CRANBORNE Chase Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty has inspired generations of artists, and now the AONB team is also hoping this vast ancient landscape will inspire writers too with a Festival of Words, running to Sunday 29th October. With free and online workshops, storytelling walks and performances, the festival is themed around the idea of…
THE award-winning FOLDE Dorset bookshop and gallery at the top of Gold Hill, Shaftesbury, has an impressive line-up of speakers for the autumn series of talks at the Grosvenor Arms. Next up is Tristan Gooley’s talk on 15th November, about his book How To Read a Tree is sold out, and there is a waiting…
FROM wild geese to the night skies, Shaftesbury’s Folde nature and art bookshop, has lined up a fascinating series of writers’ talks for the spring and early summer, continuing with Taking Flight on Thursday 18th May. It will feature Lev Parikian talking about his new book, Taking Flight: The Evolutionary Story of Life on the…
THE new series of Help Our Planet talks, by leading scientists, environmentalists and writers, continues at Sladers Yard, West Bay, on Wednesday 29th March, when Julia Hailes will discuss the practicalities and necessity of rewilding. Julia Hailes is a sustainability pioneer with more than 35 years in the green sector. She’s a campaigner, writer, speaker,…
THERE is a new literary event in our region, a celebration of fiction, on at the Grosvenor Hotel, Shaftesbury (pictured), until Saturday 25th March. Rosie King and Fran Hill, who write as Rosie Lear and Tiggy Hayes, have organised an interesting and varied programme covering different genres, including historical, crime, contemporary and children’s, and featuring…
A TRAIL inspired by The Lost Words has opened in Thorncombe Wood, a Local Nature Reserve three miles east of Dorchester, and will be available until April. Thanks to funding from Stepping into Nature community pot, you can pick up a leaflet from the Thorncombe visitor centre and follow the seasonal trail on the theme…
RUSSIA’s national poet, the creator of one of the world’s most famous and tragic love stories, Aleksandr Pushkin, is the subject of the latest talk by Graham Fawcett at Sladers Yard arts centre, West Bay, on Thursday 9th February at 7.30pm. Pushkin is revered in the West via the Russian composer Tchaikovsky as the creator…
THE winter exhibition at the Salisbury Museum in the Cathedral Close is Her Salisbury Story, running until 16th April 2023. It has been inspired by the Her Salisbury Story project and website, which aims to bring Salisbury’s heritage alive by exploring women’s stories, celebrating the lives of the city’s women past and present. The aim…
THE autumn and winter talks programme at the Museum of Somerset in Taunton continues on Remembrance Day, 11th November, with Richard Cooper-Knight talking about the Commonwealth war graves of Somerset. Richard published Death and Service which explores some of the stories behind the 800 First World War graves found across the county. Somerset Wildlife Trust’s…
TOLLARD Talks return to the village on Cranborne Chase on Friday 14th October with an unusual and exciting event, Chinese Boxing, a performance by Mark Kitto, an expert on the vast but mysterious country. The play is also being performed at Martock’s beautiful parish church on Thursday 13th October, at 7.30pm. The event is organised…