Celebrate Literature: Yesterday, today and tomorrow at Two Seasons Talking Trees Literary Fiesta

Celebrate Literature: Yesterday, today and tomorrow at Two Seasons Talking Trees Literary Fiesta, May 25, 2019

Jamaica's Poet Laureate Lorna Goodison - with yours truly.
We were colleagues at Carifesta 76!

Inspiring youth and encouraging critical thinking through exposure to literature of all genres is one of the missions of the Department of Literatures in English (DLIE) at the Mona Campus of The University of the West Indies (The UWI). One of the strategies is to take its activities beyond the campus. To this end, the DLIE is once again partnering with the Gloria Lyn Memorial Fund (GLMF) and Two Seasons Guest House to present the Two Seasons Talking Trees Literary Fiesta on Saturday, May 25, 2019 in Treasure Beach, St. Elizabeth.

Held on the expansive grounds of Two Seasons Guest House in Treasure Beach, Talking Trees Literary Fiesta offers patrons a day of readings by established and emerging authors and poets. Billed as a family event, there will be a children’s programme sponsored by Jamaica Cultural Enterprises running concurrently with the main stage.

Free to the public, this year is the sixth staging of the Fiesta and the third in collaboration with the DLIE and the GLMF. Hosted by Fabian Thomas, under the theme, “Literature: Yesterday, today and tomorrow”, the readings will feature the works of four authors who died since the last staging in 2017. These are V. S. Naipaul (to be read by former Poet Laureate, Professor Mervyn Morris), Garfield Ellis, who was a reader at the 2012 staging of Talking Trees (to be read by Senior Lecturer in the DLIE, Dr. Michael Bucknor), Hazel Campbell (read by Tanya Batson-Savage), and Andrea Levy (read by Celia Skyes-Webster).

Marguerite Orane with Award Winning Blogger
Emma Lewis 

Representing literature of tomorrow are winners of competitions to inspire the young: Khadijah Chin, winner of the Young Writer’s Prize, and Delroy McGregor, winner of the Eddie Baugh Prize, two of the four prizes awarded in the National Library of Jamaica’s Poet Laureate of Jamaica Programme 2019; the winner of the Talk the Poem Recitation Competition organized by the School of Education, The UWI Mona Campus; and the winner of the GLMF “What Jamaica Means to me” Literary Competition for schools. Members of the audience will have the opportunity to present their work during the Open Mic segment.

Literature today will be represented by a formidable cast of locally and internationally acclaimed poets and authors: Alecia McKenzie, Lorna Goodison, Curdella Forbes, Brandon Wint, A-dZiko Simba Gegele, Sharma Taylor, and Marguerite Orane. The ten-minute play, It’s raining, rounds out the literary presentations. The readings will be interspersed by the drumming of young people from Treasure Beach and the Fiesta will end with the music of the local Treasure Beach Band, Mad Yardies.

Round trip transportation between Kingston and Treasure Beach chartered from Knutsford Express will be available on Saturday, May 25, 2019, departing Kingston at 6:15 a.m. Tickets may be purchased at the University Bookshop on the Mona Campus, or call Janet at 876-3406068. The cost of the round trip is $3,700 and $3,500 for seniors 65 and over.

On Sunday, May 26, Poet Laureate Lorna Goodison will be facilitating a poetry writers’ workshop at Two Seasons Guest House. Limited to 20 participants, the contribution for the workshop is JA$5,500 per person.

Information on the Fiesta and the readers can be viewed at www.2seasonsguesthouse.com/blog. For further information telephone 876-571-0818 or email 2seasonsguesthouse@gmail.com or litsengmona@gmail.com.

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