Author Archives: pollyrowena

On books in the landscape

Some time in the mid twenty-teens, when twitter was still twitter, and still a place to make connections and jokes, my partner Will stepped out of the bookshop where he had been working part-time for years, carried a book across the road, and positioned it on a gate. For a couple of years he hadContinue reading “On books in the landscape”

Plague Year Season 4 Review

2023 eh? That was the year that was. I’m not going to share my thoughts or reflections on it because they’re all too heavily fogged up by the lens of the present moment and as I write this, huddled up with a hotwater bottle, watching the rain fall for the 6th day in a row,Continue reading “Plague Year Season 4 Review”

Open Letter About Access and Exclusion at Kendal Mountain Festival

Last Friday afternoon, November 10th, Kendal Mountain Festival sent round an email newsletter that included the following announcement: *For those who’ve accessed the Kendal Mountain Player before, you’ll notice we’re doing things a little differently this year. We’ve chosen to adapt our approach by not recording live Festival events, a move that enriches our focusContinue reading “Open Letter About Access and Exclusion at Kendal Mountain Festival”

Will we still beg when this is over? On literary events, access, and the pandemic

In my latest poetry collection, there’s a poem made out of lines from other people’s poems – a form called a cento, which has a history going back thousands of years. The word ‘cento’ once referred to planting trees, but came to mean patchwork clothing, and then a poetic form made from fragments of otherContinue reading “Will we still beg when this is over? On literary events, access, and the pandemic”