The Cheltenham Literature Festival
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The town hall was about ten minutes away, clearly visible with banners advertising the festival all along the street and then lots more banners and flags outside the building itself -even I couldn't miss it. Inside I was given instructions to go to somewhere called THE WRITERS ROOM.
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This turned out to be a small room with a bar in one corner, a table laid out with salad and fruit and a couple of drinks urns. There were a few people sitting around tables talking and at first I felt like I was intruding into some private club. There was a man sitting in a wicker chair I vaguely recognised from a television news programme. This time I managed to stop myself smiling at him as if I knew him. This is a mistake I've made before. The TV screen is one way, I reminded myself - he looks out at me, but he can't see me looking back. So I helped myself to some food as instructed in my Cheltenham Literature Festival letter and sat at my own at one of the tables hoping someone would talk to me - but of course no one did.
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A young and very charming helper in a black T-shirt then came up to me and introduced herself - Jasmine - she showed me to my venue - a room at the back of St Andrews Church, checked that everything was working and helped me rearrange the desks in the room.
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She has just finished her education at the very famous and exclusive Cheltenham Ladies College, which was just next door.
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We got through many examples of dialogue - and my 'students' produced some fine examples of their own. Then, passing by a man from Ottakars forlornly not selling copies of my books (he looked quite embarrassed, and I paused for moment wondering if I should offer to sign any, but decided against it) went on to the Festival tent...
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...to listen to Lawrence Sail, Helen Dunmore and Bernard O’Donoghue read out their own and other people’s poetry from an new poetry anthology LIGHT UNLOCKED
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The tent is really a big extension of Ottakars’s bookshop and some of my books were on display just like all the rest - so I was pleased. Apart from the bookshop area there was a small stage and screened off theatre. A covered walkway leads to the town hall where I was very lucky to be able to see Alan Bennett read and speak to a packed audience. Towards the end he appealed to the audience to buy books from INDEPENDENT BOOKSELLERS rather than chains (e.g. Waterstones) because their 3 for 2 offer has resulted in many bookshops being unable to compete and consequently going out of business.
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Back in the WRITERS ROOM things were becoming even more hospitable with the happy sound of corks being extracted from wine bottles and I spent an enjoyable few minutes talking to Michael Buerk about the joys of living in the north west of England before he was irritatingly removed to the stage (after I had been ushered to a reserved seat in front of a large hushed audience). His discussion on life as a BBC war reporter with Rageh Omaar (who still doesn’t look old enough to be out of school never mind reporting from war zones) about being a BBC war reporter was very interesting. According to Mr Omaar part of the BBC pre-visit safety training course before going off into a war zone involves testing for the presence of land mines with a biro.
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