WHEN Tom Stoppard wrote his masterpiece Arcadia, he took a familiar English trope – the English country house and the eccentric, difficult, warring and occasionally delightful people who live and die there. He turned the familiar setting on its head, by creating a two-period story, with a great house, a fascinating library, a grotto that…
GHOSTS walk the streets of Charles Dickens’ London, evoked with chilling, thrilling intensity by The Storyteller and The Musician in their new version of A Christmas Carol, at Bridport, on 2nd and 3rd December. Adapted by writer Adam Z Robinson and performed in the company’s storytelling style with live music, this production explores the gothic…
BORN into slavery in 1788, Mary Prince survived the brutality of Bermuda plantations to become a powerful voice for the abolitionist movement. Her story is told in Sold, by award-winning Kuumba Nia Arts, coming to Halstock village hall on Friday 26th November and Sturminster Marshall Memorial Hall on Saturday 27th; both performances start at 8pm….
YOU don’t have to be a church-goer or religious in any way to admire and love the great cathedrals. Historian and atheist Simon Jenkins is fascinated and awed by them. We are lucky to live in an area with two of the world’s greatest – Wells and Salisbury … Wells with its magnificent West Front, currently…
STORYTELLER Emily Hennessey and sitar player Sheema Mukherjee return to Dorset’s rural touring arts charity Artsreach from 19th to 21st November, with a new programme of storytelling with music. Ganga – Tales of the River, will be at Wootton Fitzpaine village hall on Friday 19th November at 7:45pm. Powerstock Hut on Saturday 20th at 7.30…
PETRUS Ursem, the Cornwall-based, Dutch-born printmaker, has established a second career as the author of exciting young adult novels, the Steven Honest trilogy which reaches its dramatic finale with Black As Ink. The books follow the mysterious inheritance Steven receives from a long-dead mine captain, Thomas Carpenter, who lived in the old house where he…
JAMES Rebanks won this year’s Wainwright Prize with his latest book, the compelling and important English Pastoral. He is a late addition to the impressive line-up for this year’s Bridport Literary Festival, running from Sunday 7th to Saturday 13th November Rebanks (pictured) will be in conversation with Elizabeth Wainwright, bringing the festival to a close…
THE Dorset-based environmental arts foundation Cape Farewell and Poole’s Lighthouse arts centre have come together to highlight the critical issue of climate change. From Wednesday 3rd November to Saturday 4th December, the arts centre is hosting Cape Farewell’s wAteR climaTe festival. The COP26 summit in Glasgow is a critical moment – can countries and governments…
THERE is a surprise late addition to the published programme of this year’s Bridport Literary Festival – the final speaker, at The Electric Palace on Saturday 13th November at 7.30pm, will be this year’s Wainwright Prize-winner, James Rebanks. The award-winning nature writer, Lakeland farmer and poet was awarded the most prestigious prize in nature writing…
A NEW arts and heritage project, “The Place I Love,” is being launched with a village art exhibition and sale at Broadwindsor’s Comrades Hall on Saturday 16th October. The project, orgaanised by the Windrose Media Trust, working with local artists, will culminate in an interpretive map of the West Dorset village. Work by village artists,…