Sebastian Barry
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Walberberg 2005: Whose English? |
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Walberberg. Playing pool with the noble Ciaran Carson and Fred D'Aguiar, walking the solemn path between the fields, the sense of the monks holding somewhere to their rooms till the strange literary people had departed.
The great Ali Smith cross-legged on the chair, bringing the best out in us by her passionate regard, the faces in the audience slowly over the days becoming individual lives and worlds. Elke Schmitter reading from her immaculate book, like a radio from another country, like a signal over frozen fields. Myself terrified to give a sonnet workshop and then finding brilliant faces and hearts moved by old poems.
The unexpected medicine of shnapps offered by Elke.....Marijke magical stomach pills...Marijke's magic....The British Council just for a few days The British-Irish Council, a few happy days. Entente Cordiale and the two islands at rest.
"Melding and marrying more than we knew,
Shooting a cuff to the same tune".
And the news that it might never be there again, but somewhere else, a mysterious colloquy, a rising tree, a folding rapture of mind and mind, and fealty.
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