Christien Gholson's Blog Entries
So begins Robert Walton's enthusiastic online review for literary journal New Welsh Review.
Funderland was published by Parthian in September 2011, and Nigel's appearance at literary festivals like recent Cowbridge Festival has kept interest in the collection building.
This debut collection of short stories by the award-winning writer and journalist Nigel Jarrett brings together places of violence, longing, helplessness and vivid remembrance, where characters must cope with the darker side of human relationships, often inside the seemingly cosy world of the family.
Robert notes the central theme of the family and delights in Jarrett's ability to allow us into the inner worlds of characters busily suppressing them.
Matching the depth of Jarrett's characterisation and worlds, Robert delves confidently into the inner workings of Nigel's writerly abilities, noting that, during the title story 'Funderland',
...a single sentence early in the story – ‘As handfuls of soil thudded on the coffin lids and a breeze blew, he caught a whiff of her perfume’ – not only typifies the best of his ability to suggest sensory experiences with such ease, but also establishes the desire for a new beginning which the remainder of the story ‘Funderland’ sets out to fulfil.
Award-winning travel writer John Harrison takes you on a journey to the end of the earth, to hear the lost stories of those who first explored the unknown land of Antarctica.
To mark the publication of Forgotten Footprints by Parthian, this tour is an opportunity to hear from a traveller with many years experience of this mysterious continent. Hear about the night that lasts for months, the ever-changing Deception Island, and find out who really discovered Antarctica.
The performance features stunning original photography and film, and atmospheric soundscapes by composer Tim Riley.
John is a travel guide, adventurer, and award-winning writer whose last book, Cloud Road, won Wales' Book of the Year. His previous book on Antarctica was a Sunday Times Book of the Week.
The Tour Dates:
Wed 30th May 2012 - Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff (029 2030 4400)
Fri 1st June 2012 - Rhosygilwyen, North Pembrokeshire (01239 841 387)
Fri 8th June 2012 - Square Chapel, Halifax (01422 349422)
Sun 10th June 2012 - Hay Festival, Hay-on-Wye (01497 822 629)
Wed 13th June 2012 - Aberystwyth Arts Centre, Aberystwyth (01970 62 32 32)
Bill Clinton famously called it 'The Woodstock of the mind'. Founded around a kitchen table in 1987, this summer Hay celebrates its 25th festival with a packed ten days of debates and conversations with poets and scientists, novelists and historians, artists and gardeners, comedians and musicians, film makers and politicians. This year also includes Hay Fever and Hf2 with events for children and teenagers, anhd The Sound Castle for late night live music.
Parthian's editor Kathryn Gray, and Associate Editor Jon Gower will be present this year, contributing to conversations about Quick Reads, Cyber-thrillers, whalers, and the All-Wales coastal path.
Kathryn's first Hay event of this year is with TS Eliot Prize-winning poet Philip Gross, whose new collection explores his father's loss of several languages through deafness, then profound aphasia (Friday 8 June 2012, 5.20pm. Venue: Digital Stage). Kathryn will also appear at the Wales Stage, talking to comedian and author Helen Lederer about her new Quick Reads story - A Comedy of Ambition, Dreams, Treachery and Daytime Television (Saturday 9th June, 9am).
A podcast from yest
erday's Radio Programme Words On Top is now available, featuring 'one of the most satisfying shows in the season': author Fred Johnston in conversation with Frank K Hanover about his short story collection Dancing in the Asylum and its place within contemporary Irish writing.
Frank describes Dancing in the Asylum as an 'existentially appealing collection' and 'a deeply woven book', and probes Fred for his views on being a fringe writer on the edge of the 'commercial machine' of Irish publishing. Fred also reads from the collection.
Words on Top is a programme broadcast by Cork Radio. Listen to the podcast is available at http://www.mixcloud.com/player/.
Steve Woodhams' recent essay Reading Raymond Williams in 2012 is now available on the Raymond Williams Foundation website. Part review, part report, Steve asks why the
interest in Williams - particularly that of heavily contextualising his writing with letters and rediscovered papers - has revived, and attributes the recent flood of publications on and by Williams with encouraging it.
Woodhams believes that Williams's biographer, Dai Smith, helped rekindle the interest by building A Warrior's Tale out of 'hitherto unseen letters, diaries, teaching notes, and preciously, notebooks in which were contained Raymond's plans and sketches for an extraordinary journey of work but which showed its integration regardless of type.'
The essay focuses in particular on three publications: Border Country, The Long Revolution, and The Volunteers. Border Country and The Volunteers are both included in the Library of Wales series: a series concerned with keeping culturally important Welsh writing available. Steve argues that re-publication of these titles has fuelled interest in a way that previous academic writing had failed to do. He ends his essay with a plea for publication of further work by Williams.
As part of the publicity for the forthcoming 'Britain' issue, Cynan Jones talks to The Observer about 'Dig' - the excerpt from his third novel to be published by Granta (May 2012).
Explaining the reason for his foray into the world of badger-baiting, Cynan says 'It seemed the right background to give the people I wanted to write about – the bizarre, determined, repetitive cruelty of catching badgers, and the impending sense that the animal is trapped. So is the adolescent in his situation, and the guy who's organised the dig; they're products of their environment.'
Cynan is careful to avoid glamorising the practise, instead giving us an unnerving account of a small boy drawn to trapping badgers as a means of finding companionship with his father.
In the interview, Cynan also comments on Britishness, saying 'British is a political term, a colonial term, and I acknowledge that's the reality, but it's not something I feel. If I was answering honestly, I'd say I was Welsh. These are facts – I am Welsh and I write. It's not something I have any control over. It's more important for me to be a good writer than being British or Welsh.'
Read the full interview at http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/may/06/cynan-jones-granta-dig-inter.... Cynan will be reading from 'Dig' at the Granta 'Britain' launch at Aberystwyth Waterstone's on 10th May.
Author Cynan Jones joins a high calibre list of contributors in the new issue of British literary bible Granta this May.
By 2050 some 240 million people will still depend on unsafe water and 1.8 billion will lack basic sanitation.
Yesterday, the W
estern Mail discussed Welsh water expert David Lloyd Owen's book The Sound of Thirst: a moral, economic and sustainable case for spending the many trillions of pounds needed worldwide in the coming decades to ensure safe water for all – and a more sustainable society.
In the article, David – who has 23 years experience in the sector, and has advised companies, governments, financiers, and multilateral institutions – says 'There are a lot of people in politics who think water should be free, which is a noble idea – however, just like a lot of other things in life it costs money to deliver and treat. Especially the waste water.'
He argues that a shift in political will is needed, and believes one of the integral problems is the poor data available for those in power to make valid judgements in debates about how much should be paid for water, or whether the private sector should be involved. David hopes that the arguments and assessments laid out in The Sound of Thirst will do much to challenge current notions.
'If I have one great interest in life it is trying to persuade people to take the subject seriously and to move from ideological debates to mature discussion based on commonly understood information'.
Tue, 2012-05-08 09:31 | 
Claire Houguez
Who doesn’t love a bank holiday weekend? Having lazed around, grazed incessantly from a smorgasbord of high salt, high sugar, high fat goods, and gained thoroughly square eyes, I’m refreshed this morning and ready to get stuck into some marketing. The Parthian plants were thirstily glad to see me (most likely the vegetable kingdom’s version of Stockholm syndrome). Somewhere in the building someone is drilling something. But you can’t have everything.
On my to do list for today is typesetting September title Kate Roberts’s Feet in Chains, a classic 1936 novel following the passionate and headstrong Jane’s struggles to bring up a family of six children on the pittance earned by her slate-quarrying husband, Ifan. Spanning forty years, Feet in Chains traces the contours not only of one vividly evoked Welsh family but of a nation coming to self-consciousness, beginning in the heyday of Methodist fervour and ending with the carnage and disillusionment of the First World War.
It’s set me wondering, what with all the speculation about her private life, how I’d market Feet in Chains if Kate Roberts were alive today, in the age of marketing the author. Last year's biography Kate: Cofiant Kate Roberts 1891-1985 made claims that Roberts had lesbian tendencies, and a subsequent television programme did more to stir up the furore.
Join us on June 15th at 18.30, in Waterstone's, Cardiff for the launch of Jon Gower's short story collection Too Cold For Snow.
If you haven't been lucky enough to get your hands on one of the taster preview copies, come along and listen to Gerald Tyler and Tomos Williams reading extracts from the stories.
Dai Smith will also be asking fiendish questions about the collection. Expect uproarious annecdotes, journeys from the taiga region of northern Russia to the depths of despair... and if it's all feeling a bit much, Jon's famous cocktails will be served.
A free event. All welcome.