Finding poetic inspiration in Mortlake

I spent last weekend in the peaceful environment of Mortlake in the London Borough of Richmond  upon Thames where the occasional low flying planes reminds us that we are on the edge of the great metropolitan sprawl that is London.  I wasn't plane spotting though, I was taking part in a two day poetry workshop with the impressive Ruth O' Callaghan, the poet, who also run the Camden-

Ruth O' Callaghan

Lumen poetry events where I try to go to once a month for the poetry readings. These workshops are now a regular part of my calendar and they are both inspirational, intense and mentally demanding. Luckily there is time for a strict one hour for lunch and, just down the road, there's the excellent Corner Cafe & Deli where I usually succumb to their 'posh nosh', scrambled eggs with smoked salmon and a large cup of black coffee.

I have the first drafts of six new poems after my trip and feel that I've upped my game a bit with Ruth's encouragement. Mortlake has become a place of inspiration for me but, I'm far from alone there,  J.M.W. Turner appreciated it too.

Mortlake Terrace, 1827, by J.M.W. Turner (1775 - 1851)

Stephen Dearsley returns to Brighton Library.

I'm not getting out of the house very much at the moment due to an annoying lung problem that means that I'm labouring under the influence of some particularly strong anti-biotics. So I haven't been in to Brighton, just six miles away from my home here in Lewes, UK, and therefore I might have missed the new display at Brighton's glittering modern library. Luckily my friend Val Ishii spotted it and sent me a photograph. It has cheered me up no end to see my new novel, Stephen Dearsley's Summer Of Love,  there in pride of place at the library's New Arrivals table. My thanks are due to Brighton Jubilee Library not just on my behalf but also for the main character in my novel, poor Stephen Dearsley, who spends a lot of significant time in Brighton's old library building.

Stephen has problems with modernity and an unreconstructed admiration for Victorian architecture but I like to think he would approve of the new library building - opened in 2005 with vastly improved facilities.

http://www.brighton-hove-rpml.org.uk/Libraries/sites/Jubilee/Pages/home.aspx

Who can say though, Stephen is a strange young man.

My novel, set in 1967,  begins with Stephen's regular morning bus journey to his bus stop near Brighton's famous Dolphin Fountain and then his short walk round the corner to study in the local reference library. Shockingly for Stephen, on this particular morning, there is some naked frolicking going on in the water at the base of the fountain.

Stephen is less impressed by that than the solid comforts of Brighton's old library building now exclusively given over to the Brighton Art Gallery and Museum. Stephen's sanctuary is upstairs here in what used to be the Reference Library.

http://www.brighton-hove-rpml.org.uk/Museums/brightonmuseum/Pages/home.aspx

So it is particularly apt now that the chronicle of Stephen Dearsley's time in Brighton Library should be on display in the library's shiny reincarnation.

The lovely old room is still there but some ten years ago it was converted into the Brighton History Centre and then, late last year, closed down when the History Centre moved to its own modern building, to join The Keep, the brand-new archive centre for Sussex, opened in November 2013.

http://www.brighton-hove-rpml.org.uk/Museums/thekeep/Pages/home.aspx

Already The Keep is attracting much more distinguished visitors than Stephen Dearsley.

There are no plans yet for what will happen to the old reference library space upstairs at the Museum and Art Gallery but  I trust that it will find a new role for new Stephen Dearsleys and others as a cultural refuge space away from that madding crowd  that is the lively Brighton community. I suspect if Stephen does ever return to Brighton, he won't be able to resist putting his nose inside the door to see what the room looks like now. When I was last there, the old tables and chairs had gone but the basic infrastructure had remained unchanged. Long may that be the case. Let's preserve the old space but also celebrate Brighton's splendid new library buildings.

Sicilian Vespas and The Sicilian Vespers - a record of my time on the island of Sicily with photographs and a newly published poem.

I had a new poem published with week, Sicilian Vespas,  which was written after I spent some time on the wonderful island of Sicily a couple of years ago. My thanks are due, yet again, to Every Day Poets for publishing my response to the moving story of Sicily with its ancient and rich culture, its near miraculous agricultural fertility, its beauty and, tragically, its long history of foreign invasion as well as Mafia bloodshed.

Anyone who goes to Sicily will be familiar with  those masterpieces of design, the ever present Vespa scooters buzzing around the place by apparently fearless but joyfully reckless young Sicilians and living up to their name. Vespa is the Italian word for wasp but unlike those unpleasant creatures, Vespa scooters are things of beauty and of joy.

When thinking of a poem to write about this wonderful country, I was struck by the possibilities of the contrast between the similar sounding words Vespa and Vespers, the Roman Catholic evening service that in Sicily has a particular resonance.

The Sicilian Vespers (1846), by Francesco Hayes  (1791 - 1881)

The so-called Sicilian Vespers was a bloody Sicilian insurrection against the country's French rulers that erupted when the bells rang out near Palermo for Vespers on Easter Monday, March 30, 1282. It was bad news for the French and consequently it has been remembered with pride by Sicilians ever since. Sicilian Vespers and Sicilian Vespas were the starting point for my short poem that was probably forming in my head while I was exploring the impressive and beautiful historical sites of Sicily and thinking that it was now time for all Sicilians to be allowed to live in peace on their own glorious island.

If you'd like to read it, here's the link:

http://www.everydaypoets.com/sicilian-vespas-by-colin-bell/

Maybe some of my Sicilian photographs will help illustrate the poem with images of Greek and Roman remains, the glorious colours of the sea, the moodily dramatic streets, the romantic atmosphere, Sicilian friendliness and fruitfulness, that sweet Marsala wine beloved by the Ancient Romans and, of course, those inimitable sunsets. Make no mistake about it, Sicily is a very special place.

Verdi's French grand opera Les vêpres siciliennes (The Sicilian Vespers) 1855, known in Italian as I Vespri Siciliani, is highly entertaining but, sadly, there are no Vespa scooters in the plot but it does offer a gory and dramatic operatic interpretation of that Sicilian uprising of 1282. The opera is best known these days for its splendidly dramatic overture, one of the best by Italy's greatest opera composer, Giuseppe Verdi (1813 - 1901) and one that deserves its place on the concert platform even if the opera seldom makes it into production any more.  In a more benign foreign invasion than Sicily has usually suffered, the Italian conductor Claudio Abbado brought the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra to Palermo, Sicily, in 2002 where they performed the Sicilian Vespers Overture not far from where the Sicilian Vespers Uprising actually took place eight hundred years earlier.