The Reader Online

Last week, Director of The Reader Organisation, Jane Davis appeared on Mariella Frostrup’s Open Book show on Radio 4. Jane offers advice for a listener who has found it difficult to concentrate on reading since a bereavement 15 years ago. As Jane says, reading, even in very small chunks, “takes you out of yourself to take you into yourself” and therefore can help people to deal with some of the more difficult times in their lives.

You can listen to the show by clicking here and view Jane’s list of reading suggestions.

On this morning’s ‘Today’ programme (Radio 4), Josephine Hart spoke ardently about the decline of English Literature within education syllabi.  She said that because, unfortunately, English Literature is regarded as an “elite subject” within our culture, it is only really offered to the high achievers to study, that there are thousands of children going through their education without access to great books and only learning “communications skills”.

Speaking on the programme, Schools Minister Diana Johnson, agreed that we must encourage more than ‘basic literacy skills’ by reading great books but when questioned about it, was unable to defend the fact that far less literature is being taught in schools. It looks like come 2010, the GCSE syllabus will not contain a separate GCSE in English Literature but that only the combined English Language and Literature qualification will be taught. On one hand, it’s good to keep the two together – this brings advantages for literacy and communication skills but it’s worrying that this may be the only focus and that the depth of feeling and wide range of experiences that reading literature offers, will be lost.

The humanising power of literature should be available to all young people and Michael Rosen commented on the programme that the “low level of expectation in Government” has led to deprived people being given a “deprived curriculum”. If people are only given the minimum, then that’s all that they will be able to achieve – it simply can’t be the case that we can work on a minimum basis. If people don’t come into contact with reading that will enthuse and enlighten them, how can we lift people’s achievements?

Josephine Hart is absolutely right in saying that we need passionate people to enthuse children about reading – that human contact is essential – and that’s why our Get Into Reading project workers are in schools and foster homes, reading with young people one-to-one and in groups, to encourage reading for pleasure. This is one way in which our Reading Revolution is happening – and making a very real difference to the lives of these young people. As Jeremy Irons mentioned on the programme, we need to give people a “rounded experience of the life that’s available to them” and there’s no better way to do this than through the reading of great books.

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Linked to this is Gabriella Gruder-Poni’s essay, ‘Scenes from a PGCE’, which was published in The Reader 35 and is available online here.

Radio 4 is launching a new initiative through Open Book and the Classic Serial.

Mariella Frostrup will interview ten top authors on 18th and 25th October. Each author will pitch a classic book that they think has been unjustly neglected. Listeners will be asked to vote, with the winner being dramatised for the Classic Serial. Beyond that, though, Radio 4 are hoping to open up a big conversation about all those books and authors that somehow we’ve forgotten about, but which still provide a thrilling and memorable read.

More information soon on the Open Book website at Radio 4.

So, what forgotten classic do you feel’s been unfairly abandoned?

We are big fans of the poet Sharon Olds whose latest collection One Secret Thing has been shortlisted for The Forward Prize for Best Collection 2009. Yesterday in an excellent interview with Jenni Murray on Woman’s Hour, she read two of the poems from the book and talked about why, despite her opposition to the war in Iraq, she has begun to write about honour, bravery and brutality in war.

Unfortunately we cannot post any of her poems here for copyright reasons but the interview is well worth hearing.

The BBC’s Poetry Season is now fully up-and-rhyming. Last weekend, BBC Four showed a series of programmes – some old, some new – about Wilfred Owen, Dylan Thomas, Ted Hughes, Stevie Smith, Philip Larkin, Carol Ann Duffy, W. H. Auden and Radio 4’s long-running Poetry Please. A few are still available to watch on iPlayer, along with Ian Hislop’s witty and interesting look at the role of Poet Laureate, The Changing of the Bard.

But there’s plenty more to come, including:

Griff Rhys Jones: Why Poetry Matters
Wednesday 20 May, 21:00, BBC Two

Join Griff Rhys Jones on a personal journey to find out why we should care about poetry.

Off By Heart
Friday 22 May, 21:00, BBC Two

A documentary following primary-school children preparing for a national poetry recital competition.

Simon Schama’s John Donne
Tuesday 26 May, 21:00, BBC Two

Simon Schama celebrates the life and work of Britain’s greatest love poet, John Donne.

Armando Iannucci in Milton’s Heaven and Hell
Wednesday 27 May, 21:00, BBC Two

Armando Iannucci explores his passion for John Milton – a poet whose preoccupation with ideas of sin, liberty and the fall of man, may seem out of step with 21st century Britain but, as Iannucci reveals, has never been more relevant.

Arena: TS Eliot
Sunday 31 May, Time TBC, BBC Two

A profile of TS Eliot which, with unprecedented co-operation from the Eliot Estate, tells the story of one of the 20th century’s most celebrated and elusive writers.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Thursday 4 Jun, 21:00, BBC Four

Having published an acclaimed translation of the 14th-century poem, Simon Armitage goes on the trail of the mythical Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.

The Poetry Season website is also well worth a visit. It has What’s On listings for TV and Radio; an Events guide; short features about, and sample poems by, a selection of great writers; and a (well-intentioned but rather meaningless) vote to find Britain’s Favourite Poet.

In addition, SKY Arts (channel 256 – an oasis in the digital desert) will be broadcasting a daily round-up of this year’s Guardian Hay Festival, Hay-On-Sky, presented by The Book Show’s Mariella Frostrup, starting this Friday at 19:00.

Who needs to go out?

To mark the start of Children’s Heart Week which begins on Saturday, poet Rebecca Goss (a strong supporter of The Reader Organisation), will be on Woman’s Hour this Friday, May 8th, BBC Radio 4 at 10am.

Rebecca is hoping to raise awareness of congenital heart disease by reading some of the poems she’s written about her daughter Ella. Ella was born with a severe heart defect in 2007 and Rebecca will be talking about her short but incredible life.

There will be a Children’s Heart Federation appeal on Radio 4, on Sunday May 10th.

Thank you for listening if you can.

The program will be available on ‘listen again’ for seven days from Friday.

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A number of Rebecca’s  Ella poems are available to read in the latest issue of Shadowtrain magazine.
Read Featured Poems by Rebecca Goss on this blog: ‘Candour’ and also ‘Aeroplanes’, which has also been turned into a short animated film.

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Children’s Heart Federation

1 in every 133 children is born with a heart defect. Our vision is of a society in which all children with congenital heart disease can live life to the full because their medical, educational and social needs have been met. Charity Registration No 1120557.

Our ‘Get Into Reading’ project has been singled-out by the Government as an example of best practice in helping improve public mental health and wellbeing.

The Department of Health presents ‘a new vision for mental health and wellbeing’.

‘New Horizons’ is a new strategy that will promote good mental health and well-being, whilst improving services for people who have mental health problems. In devising this strategy, the Department of Health has recognised that there are services already in place, which aren’t normally considered as mental health services, but which could help promote public mental health and wellbeing and prevent future problems. The Reader Organisation’s pioneering social outreach project Get Into Reading was named as a specific example.

Jane Davis, Director, The Reader Organisation:

‘We’re delighted to have been named as an example of good practice by the Department of Health. Get Into Reading is inclusive, creative and cost-effective. We bring great books to more than 500 people each week here on Merseyside. Through our Read to Lead training, we’re helping to spread ‘shared reading’ across the UK and beyond.’

The ‘New Horizons’ strategy can be seen on the Department of Health’s website.

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Tonight’s your chance to listen to a repeat of Roger Phillips interview with Founder and Director of The Reader Organisation, Jane Davis,  on BBC Radio Merseyside. Tune in at 9pm to find out how The Reader Organisation came to be.

A radio interview with Jane Davis

Well, I never really planned anything…

Roger Phillips interviews Founder and Director of The Reader Organisation, Jane Davis,  on BBC Radio Merseyside on Sunday 26th April at 5pm (repeated on Wednesday 29th April at 9pm). Tune in to find out about how it all started…

The BBC are launching Poetry Season: an entire season of content dedicated to literature, and to poetry in particular, starting in Spring 2009. Ranging from television, radio and online features, the series will feature some of the nation’s best-loved poets and celebrities exploring the world of poetry.

The series will be launched by Griff Rhys Jones and his plea for Why Poetry Matters on BBC2, which will also be home to the Lifelines exploration of poetry from Milton to Shakespeare, and a poetry recitation competition for school children in Off By Heart.  BBC4 will also feature A Poet’s Guide to Britain hosted by Owen Sheers, as well as Ian Hislop’s welcoming of the new Poet Laureate.

Both BBC Radio 3 and 4 will celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Tennyson, along with another Poetry Slam competition, also on Radio 4. For its online feature, the BBC will be holding a competition to find the Nation’s Favourite Poet, and the Poetry Season website will feature a poetry search engine; enabling site users to find poems fit for any occasion.

Further commissions will be announced at later dates. The season runs in association with the Poetry Society, the Poetry Archive, and National Poetry Day.

Our Reading Heroes, Louise Jones and Jane Davis, will be live on BBC Radio Merseyside’s Drivetime show this evening. Tune in to 95.8 FM or on DAB shortly after 6.30pm to listen to Louise and Jane explain what it means to them to win this award (and visit Downing Street later in the week to collect them!) and find out how they were inspired to Get Into Reading. If you’re not local to Merseyside, or you don’t own a radio, you can listen online.

You’ll hear more about Louise and Jane’s visit to Downing Street next week…