Written in Water - a very special Frogmore event - 6 May 2017

The Frogmore Press invites you to a very special poetry and prose event at the Constable and Brighton exhibition at Brighton Museum.

Written in Water (a nod to Keats' epitaph) will take place on Saturday 6 May 2017, during the Free for the Festival Day at the Brighton Museum. It coincides with the beginning of the Brighton Festival, which this year is directed by poet Kate Tempest. The themes of the readings will be loosely connected to the Constable exhibition: water, wind, weather, storms, clouds, the Sussex coast and Downs, the sea, Brighton, landscape painting, the Romantic Age, Brighton as a home etc.

The event will be compèred by Frogmore Press Managing Editor Alexandra Loske, who is also a curator at the Royal Pavilion and Brighton Museums. There will be two readings, one at 12noon and one at 3pm. 

In addition, Tanya Shadrick, creator of Wild Patience Scrolls and co-editor of Frogmore's latest anthology Watermarks: Writing by Lido Lovers and Wild Swimmers will be there as writer-in-residence for the day.

There is no need to  book, but the museum is likely to get very busy and there is a strict limit on people allowed in the Constable galleries at any one time, so come early to avoid disappointment.

Here is the line-up of poets/writers:

12noon
Marek Urbanowicz, Vanessa Gebbie (also reading work by the late Joanna Seldon), Clare Best, Lyn Thomas, Janet Sutherland, Rachel Playforth, Zel Norwood, Mark Bridge, Jan Heritage, Stacy Carl-McGrath, Gary Goodman

3pm
Maria Jastrzębska, Chris Sykes , Mandy Pannett, Karen Antoni, Marek Urbanowicz, Sonya Smith,  Jeremy Page, Seema Kapila, Alison Rumfitt, Claire Booker, Michaela Ridgway, Claire Pankhurst

New Frogmore anthology 'Watermarks - Writing by lido lovers & wild swimmers' out now

Watermarks

Writing by lido lovers & wild swimmers

 edited by Tanya Shadrick & Rachel Playforth

 A Frogmore Press & Pells Pool collaboration

Artwork by Neil Gower

Watermarks is a collection of new poetry, stories and non-fiction by lido lovers and wild swimmers: writers who find inspiration in or near outdoor pools, lakes, rivers and other wild waters.

Full of quick turns, graceful strokes and surprising dives into the depths, this is writing to make us catch our breath, laugh in delight or shiver a little.

Our call for new poetry, short fiction and life-writing celebrating the life aquatic was answered by swimmers at home and abroad. F Scott Fitzgerald wrote that ‘all good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath’ and all the writer-swimmers in the book had us hold ours a little too.

Lake Ontario. Skarðsvík. Isola Santa. Galway. Hong Kong. Trollhagen. In waters from around the world, we are immersed in birth and death, danger and rescue, new loves and last. Ness Cove. Spitchwick. Thurlestone. Sharrah. Swimmers closer to home take us places few know and less dare: freezing mountain pools, rivers in full spate where buoyancy is lost suddenly in froth and bubbles.

With work by more than fifty fine writers, the collection includes an extract from Alexandra Heminsley’s new memoir Leap In and work by Lynne Roper, the visionary West Country wild swimmer and former press officer for OSS who died in August 2016.

You can order Watermarks at your local bookseller, such as Skylark at Needlemakers in Lewes, or online at, among others, Waterstones, Foyles and Telegraph Books.

Would you like to read your work surrounded by the works of John Constable?

The Frogmore Press editor is looking for creative writers who would like to read some of their work on 6 May in the exhibition galleries in Brighton Museum, during the much-anticipated Constable and Brighton exhibition, which opens 8 April 2017. 

The event will be called Written in Water (a nod to Keats' epitaph) and take place on Saturday 6 May 2017, a Free Day at the Brighton Museum. It coincides with the beginning of the Brighton Festival, which this year is directed by poet Kate Tempest.  The themes of the readings (poems or short prose pieces) should be loosely connected to the Constable exhibition, but can be interpreted quite freely: water, wind, weather, storms, clouds, the Sussex coast and Downs, the sea, Brighton, landscape painting, the Romantic Age, Brighton as a home etc. 

There will be two slots: one at 12 and one at 3pm. You may read at either or both, for a maximum length of approx. 10 minutes. You are welcome to include your favourite poem(s) from the Romantic Age, or about the sea. 

Among the poets who will read a the event are Clare Best, Sonya Smith, Michaela Ridgway, Jeremy Page, Rachel Playforth, Maria Jastrzebska, Karen Antoni, Amber Agha and Marek Urbanowicz.

Tanya Shadrick will be Writer-in-Residence for the day, continuing her A Wild Patience: Laps in Longhand project.

If you are interested in taking part, please contact me by email for more information. Please include a few lines about yourself  and samples of what you would like to read.

Alexandra Loske

Managing Editor, The Frogmore Press

Alexbythesea@hotmail.com

Frogmore call for submissions: Watermarks - New Writing by Lido Lovers and Wild Swimmers

In 2017 The Frogmore Press and Pells Pool in Lewes — the oldest freshwater pool in the UK — are publishing an anthology of exceptional new prose and poetry to celebrate the life aquatic.

The anthology will be edited by Tanya Shadrick (currently Writer-in-Residence at Pells Pool), Rachel Playforth and Rob Read. 

Tanya Shadrick, writer-in-residence at Pells Pool, Lewes

 We are looking for work by writers who find inspiration in or near lidos, lakes, sea pools and other wild swimming places. The writing has to be short — a maximum of 1000 words for prose and 50 lines for poetry — but supple. We want work full of quick turns, graceful strokes or surprising dives into the depths: stories which hold the attention and last in memory as good swimmers do when they take to the water; writing which has us catch our breath, laugh in delight or shiver a little.

Rachel Playforth

Nature and life writings are welcome, but must — like fiction and poetry — emphasise scene, story and sensation. We are not seeking local history, natural history or journalism.

We can only consider original writing in English, but authors are not restricted to UK waters: We are interested in work situated both close to home and far away.

Further criteria for submissions:

•   Original material only. Submissions must not have been published previously in print or online , nor should they be out on simultaneous submission before January 2017

•   Work should be double-spaced in Times New Roman or Arial

•   For email submissions, use Watermarks in the subject line. Only one piece can be considered, and should be sent as a Word attachment to: watermarksanthology@gmail.com

•   You can submit work by post to Watermarks, The Frogmore Press, 21 Mildmay Road, Lewes, East Sussex, BN7 1PJ. If you would like your work returned to you please enclose a suitably-sized SAE. We can only acknowledge receipt by email, so for that purpose please include an email address with your postal submission.

•   If you swim regularly at a particular lido or outdoor water, please mention this in your covering message.

•   We are not able to pay for work accepted, but contributors will receive a copy of the anthology upon publication.

•   The deadline for submissions is 15 September 2016

•   Successful authors will be contacted by the end of January 2017

Alexandra Loske, Editorial advisor