Welcome to my blog, SALT ROAD:
I'm a published poet, experienced freelance creative
writing tutor and mentor and
A regular visitor to North America, I've had the pleasure of
reading on the East and West Coasts and in the Mid West and have recently
returned from a fab visit reading in Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri - next trip
to the US was October, where I should have been reading in New York City and Long Island - 'Sandy' put paid to this!
2012 poetry readings in the UK included Dylan Thomas' Birthplace
at 5 Cwmdonkin Drive, Swansea for 'A Celebration of the Spoken and Sung Word'
on National Poetry Day, October 4th. After that it's off to Suffolk in January
and London in April. Suffolk Poetry Group having invited me to run a workshop
for them and give a reading. The London trip is at the invitation of the
Society of Medical Writers. Yes, that's right, medical writers. A group of them
are also creative writers and, having had the pleasure of judging a competition
for them before, I'm looking forward to this one! I'll be finishing the day off
by giving a reading.
Other poetry workshops include 'Writing the Wild' venue:
Swarthmoor Hall, Ulverston, Cumbria UK on September 9th,, 1-4pm. Cost £25 and in October a workshop for Lapidus North West in Lancaster, titled 'Memory,
Place and Displacement' and a series of workshops in Ulverston titled “Walking
Stories:Leaving Footprints” (Allice Legaat quote)
In case anyone wants to know a little more about me,
here's some info on my experience as a poet and performer:
UK poet, Dr. Geraldine Green’s first
collection, The Skin was published 2003, Passio 2006, (Flarestack
Publications), and Poems of a Molecatcher’s Daughter (Palores Pubs.) in
2009. She’s read and been published in the UK, USA, Italy and Greece.
Visiting Lecturer at the University of Cumbria, Freelance
Creative Writing Tutor and Associate Editor Poetry Bay www.poetrybay.com Geraldine has recently
completed her Practice-based Creative Writing PhD titled, ‘An Exploration of
Identity and Environment through Poetry’, completed her fourth poetry
collection, The Other Side of the Bridge, published July 2012 by Indigo
Dreams, and is now working on her fifth, Salt Road accepted for
publication by Indigo Dreams, summer 2013. You can find info on how to
buy my latest collection on Indigo Dream's website:
poetry readings include:
UK: Dylan Thomas Centre, Swansea; Brewery Arts
Kendal (Apples and Snakes); Apples and Snakes, Falmouth, Cornwall; Callander
Poetry Festival; So You Café, Dumfries; Both Sides of the Border, Selkirk;
Everyman Theatre, Liverpool; Fuel Bar, Manchester; Kurt Schwitters’
Celebration, Ambleside; Norman Nicholson Celebration Day, University of
Cumbria, Lancaster Campus; Dylan Thomas House, Swansea; Maddy Prior’s Stones
Barn, Bewcastle, The Ted Hughes Festival, Hebden Bridge
Cumbrian venues such as The Water Margin Festival, Keswick;
Source Café, Carlisle; NEO Gallery, Cockermouth; Sedbergh Literature Festival;
Maryport Literary Festival, plus organising and hosting poetry readings,
including fund-raising ones, for local and international charities at the
Bluebell Bookshop, Penrith, Cumbria; The Wordsworth Trust, Grasmere.
Poetry on
the Lake Festival, Orta, Italy (two of my poems were awarded a ‘highly
commended’ status in the competition, Judge: Penelope Shuttle); Rooftop Poetry,
Skiathos, Greece;
New York
City: Smalls Jazz Club; Bowery Poetry Club; Cornelia Street Café;
Fall Café; The New School; Gramercy Club; Space on White; Jujomukti Tea Lounge
New York: Hunting
Historical Society Poetry Barn, Long Island; Toast Café, Port Jefferson, LI;
Summer Gazebo Readings, Oceanside, LI; Colony Café, Woodstock; Poetry in the
Park, Albany; River to River Festival, Beacon, Hudson Valley; Walking with
Whitman Series, Long Island; Bradstock Festival LI
North
America: Woody Guthrie Festival, Oklahoma; Dolce Vita Café, New Jersey;
Branford House, University of Connecticut; Laurel Bookstore, Oakland
California; Prospero’s Bookstore, Kansas MO, Benedict St. Market Place, Shawnee,
Oklahoma, Istvan Gallery Oklahoma City, OK; The Gordon Parks Centre, Fort
Scott, Kansas; Pittsburg Library, Pittsburg, Kansas
... a few reviews on my latest collection 'The Other
Side of the Bridge'
"These are poems of vivid and compelling energy. Nature is
a living presence throughout these poems, which are spontaneous, alert, and
rich in transformations. Landscape is this poet's muse, be it her native
Cumbria or Long Island or the Mid West. Memory is also a rich seam for this
poet." - Penelope Shuttle
Inside this volume are poems of great
tenderness and moment – urging us to bend a knee, like Walt Whitman, “to better
understand the blades of grass.” If fierceness and tenderness are two faces of
the same coin, then the poems in ‘The Other Side of the Bridge’ are works of
rare coinage. – George Wallace, Writer-in-Residence Walt Whitman Birthplace
"The Beloit Poetry, one of America's most venerable,
famously reads submissions aloud. If they read Geraldine Green's poems aloud
they will think inevitably of e e cummings' regard for punctuation as
impediment. Her very first poem, "Me and Janine," is full of
information and yet it tells its story-sings it-without punctuation simply
because Green's mind possesses unerring musicality. She thinks musically whereas
some poets translate their thoughts into music. The difference shows up again
and again in this remarkable, stylistically diverse manuscript, The Other Side
of the Bridge." - Djelloul Marbrook www.djelloulmarbrook.com
"Geraldine Green's THE OTHER SIDE OF THE BRIDGE delights
with poems that travel from the Lake District to Greece to a Sac and Fox powwow
in Oklahoma. Green's voice is fresh and full of verve. Her sharp sense of place
is presented in a fusion of past and present. Her unique music and ability to
capture personality through her characters' chatter enlivens her work. She sees
the world as lush and does not skimp in invoking its magic, mystery and myths.
Readers can never be sure where her words will carry them, even from the
beginning of a phrase to the end of it. The surprises may startle, but each
leap of imagination and language quickly seems perfectly apt. This is a volume
to be read and re-read." - Carol Hamilton, former Poet Laureate, Oklahoma
“These are poems brimming with deep generosity. Although a
faithful chronicler of Northern life, she holds out her arms to people across
the world. She is a listener, a storyteller, working carefully with language to
find the colours of reality. She is concerned with humanity, showing tenderness
and curiosity in intimate writing revelling in the joys of love, or in poems
where she stands as a witness to other times, other places, unafraid of the
dark. Giving voice to those who often go unheard, she widens our knowledge and
engages our imagination.” – Rose Flint
and reviews of The Skin and Passio, my
earlier poetry collections:
“… there’s a freshness about her work that brought tears to my
eyes. Real tears, like a child’s.” – Anne Stevenson, Mslexia OctNovDec 2003
“Passio is a high-wire act where risk, desire and
accomplishment create poems of precarious and touching beauty. There is a mythic
quality to much of the work here; each poem a mantra of what is possible if
we’re prepared to become – and remain – astonished by our lives.” – Professor
Graham Mort
“And with both exuberance and sadness, on an uncharted adventure
and uncertain in a backwater, and with a language that’s new-found, new-made
for what is needed. One of the world’s lovers.” – David Hart, Freelance
Writer/Poet
“Her infectious enthusiasm informs a created world which
integrates the vocabulary of her locality with the universality of transcendent
vision” – George Wallace NY Poet
... talks
& lectures:
July 2012: Co-presented
a Reading with New York poet George Wallace at the Gordon Parks Centre, Fort
Scott Kansas, US
June 26th
2012: Presented a Paper at the Centenary Celebration of Lawrence
Durrell, Durrell School, Corfu.
May 2010: Personal
& Professional Motivational Talk to female Staff and Officers, Cumbria Police
February
2009: Presented a Paper on Ecocriticism, titled ‘Dwelling in the
Works of John Clare and Aldo Leopold’ at The South West Texas 30th Conference
of Popular Culture, Albuquerque, New Mexico (part-funded by the AHRC – Arts
& Humanities Research Council)
and some rather lovely things about my workshops!
•
“I've been on Geraldine's face-to-face and
online workshops and have also booked her to lead several workshops in the
past. All her workshops that I've been to have been inspirational so I highly
recommend her as a workshop facilitator. She brings her poetry expertise and
knowledge to the workshops so I always come away with poems that I’ve written,
but also names of interesting poets to read more of. Another thing I love
is that Geraldine creates a lovely supportive group in her workshops and
manages to include everyone regardless of whether they are experienced or a
beginner or have learning disabilities.” - Carol Ross
•
"I thought the (National Trust Create by
the Lake) workshop was very well facilitated, you [Geraldine] really encouraged
participants to think creatively and to feel comfortable with sharing what they
had produced. You had a lovely manner with people and we would definitely call
on your expertise again with future creative writing events. I really look
forward to working with you again in the future. I think it's great to do
really creative activities in the outdoors, it worked really well on the site.
The only thing that people said in their feedback was more time, so we'll have
to think about that again in the future!" - Naomi Hewitt Project
Manager, National Trust Derwentwater Foreshore Project, Keswick, Cumbria
·
Feedback
emailed to me from Anna Turner, from a poetry workshop I ran in October
for Calderdale
Reader Development and The Elmet Trust, Hebden Bridge:
http://www.theelmettrust.co.uk/
In
response to the question: "Was there anything you particularly liked about
the day?” The following responses were received:
Giving and receiving feedback from everyone in the groups
– esp. Geraldine’s workshop. Everyone feeling confident to comment and
risk.”Giving and receiving feedback from everyone in the group – esp.
Geraldine’s workshop. Everyone feeling confident to comment and risk”
“Geraldine’s workshop was very warm and friendly”
“I enjoyed the
afternoon writing exercises with Geraldine Green”
“Great group with Geraldine Green!”
Please contact me via Poetry PF www.poetrypf.co.uk
if you're interested in my running a creative writing
workshop, giving a reading or a talk - thanks!
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