your place on this free event at events@culturalenterpriseoffice.co.uk or call 0844 544 9990

Wigtown Poetry Competition - one week left to enter!

The 2010 Wigtown Poetry Competition is now nearing its closing date of February 12th.

Please click here to view full details, download an application form or enter online.

The Wigtown Poetry Competition is the largest in Scotland with a first prize of £2,500, runner up prize of £750, eight additional prizes of £50 each and a Gaelic prize of £500. The winning poem and runner up will also be published in the Scotsman, or its sister paper Scotland on Sunday and the winner will be invited to appear at the Stena Line Wigtown Book Festival 2010.

To download an application form click here, or alternatively email poetry@wigtownbookfestival.com or send an SAE to:

Wigtown Poetry Competition
County Buildings,
Wigtown,
DG8 9HL.

If you know anyone who would like to be added to this mailing list please send their full email and address to mail@wigtownbookfestival.com.

Listen to Andy Forster's poetry!

Delighted to let you all know that Andy Forster, lately Literature Development Officer for DGAA, and now working for The Wordsworth Trust in Grasmere, can be heard reading one of his fine poems online at http://thepoetrychannel.org.uk/poems/radnotis-notebook/

Andy's reading his poem 'Radnoti's Notebook', which was highly commended in the Bridport Poetry Comp, no less, a few years back. He's been invited to read it on The Poetry Channel.org.uk which is a very cool site in its own right.

'Radnoti's Notebook' comes from Andy's first collection, 'Fear of Thunder', which was shortlisted for the Forward Prize last year. His second collection, 'Territory' is out this spring - watch this space!

Happy New Open Stage!

Hoping you all enjoyed your icy Christmases - it was great. For a bit. Now winter's bite is easing (I hope), some good news.

Open Stage, Dumfries' favourite open mic event for poets and singer songwriters, is taking a break this month before a Grand Re-Launch on Wednesday 24 February.

We are delighted to announce that Open Stage will be returning to the town centre to the gorgeous So You Cafe in Castle Street.

We're booking a couple of top-notch guest slots to entertain and inspire, and welcome you to come along at 7pm on Wednesday 24 February to book your own performance slot. The show starts at 7.30, and if you don't want to perform, come along to join our friendly audience for a great night.

£3 on the door.

A literary stocking filler!

Local writer A. R. Davis (Tony) has just published 'Geronwithit in the Stewartry' - a book recounting his experiences with the Stewartry Football League over the last six years.

Written with a huge enthusiasm for youth football and refereeing, Tony's book will be a great read for local football fans, and proceeds from it will be ploughed back into local clubs to ensure their continued success with young people.

Tony has previously published 'In the Saddle for the Saddlers', a true short story with a cycling theme.

If you would like to buy one of Tony's books, please contact him at anthony.davis3@homecall.co.uk

Alan Riach and Sandy Moffat in the Midsteeple this Friday

As part of their Arts in the Steeple series, Dumfries & Galloway Arts Association welcomes Professor of Scottish Literature Alan Riach, and artist, teacher and chair of the Royal Scottish Academy Exhibitions Committee, Alexander Moffat RSA, to the Midsteeple in Dumfries on Friday 11 December at 7pm. The free event takes the form of a dialogue between Alan Riach and Alexander Moffat, and promises to be a uniquely fascinating evening discussing the sources and interconnections of Scottish art and culture explored in their new book Arts and Resistance.

The event is free but ring 01387 253383 to book your seat. Complimentary glass of wine on arrival!

Dunragit Poet Sam Gilliland wins MacDiarmid Tassie

Writer in the Storm is delighted to congratulate Sam Gilliland on his success in winning the much-coveted MacDiarmid Tassie for his poem Withoutin Weir, which won the Scots Language Society's highly prestigious Sangshaw Literary event.

Dr George Philp, the originator of the award, hailed Sam as a highly practiced exponent of the MacDiarmid school and an outstanding example of the Scottish literary movement.

Sam Gilliland lives in Dunragit, Stranraer, and has a collection of Scots poetry 'A Rickle O Banes', published by Penny Wheep Press due to appear in December. Look out for it!

Irresistible Poetry Doubles next Monday

Monday 23 November Poetry Doubles (the last one this year)
with Tom Pow and Liz Niven

A taster to help you step outside in the murk of November and make your way to the Duncan Room, Easterbrook Hall at 7pm.

Here's Liz Niven - from Picasso's Timeshare (Burning Whins)

Picasso said,
of his own poetry,
Painted in words, with lines taut as harpstrings.

Mair lik a bugle, it seems, ma shout
no findin the harpstring's voice.

Mair, a jiggin fiddle cries
Aye an hoochaye ower

islands, bens, lochs, or



the soun o silence,
oan an empty raised beach.


And this is Tom Pow - from Ex-Laundry Girl, 1943 (Dear Alice)

If ever I'd the chance to choose my place
I worked the drying green. I eased off

my boots, let my feet grow sweetly cold
on the grass. We laid out the sheets

till they sat on the air like ruffled snow.
I smelled the sharp spoor of joy


a child leaves across a vacant field -
and wept a little for my loss.


There. We're in for a treat! Hope to see you next Monday. Tickets £7/£5 from DGAA 01387 253383, from the Midsteeple, or on the door.

Very special end of season Poetry Doubles!

Poetry Doubles, Dumfries & Galloway Arts Association’s popular poetry season, will conclude on Monday 23 November at the Duncan Room, Easterbrook Hall, Crichton Campus, when it welcomes two of our most highly regarded Scottish poets for an unmissable literary event, Tom Pow and Liz Niven.

Tom Pow has had a fantastic year, winning the Poetry category in the Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust Book Awards 2009, in partnership with the Scottish Arts Council, for Dear Alice, and recieving a Creative Scotland Award for his Dying Villages project. His new collection of selected poems, In The Becoming, was launched in June.

Liz Niven is also an award-winning poet with an impressive track record. She'll be reading from Stravaigin and Burning Whins, and, like Tom, she is a gifted teacher who has long been respected for her contribution to the region's healthy writing culture.

This really will be a not-to-be-missed event - and do please take note, it's being held at The Duncan Room, Easterbrook Hall, Crichton Campus, on Monday 23 November at 7pm. Tickets from DGAA on 01387 253383 or from The Midsteeple.

Look out for the next blog which will contain tantalisingly wonderful lines from Liz and Tom's poetry, aimed at helping you to decide to turn out on a dark night!

Vivien Jones reads in Newcastle

Local writer Vivien Jones took part last week in a reading at the UK launch of world poetry anthology Not A Muse.
The launch took place at Gallery North in Newcastle–upon-Tyne, and involved three contributors to the anthology: Vivien Jones, Adele Geraghty from USA and Joan Hewitt from Northumbria.

"Creator, lover, freedom fighter, explorer, home maker, myth maker... As this stimulating selection of poems proves, there is no such thing as an average woman - a notion upon which we might all care to muse."
Stephen McCarty, Literary Editor, South China Morning Post

Well done Vivien!