We regret that, for funding-related reasons, we can hold these events only in Glasgow at the moment – but we remain both national and international in outlook.  Should people elsewhere be in a position to invite the writers involved in this series to read in other parts of Scotland or, indeed, the world, please simply get in touch and we shall try to make it happen.

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THREE MEXICAN POETS

Thursday 29 April at 7pm

CCA, Glasgow — ADMISSION FREE

2010 is the 100th anniversary of the Mexican Revolution. To mark the occasion, the Scottish Writers’ Centre will team up with St Mungo’s Mirrorball (Glasgow) and the Poetry Translation Centre(London) to present a trio of Mexican poets: Coral Bracho and David Huerta (who write in Spanish) and Victor Teran(who writes in Zapotec, an indigenous and endangered Mexican language). Coral is translated by Katherine Pierpoint & Tom Boll; David by Jamie McKendrick & Tom Boll; and Victor by David Shook. Expect an evening of readings and lively discussion!

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DONAL McLAUGHLIN

Thursday 21 January at 7pm

CCA, Glasgow — ADMISSION FREE

Donal will read from his recent book – an allergic reaction to national anthems & other stories – as well as from his translations of German, Austrian and Swiss writers. For more details, see the previous Post immediately below.

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CELEBRATING WILLIAM STAFFORD

Thursday 18 February at 7pm

CCA, Glasgow — ADMISSION FREE

Two Glasgow/Americans – Larry Butler & Donna Blackney – will lead this celebration of the work of William Stafford (1914-1993). Author of over 50 books, Stafford was a lifetime pacifist – and a conscientious objector in World War II when he began his habit of writing a poem before dawn everyday. The evening will include a short film, and anyone attending is invited to read a favourite Stafford poem. If you don’t know his work, have a look at http://www.williamstafford.org/

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GERRIE FELLOWS:

Poetry Collage Workshop

Thursday 18 March at 7pm

CCA, Glasgow — ADMISSION FREE

This workshop, run by the poet Gerrie Fellows, will explore how the technique of collage can be used to incorporate a diversity of voices into a poem. Our lives are a confab of many different kinds of language: from the lists of everyday life to the jargons of technology; from the precision of medicine to the emotive word stock of place or plant names. The aim of this workshop is to find ways of playing with these sometimes conflicting languages, opening them up to the imagination.

GERRIE FELLOWS' fourth collection, Window for a Small Blue Child (Carcanet), is a sequence of poems about fertility treatment in which the language and images of medical technology interact with those of the body in the natural world. Described as 'an exciting and important book that extends the territory of poetry', it was shortlisted for the Sundial Scottish Poetry Book of the Year. New Zealand born, but long resident in Scotland, her earlier collections The Duntroon Toponymy and The Powerlines, brought together the voices and geographies of those two countries. In 2008-9 she was the first mentor for Glasgow's Clydebuilt Verse Apprenticeships.

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GLASGOW VOICES

Thursday 8 April at 7pm

CCA, Glasgow — ADMISSION FREE

Peter Robertson, the Argentinian-based editor of international literary quarterly, will join the Scottish Writers’ Centre to celebrate the publication, in March, of his feature on ‘Glasgow Voices‘. Some of the contributors will be present to read from their poetry and fiction. Go to http://interlitq.org/ to access this very interesting e-magazine.

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