A year or two ago Rochdale’s 40\nkilometres of tow paths, cycle tracks and walkways were celebrated in a poetry\nanthology that brought together eight locally well known poets. Plaques and\nsigns were placed along the routes to be read and enjoyed by those who love\nthese trails through some of the most beautiful of Rochdale’s countryside.\nThese were made compatible to mobile phone applications in a way that enabled\npeople to respond to, or add to, the poetry they read.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking at a meeting of\nCastleton Literary And Scientific Society recently Seamus Kelly discussed the\nbenefits brought about by the project and its sustainability and the legacy it\nhas already created. He talked of how the transport department he then worked\nfor identified a need for greater public awareness of these walkways and how\ncycling and walking them might improve personal health and well being. He and\ncolleagues devised the Connect2Poetry project and invited other agencies such\nas Cartwheel Arts and Just Poets to help deliver it. Between them, these\nagencies identified and commissioned eight poets, with each poet asked to\nproduce a certain number of poems to describe their allocated sections along\nstretches of Rochdale’s canals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Earlier this month Castleton\nLiterary and Scientific Society members listened to a public reading of poems\ncelebrating Rochdale’s canal routes. Eight poets specially commissioned to\ncontribute original works to a project two years ago re-convened to deliver a\nheart-felt reading of a diverse and eclectic collection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Robin Parker conveyed a sense of\nhistory and architecture and Val Chapman a collection of personal teenage\nmemories associated with walkways, whilst Eileen Earnshaw created myth and magic.\nNorman Warwick delivered a personal musical soundtrack and Seamus Kelly spoke\nof a traveller’s love of these country detours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many of the poets spoke of the\nquietness and solitude of some of these areas, but it was Anne Robinson who\nheard that silence shattered by a broken branch and reflected, in a truly\nmemorable line, that ‘sound is never shy’. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Steve Gartside has a voice and\ndelivery technique that lend themselves to his profound words and Sam Fisher’s\nenthusiasm for the project danced ecstatically in his reading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Billed as Tow Path Val And The\nRamblers, these eight poets were mainly drawn from three of the Borough’s\ncreative writing groups; Langley Writers, Weaving Words and Touchstones\nCreative Writing Group,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To build on this success, a radio\ndocumentary is under consideration.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A year or two ago Rochdale’s 40 kilometres of tow paths, cycle tracks and walkways were celebrated in a poetry anthology that brought together eight locally well known poets. Plaques and signs were placed along the routes to be read and enjoyed by those who love these trails through some of the most beautiful of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":73,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[21,22,43,24],"class_list":["post-43","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry","tag-canals","tag-cartwheel","tag-cyclepaths","tag-tcwg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}