Penelope Shuttle described the process as a “fascinating and educative experience” and went on to say that “reading the poems was exhilarating and often profoundly moving.” 

The poems were judged anonymously, so the judges were excited to discover that they had chosen such an international shortlist with poets hailing from all over the world, as far afield as Christchurch (New Zealand), Lagos (Nigeria) and Florida (U.S.A) with plenty of poets from across the U.K. too and one of the shortlist a Morrab Library member from Penzance. 

We thought we’d tell you a little bit more about the competition winning poets and also share clips of the poets reading their winning poems in their own voices at our hybrid event which took place at The Exchange in Penzance earlier this month.

She began writing poetry in 2007 on retirement from being an NHS manager. Since then she has had individual poems published in poetry journals, organises an arts festival in Sussex and had  her pamphlet Grapes in the Crater published in 2015. She is now working on her full collection.

Anna added: “Although I wrote this poem a couple of years ago, it’s been especially in my mind with everything that’s going on currently”.

Children’s competition:

Penelope and Katrina were both truly “wowed” by the quality of the poems in the children’s category. 

Penelope Shuttle said “The standard of the children’s poetry was exceptionally high. Well done all! And congratulations to the teachers for giving their students, however young, deep access to the imagination, and the power of articulation.”

The children’s competition received over 200 submissions and the judges were so impressed by the calibre of entries that they decided to appoint joint second and joint third prize winners, generously supported by the Dennis Myner Trust. 

Dexter Warburton, aged 13, won second prize for her poem called ‘A Boy Talking To A Robot In The Future About Where He Lives’ which you can read here. Caterina Williams was awarded joint second prize for her poem ‘The Flow of Words’, which you can read here. 

The judges loved the form of the joint third prize winner, 7 year old Ziva Patel’s poem, ‘Refugees’ which you can read here. 9 year old  Benjamin Williams, younger brother of Caterina Williams, was the joint third prize winner for his poem ‘Nonsense Safari’ – the judges particularly loved the rhymes in this poem which you can read for yourself here.   

You can read many the highly commended poems, in the adult’s and children’s category, on the website here.  

Morrab Library, The Dennis Myner Trust and our judges would like to congratulate all of the shortlist poets and say a big thank you to everyone who took the time to enter the competition! 

For any number of reasons, many of us are finding ourselves needing a little support to make that step out into the world – to join new groups, take part in activities, or make new friends. This isn’t only on emotional grounds – it can also be for purely practical reasons. Where might one start? Sometimes, we just need a little bit of help to get us back on track and heading in the right direction to improve our health and wellbeing.

Morrab Library is teaming up with the local NHS Social Prescribing team to offer some help. These are the people who take a holistic approach to people’s health and wellbeing. They connect people to community groups and services for practical and emotional support. Social Prescribers also support existing community groups to be accessible and sustainable, and help people to start new groups, working collaboratively with local partners.

It’s an option for a wide range of people including anyone with long term medical conditions, people needing support with mental health, those feeling lonely or isolated, and those with complex social needs.  You can contact Social Prescribers directly or be referred via a number of local agencies including GPs, pharmacies, social care services, community and social enterprises and job centres.

Morrab Library and the Penwith Social Prescribing team are working together to start a new group (or two!) at the library. The idea is for an informal book group – where people can get together, over tea and biscuits of course, to share an enjoyment of fiction, to find recommendations for your next book, to talk about books and reading and to meet people.

We’d like to target two groups – those struggling to ‘get back out’ and to meet new people, as well as a group specifically for young people.

To make this really work though, we need you to help us make sure we create the best kind of groups possible which maximise the support and help we can offer.

Here is a link a brief survey from the Social Prescribing team which we ask you might consider completing to make sure we get it right. We have a box at the library for you to drop in your replies or you can email this form to enquiries@morrablibrary.org.uk. 

We really enjoy chatting with you when you return your recently read books to the library and wanted to share some of your recommendations with fellow members. We will be sharing your reading suggestions at the end of the each Fortnightly Links email and adding them to this rolling blog.

Your reading tastes are wonderfully eclectic and inspiring so this section will be a chance to tell your fellow members about books you have borrowed (and enjoyed!) from the Morrab Library.

If you’d like join in, please send us a few sentences (up to 100 words) on a recent book you’ve enjoyed to enquiries@morrablibrary.org.uk and we’ll share your tips.

Time Song by Julia Blackburn recommended by Ruth Towse

“This original, imaginative, beautiful book is a delight. It is original in more ways than one, in the style of writing but also the subject – what she calls ‘searching for Doggerland’. Doggerland , originally land area now filled by the English Channel, which inundated it somewhere around 5,000 BC. Recent developments in underwater archaeology have enabled research on what appears to have been a huge fertile area frequently visited by early peoples. That research provides the backbone of the various strands of knowledge and thoughts the author presents in the form of song, narrative and drawings.

The book is organised into 18 ‘Time Songs’ in three sections: Old Time, Middle Time and No Time At All. Each ‘chapter’ begins with a song, printed as for a poem, followed by an account in the first person of her discovery of the information it conveys and her sources, which she references. The songs seem to me to hark back to the way that pre-literate peoples memorised and passed on their knowledge. You identify with them immediately while recognising their profound implications about the skills and knowledge of our very ancient forebears and how strongly they were connected to the earth and to nature on which they thrived.

The narrative accounts tell of the author’s visits to sites, not just ones in the vicinity of Doggerland, where there is evidence of ancient people’s presence going back even before the Neanderthals (who emerged at least 200,000 years ago before becoming extinct around 30,000 years ago) – footprints that have survived in fossilised mud, shell middens and other such clues of their existence. Blackburn also visited places, such as Canada and Australia where people still retain ancestral knowledge. The accounts are personalised in ways that makes the reader understand the author’s deep identification with the experiences she describes.

I read the book one chapter at a time each night as bedtime reading and felt a deep sense of gratitude to the author for giving us so much to experience and think over. A most soothing and life-affirming book.”

THE NOT QUITE PRIME MINISTERS (Leaders of the Opposition 1783-2020) by Nigel Fletcher recommended by George Care

“The author of this lively and entertaining book teaches at Kings College London, has worked as a SPAD and established OPPOSITION STUDIES as an academic discipline.  This witty study begins with Charles James Fox, whose erudite classical speeches, off the cuff [remarks] on behalf of radical causes were interspersed with heavy unsuccessful gambling in Brooks, where he drank heavily with the Prince Regent.

The Opposition leaders in the mid-1800s were occupied with issues such as the Corn Laws and the extension of franchise..  Most were educated at one or two public schools followed by either Oxford or Cambridge.  Several, like the Conservative John Charles Harries, benefited from education abroad, at Leipzig in his case, and his chapter affords a glance at characters like Disraeli who are omitted from the study because he became an actual Prime Minister.

The final chapters are particularly useful as a reminder of recent events.  Hugh Gaitskill, for instance,  and his issues with Nye Bevan and the left as well as his personal affections and minor peccadilloes.  The rise of women in the persons of Margaret Beckett and Harriet Harman show how their regular level-headed contributions took the Labour Party through some very difficult days.  This compelling and delightful account will well repay the time it takes to peruse.”

15 FAMOUS ENGLISH HOMES by Randolph S Churchill recommended by Helen Moulsey 

“One of the things I love about Morrab Library is browsing the shelves, with no particular topic or author in mind.  I find myself drawn to some of the older books, which for me are what make Morrab Library so special.   15 Famous English Homes by Randolph S. Churchill caught my eye, and I took it down from the shelf.   The first date stamp was 15 May 1956, “Penzance Library, Morrab Gardens”.  As the title Fifteen Famous English Homes suggests, each chapter covers an English country home (emphasis being on “home”), each house still being inhabited by the family at the time of Randolph Churchill’s writing. 

What is so interesting to me and caught my attention about the book, particularly the chapter on Althorp, is that as we read in 2024, 70 years after the book was published, we have a much longer perspective, and know what was to come with the Spencer family.   

The first paragraph begins with: “historically Althorp is important as the home of the Spencer family, which can legitimately claim in its two main branches to have furnished longer continuous public service than any other family” (longer even than our current royal family, as some modern day commentators have pointed out).

We learn that from 1603 when a barony was conferred upon Robert Spencer, there has scarcely been a period when some descendant of the 1^st Lord Spencer has not played a prominent role in our national life.  Furthermore, a Spencer – the Spencers were Earls of Sunderland – was never far from the centre of the political stage in the reigns of Charles II, James II, William and Mary, Queen Anne and George I.  Through the female line the dukedom of Marlborough was inherited, from which family our author Randolph S Churchill tells us were to spring “such famous statesmen” as Lord Randolph Churchill and Sir Winston Churchill, the grandfather and father respectively of our author Randolph S. Churchill.  We are told that the 7^th Earl Spencer succeeded in 1922, and occupies Althorp “today” (1954).  He observes “no occupier of Althorp has devoted more care to its exceptional beauties and treasures than the 7^th Earl Spencer.”

What our author was unable to tell us was that Lady Diana Spencer daughter of the 8^th Earl Spencer would marry the son and heir of Queen Elizabeth II, becoming Diana Princess of Wales, and fulfilling the role of providing heirs to the throne, her spouse being Prince Charles, now King Charles III.  

After Diana died tragically in a car crash whilst being chased by paparazzi through the Pont de l’Alma road tunnel in Paris, her brother the 9th Earl Spencer at her funeral pledged to look after her boys William and Harry, heirs to the British throne (and by implication, perhaps, protect her from the royal family).

Fast forward to today the 9th Earl Spencer, more familiarly known to us as Charles Spencer, presents the podcast The Rabbit Hole Detectives with the Reverend Richard Coles (former Communard) and Dr Cat Jarman (archaeologist and author).   Charles Spencer is writing a series of books dealing with the estate itself and with his family history, commencing with an account of his ancestral home, Althorp: the Story of an English House, published in 1998.   It would be interesting to see how this compares with where Randolph Churchill left off in 1954.”   

Susanna, Mother of the Wesleys, by Rebecca Lamar Harmon, recommended by one of our volunteers

“Susanna, Mother of the Wesleys, published 1968, by Rebecca Lamar Harmon (wife of a Methodist bishop in the USA and former editor of The Methodist Church, and who died in 1980).  

Susanna Annesley (1669-1742) the daughter of an eminent Puritan was a fascinating woman, courageous and indomitable. She married Samuel Wesley, not a nonconformist but an Anglican priest, who was scholarly and, at times, impractical. Together they had nineteen children, only nine of whom survived to adulthood. Best known were the boys, Samuel, Jr., Charles, and John, the founder of Methodism, and much has been written about them. However, little was known about the women, Susanna and her daughters, Emilia, Susanna, Mary, Mehetabel (Hetty), Martha, and Kezziah. Rebecca tells the intriguing story of the whole family and Susanna Wesley’s influence. From the day she and her husband moved into the Epworth parsonage, in remote swampy Lincolnshire, until her death, Susanna is portrayed as a woman of uncommon spiritual, intellectual, and physical strength, albeit within what must have been for her the confining social constraints of rural 18th century England. 

Rebecca discusses Susanna’s novel approach to home schooling, and how she and Samuel provided for the family on a country rector’s paltry income. And of the differences between them concerning the raising of their daughters, especially about Hetty, who conceived ‘out of wedlock’ and was disowned by her father.

This book, published in the USA in 1968, is a book that deserves to be read as much for social history and 18th century family customs as for its contribution to Methodist history.”

Un Avion Sans Elle by Michel Bussi, recommended by one of our volunteers

“An airliner with two three-month-old babies and their parents on board crashes into a forest on a Swiss mountainside and bursts into flames. The only survivor is one of the babies, miraculously unharmed, but with no identifying features to prove her parentage. Both sets of grandparents bitterly contest their right to her adoption, which is finally settled by a judge in favour of the least well-off family. The frustrated wealthy grandparents thereupon hire a private detective to investigate the girl throughout her life until she is eighteen, when she can then decide for herself to which family she would belong, guided by the detective’s report.

In this long, French, detective roman, high tension – and a romance – is maintained to the very last pages as the story twists and turns between families, siblings and readings of the detective’s report as he repeatedly returns to the site of the crash. 

A cracking read for a long wet weekend.”

“The SAD Detective by Colin Stringer, recommended by Linda Camidge

“SAD in this instance does not mean ‘sad’ or even ‘emphatically sad’. Nor does it mean that the main character suffers from Seasonal Affective Disorder. No: D I Rob (who is not a Detective Inspector, either) suffers from ‘social anxiety’. Although in fact his choices and behaviours struck me as a witty representation of the entirely normal. Slightly exaggerated for comic effect, perhaps – but D I Rob thinks and does the kind of things that we all might have thought or done once, or might in the future, or that are even part of our habitual behaviour.

The self-deprecating D I Rob is hardly a hero, but he’s much more than a comic cipher. As the plot unfolds, our enjoyment of his self-deprecation and self-inflicted plights is gradually overtaken by respect for a character who in more than one sense finds his purpose, his place in the world. And the plot itself is masterful, with a few surprises and everything tied up in satisfying fashion at the end. 

Without being an ‘easy-read’, this is nonetheless an easy book to read. The chapters are short, and their intriguing names made me want to allow myself the luxury of reading the next and finding out where in the text the chapter title might be waiting. I am not an adept reader of mysteries and am also useless at puzzles, so I appreciated the careful way in which Colin Stringer subtly re-caps and reminds the reader of key details where necessary. He has also created a manageable number of characters, and differentiates clearly between them in terms of appearance, catch phrases and personality.

I enjoyed the local colour – the representation of the Morrab Library is both endearing and accurate – and I liked the way that the characters are presented with affection. All – or almost all – are forgiven. There is no brutal showdown: instead, we reach the end with a sense of satisfaction. The mysteries are solved and everyone is ready to move on. Not so much Macbeth, more The Tempest

But there the similarity ends. For this is not a final published work, but a first. And I, for one, hope that Colin Stringer will go on to write more.

Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton, recommended by one of our volunteers

“In a remote corner of New Zealand a group of radical environmentalists surreptitiously cultivate crops in patches of waste ground. Their principles are compromised when they accept financial support and go big time on a large abandonned estate owned by a multimillionaire who made his money making drones. The consequences for them all are devastating. Birnam Wood – the name of part of the estate – is a compelling read with a cliffhanger ending – and a moral message. Recommended.”

Sapiens – A Graphic History by Yuval Noah Harari illustrated by David Vandermeulen and Daniel Casanave recommended by C J Van Dop

Back in the day, comic books and comic book art had a rather juvenile and vulgar reputation. Aside from cartoon capers by various animals, sometimes more serious attempts at visual subject matters would arise – Robin Hood, Westerns etc and depend on engaging graphic style for their appeal. Since the 1960s, new avenues in comics appeared in the shops of Head Comix – mainly counter-cultural, psychedelic or nihilistic by nature then publications pointed toward a medium outside T.V or mainstream literary publication for artists and writers to get public exposure and sales. Recently subjects from Margaret Atwood’s writings to the proliferation of MANGA have become widely accepted. 

Among these many offerings this year comes ‘SAPIENS’ a broad and exciting visual journey charting the emergence of mankind no less. In the format of a youngster with big questions about where we have all come from and how it is that we are here, we meet some lucid, informative and cool ‘professors’. The illustrations use a pared down but broad graphic layout to depict different scenes of the journey. Many aspects of early ape creature lives are spotlighted. How for example it is that six separate branches of early man lived in different parts of the globe – from homo floresiensis way out east to our very own Neanderthals – but only we as homo sapiens sapiens survived but flourished to become Lords of the Universe? There are of course many unanswered questions and some parts of this long march of ours is probably unknowable. What did happen to an old relation to the Neanderthal? We all share 2-6% of his DNA but did we assimilate him in prehistory or did we simply kill him? Sapiens, it seems, are not terribly good at coexisting with other animals or humans. These changes from man to the hunter-gatherer through manch  pastoral gardens to man the builder of cities and Sapiens is, eor, graphically prorated as set out. A companion volume called ‘Civilization’ has been published when it was doubted many of these features about our evolution will be under the spotlight. 

I tried to dislike SAPIENS. How can 5 million years of human evolution be addressed in a cartoon strip?! But I quickly became a fan. I want to recommend this – it’s not hugely expansive but a weighty hard back tome –  to anyone or anyone’s children who are interested in learning more about our remarkable journey but don’t know where to begin.

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan – recommended by Becky Wildman

“Around fifty pages into Jennifer Egan’s A Visit From the Goon Squad, I realised I was going to love this novel. Thirteen interrelated stories centre around Bennie Salazar, a record company executive, with events taking place from the 1970’s to an imagined present day. Egan moves effortlessly though the lives of the characters, showing how the fortunes and events of each are connected and intertwined. Shifting the perspective of both the narrative and the order of chronological events, she creates a nostalgic, charming and imaginative tale of lives forming and passing around the entertainment industry. She uses a range of creative techniques to present the different viewpoints expressed within the novel, which make it both effective and progressive and a truly enjoyable read.”

The Museum Makers: A Journey Backwards by Rachel Morris – recommended by John B.

“As a professional adviser to museums Rachel Morris illustrates their cultural importance, whether local or national(contemporary Vandals in County Hall please note). But what gives this marvellous book its particular appeal is the author’s attempt to construct what she calls “A Museum of Me”. The contents of her museum comprise long neglected family records, letters and photographs she has inherited together with what she learned from her Gran’s memories. When her mother died young, Rachel and her two siblings were effectively abandoned by their father Guido Morris who as a printer and publisher drank his way round post-war St Ives for the best part of a decade. The formidable Gran, Margaret Birkinshaw, kept the impoverished  family together. In reconstructing her family history  Rachel ranges from the late 19th to the early 21st century and, despite some dark episodes, her memoir is a wonderfully positive act of recovery. Any fan of “Whose life is it Anyway?” on TV will love this.”

Scythe by Neal Shusterman – recommended by Josie Yard 

“I don’t normally enjoy dystopian books, but Scythe put such an unexpected spin on this genera you couldn’t pick out another book like it. It’s set in a future where humans have overcome death, and so they have a group of people with the ability to kill, called Scythes. The story follows two apprentice scythes (Citra and Rowen) who are taught the art of killing and start to find that the perfect world they knew has been crumbling before their very eyes. Some scenes may be too gruesome for ages 11 or under but I recommend it for teens.” 

Cedric Morris – A Life in Art and Plants by Janet Waymark – recommended by Helen Moulsley 

“This book is a visual delight and takes us on a journey of the life of the artist and plantsman Cedric Morris, a life he shared with his lifelong partner artist Arthur Lett-Haines who managed their business affairs.  

After sojourns in Cornwall (Zennor and Newlyn), Paris and London, and Pound Farm in Suffolk, they opened the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing at Dedham in 1937 (relocating to Benton End after a fire) primarily as a means of earning a living.  Students over the years included Lucian Freud and Maggie Hambling.   The style of teaching was to guide and advise if needed; meals and accommodation provided by Lett were bohemian.

Benton End enabled Cedric Morris to indulge his interest in plants, especially irises, producing over 90 named varieties, which of course he painted and which are shown in the book.  As a plantsman he became friendly with and influenced gardener Beth Chatto among others.

As well as being a biography of Cedric Morris the chapters in the book act as mini-biographies of those whose lives were touched by Cedric Morris.   The short chapters are illustrated by his work, and that of his students as well as by many photographs.   The oil on canvas by Hambling entitled Lett Dreaming 1975/76 (Lett died 1978); and her charcoal of Cedric in Ipswich Hospital the day before he died (1982), bring this wonderful book to its close.   The inscription on Cedric Morris’ gravestone in Hadleigh cemetery describes him as “artist plantsman 1889 – 1982”.   Lett’s gravestone is set back slightly behind Cedric’s. “ 

Wonder by R J Palacio – recommended by Ilani 

The High House by Jessie Greengrass – recommended by Jane Prince 

“I had just finished reading this book before the U.K. was experiencing its own extreme weather event, emphasising the theme of the novel. The plot revolved around a group of young people who survive devastating floods and unnaturally long hot summers because of the presence of Francesca, a climate activist who realises that time is running out quicker than anyone believes and takes steps to ensure the survival of her son Pauly and his older step-sister, sacrificing her own family life to do so. The book is both touching and chilling and is eminently readable. “

The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett – recommended by Jenny Dearlove

“A cleverly plotted, warm and hilarious fantasy about Her Majesty getting a passion for reading. It makes the world seem brighter and full of possibilities”. 

South from Granada by Gerald Brenan – recommended by Harry Carson

This Changes Everything – Capitalism vs. The Climate by Naomi Klein – recommended by John Trigg 

“An in depth exploration of the climate / environment from a left wing viewpoint. Exposes the un-caring world of business and trade, how the earth becomes just a resource to be exploited. Forever dominated. And governments need to be much more involved in controlling this.”

Kingdoms of Elfin by Sylvia Townsend Warner – recommended by George Care

Cornish Wrecking 1700-1860: Reality and Popular Myth by Cathryn Pearce – Recommended by Ruth Towse

I found this splendid book lurking in the Cornish collection. Published in 2010, it shows little evidence of having been taken out of the library. It deserves a much wider readership, and my guess is that it will soon get it. There is likely to be a surge of interest in the topic as Ethel Smyth’s opera The Wreckers is to be performed as part of Glyndebourne Opera’s summer season and at the Proms, no doubt awakening interest in the more lurid view of wrecking, which Smyth, along with many others, adopted.[i]

Pearce’s book is extremely well researched and is engagingly written. It seeks to disprove the trope of wrecking as the murderous luring of boats to doom by misleading use of lights, pointing out that on the one hand, so-called wrecking consisted of several acts – harvesting (beachcombing), plunder, collection of flotsam, jetsam and lagan (items cast off to save the ship) – most of which were legal over the period she covers, and on the other hand, that the portrayal of evil wreckers was part of fears in the period about the potential ‘wrecking’ of society by the lower classes. In fact, wrecking was not confined to Cornwall and most cases took place elsewhere, notably along the counties of the South coast. She identifies the changes in attitude to these different acts by society and the state (Methodism, the Customs and Excise Office) and traces the history of the laws and practices relating to them.  

Retrieval of goods from wrecks formed part of manorial rights and in Cornwall ‘royalties’ from them were due to the lords of the manor – the Arundels, Bassetts, Godolphins, St Aubyns, Duchy of Cornwall – and sometimes to the Church. Wreck agents were appointed by them to deal with the collection and sale of the goods from wrecks and the reward of the ‘country folk’ and tinners who gathered them, as well as the disposal of the bodies of those who had drowned. This system continued for centuries, only involving the state in the form of Customs officers when wines, tobacco and tea etc. were involved. When lands were sold, the rights to the royalties from wrecks on them were not part of the deal, leading to considerable complexity about their ownership and disputes that were sometimes settled in courts. The story of how the system evolved over the years is fascinating and Pearce tells it clearly, rigorously citing sources from lawsuits to newspaper reports. Over time, though, these rights came to be challenged by the state; laws and social attitudes changed and, moreover, there were fewer wrecks as ships were better built and navigation devices (such as light houses) improved.

Overall, the book offers insight into both Cornish customs and history, revealing how misunderstanding of wrecking and the vilification of the rural poor came to dominate the topic. It is as much a social history as well as one of maritime law, the subject in which Cathryn Pearce is specialised. Mainly, though, it is a jolly good yarn about aspects of life in Cornwall that many of us know little of.

Ruth Towse

01/05/22 

[i] The synopsis may be viewed on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wreckers_(opera)#Synopsis for Smyth’s biography see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethel_Smyth