‘Local Voices’ in June


Three Friends of the Museum are involved in a project which will see a Salterton Playhouse production on Friday 13 June.

The project is sponsored by the Otter Valley Association with the aim of encouraging writing and the pleasure of reading — both poetry and prose fiction — inspired by our local Devon landscape and natural heritage.

Friends of Fairlynch Sue Chapman, Katherine McDermott-Darley and Nicola Daniels have been working in the ‘Local Voices’  group which includes Wendy Spicer and Maggie Giraud.   Their writing has been inspired  by the broad theme of the Phoenix Myth: regeneration, rebirth, hope and growth.  “It’s a very broad and surprising  spectrum of ideas,” says Sue.  A successful creative workshop collaboration with Clinton Devon Estates, and the East Devon Pebblebed Heaths Conservation Trust took place earlier this year around themes associated with the ‘Phoenix Cycle’ and local photographer Mo Bowman’s stunning images. A second Writers’ Workshop took place on Saturday 5 April.   Dovetailing into this creative programme for 2014, ‘Local Voices’ has reached out to individuals in the community who have contributed their writing for an event taking place at the Budleigh Salterton Playhouse on Friday 13 June,  from 7.00 to 9.00 pm.  Sue’s fellow-organiser Katherine  explained:
 
“This event will be an evening of readings, wine and socialising, featuring writing linked to the local environment across an open theme  —  ‘The local natural environment explored and celebrated.’ We’re hoping to encourage and present a variety of writing which explores and celebrates what we have around us, and in a way which opens up the imagination and is experimental with language and metaphor.” Tickets at £3 on the door include a glass of wine and canapés.

Writing is most definitely a craft, and several books by or devoted to local writers are on sale in Fairlynch Museum shop alongside works of art and products from the area. Maybe the shop bookshelves will be a bit fuller with poetry and prose inspired by the area and what ‘Local Voices’ is doing to promote it.

Pictured above: The Phoenix reborn, one of the mythological creatures featured in the  Kinderbuch by the German publisher Friedrich Justin Bertuch (1747-1822)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

WW2 100 – 3 July 1941 – ‘Our beloved son’: Private Stanley John Holloway (1914-41) 12th Battalion, Devonshire Regiment

Image
Continued from 11 June 1941 ‘A German platoon fired a salute of honour over the grave’ FLYING OFFICER PETER HAROLD HOWARD PRITCHARD (1921-41)   https://budleighpastandpresent.blogspot.com/2021/11/ww2-75-11-june-1941-german-platoon.html   Image credit: www.FindaGrave.com Stanley’s sad death at the age of 27 stirred various thoughts in me when I first read about it. He is not listed on Budleigh Salterton’s War Memorial, yet his grave is in St Peter’s Burial Ground on Moor Lane. His family were not local, yet he seems to have been killed while engaged in the highly hazardous work of protecting Budleigh against invasion.   The Commonwealth War Graves Commission records him as a member of the 12 th Battalion, Devonshire Regiment with the Service Number was 5627659. According to the same source, his parents were George and M. Holloway, of Hounslow, Middlesex.   Tackling this WW2 project chronologically as I am, it was clear that Stanley had died on the same day as Private Clifto
Read more

People from the Past: 3. Reg Varney (1916-2008)

Image
Reginald Alfred 'Reg' Varney was an English actor, most notable for his role as a cheerful Cockney bus driver in the 1970s TV sitcom On the Buses . For ten years he lived at Dark Lane House on picturesque Dark Lane in Budleigh Salterton, seen above.  Millions of television viewers remember him with affection. He has been described as belonging to the old school of comedians, with his dislike of much contemporary television and his pride in never using swear words to get a laugh. Varney was born on 11 July 1916 in Canning Town, which was then part of Essex but is now part of East London. His father worked in a rubber factory in Silvertown and he was one of five children who grew up in Addington Road, Canning Town. He was educated at the nearby Star Lane Primary School in West Ham and after leaving school at 14, he worked as a messenger boy at the Regent Palace Hotel, pictured above.  
Read more

A home that Hatchard-Smith built: Lavender House

Image
Lavender House, one of no less than 50 houses in Budleigh Salterton designed by Hatchard-Smith   Instantly recognisable with their red and white decoration and their front doors set within brick arches, the houses built by architect William Hatchard-Smith (1887-1987) are still sought after and appreciated by their owners for their elegance and comfort, their sturdy construction and their attention to practical detail. Plans for one of the houses designed by Hatchard-Smith Lavender House, on Moorlands Road , is a four-bedroomed detached family residence built by Hatchard-Smith in the late 1920s when it was originally named Lavenderhay.   Set within what are described as beautifully landscaped gardens of approximately an acre it has recently undergone an extensive refurbishment programme while retaining much of the original charm and character. The stained glass memorial in Budleigh Sa
Read more