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Alan C. Smith, Big Naked Gombey (detail).
Book tickets
Connecting Thin Black Lines 1985 – 2025
A rare event in the UK – four of Bermuda’s finest poets come together on one stage: Chris Astwood, Paul Maddern, Alan C. Smith and Yesha Townsend. Bermudian scholar Kristy Warren will lead inquisitive conversations with the poets on the relationship between Bermuda, themselves and the world. These discussions will be interwoven between each poet’s performance, and the event will conclude with an opportunity for the audience to ask questions.
Yesha Townsend’s poetry is emotive, vivid and distinctly Bermudian. She combines contemporary experimentation with form, mathematical precision and reverence for human and natural elements of homeland. Increasingly she presents her poetry as visual and performance art.
Paul Maddern’s nuanced, conceptual poetry collections combine impressive technique, meticulous ordering and insight in his layered explorations of family, nostalgia, warfare and creativity. Recurring motifs seamlessly connect the disparate themes.
Chris Astwood’s gritty verse has always resonated with his singular vision of the Bermudian experience. Crackling with intensity and propulsive energy, his words are, at turns, urgent, meditative and incisive.
Interrogation of otherness is the foundation of Alan C. Smith’s creative output. Clarifying contemporary concerns through poetic excavations of Bermudian history and revealing the universal through the confessional are inspirational touchstones.
Click here to explore the full exhibition and event programme.
A rare event in the UK – four of Bermuda’s finest poets come together on one stage: Chris Astwood, Paul Maddern, Alan C. Smith and Yesha Townsend. Bermudian scholar Kristy Warren will lead inquisitive conversations with the poets on the relationship between Bermuda, themselves and the world. These discussions will be interwoven between each poet’s performance, and the event will conclude with an opportunity for the audience to ask questions.
Yesha Townsend’s poetry is emotive, vivid and distinctly Bermudian. She combines contemporary experimentation with form, mathematical precision and reverence for human and natural elements of homeland. Increasingly she presents her poetry as visual and performance art.
Paul Maddern’s nuanced, conceptual poetry collections combine impressive technique, meticulous ordering and insight in his layered explorations of family, nostalgia, warfare and creativity. Recurring motifs seamlessly connect the disparate themes.
Chris Astwood’s gritty verse has always resonated with his singular vision of the Bermudian experience. Crackling with intensity and propulsive energy, his words are, at turns, urgent, meditative and incisive.
Interrogation of otherness is the foundation of Alan C. Smith’s creative output. Clarifying contemporary concerns through poetic excavations of Bermudian history and revealing the universal through the confessional are inspirational touchstones.
Click here to explore the full exhibition and event programme.
Bios
Chris Astwood was born in Bermuda in 1984, got involved in the local open mic and poetry communities, and went on to study creative writing as an undergraduate in the USA and a graduate student the UK. His writing has appeared in various journals, and 'JANE DOE' - a pamphlet of linked narrative poems - was published by Gatehouse Press, 2023.
Paul Maddern was born in Bermuda in 1962 and has lived in Colorado, San Francisco, London and, since 2000, in Co. Down, Ireland. He has a BA in Film from Queen's University Ontario, and an MA and PhD from the Seamus Heaney Centre, Queen's University Belfast. He has taught at the Seamus Heaney Centre and was Teaching Fellow in Creative Writing with the University of Leeds for three years. He has four publications with Templar Poetry, and with Lifeboat Press (Belfast) edited the landmark anthology Queering the Green: Post-2000 Queer Irish Poetry (2021). His debut collection, The Beachcomber's Report, was shortlisted for the 2011 Shine/Strong award for Best First Collection (Ireland), and he is the first Bermudian poet to win three Bermuda Government Literary Awards.
Alan C Smith is a Bermudian visual artist, writer, performer and theatre director. He has been published in POUI, In Our Own Words: A Generation Defining Itself, Caribbean Writer, the award winning Under the Moon and Over the Sea: A Collection of Caribbean Poems, Poems United: A Commonwealth Anthology and Bermuda Anthology of Poetry, This Poem-Worthy Place: Bermuda Anthology of Poetry Volume II, I wish I could tell you: Bermuda Anthology of Children’s Literature and Young Adult Stories, Wild River Review, Tongues of the ocean and other print and online publications. He has performed in Bermuda, North America, the West Indies and the UK. In 2019, The A3 Press published his chapbook, 30 Days w/o
Yesha Townsend is a Bermudian writer. She holds a B.M. in Music Composition and an MA in Creative Writing at Goldsmiths, University. She is an English lecturer at The Bermuda College. Yesha’s work has featured in The Bermudian Magazine, BerMemes, The Bermuda Anthology of Memoir & Creative Non-Fiction, Poui: Cave Hill Journal of Creative Writing, The Wolverhampton Literary Festival 2021, MOKO: Caribbean arts and letters, The Bermuda Biennial 2022, TEDxBermuda 2015, The Caribbean Festival of Arts (Carifesta), The Accord Literary Residency 2023 in Accra, The PREE Writing Studio 2024 (Jamaica), The Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival 2024 (US), and the BOCAS Lit Fest 2025 (Trinidad).
Kristy Warren examines the history, vestiges and legacies of Black survival of British colonialism in Bermuda, the wider Caribbean and the United Kingdom. Spanning from the late eighteenth century to the present day, her research consists of explorations of colonial institutions, governance, migration and inclusion/exclusion. Kristy is particularly interested in what the arts, commemoration, and material culture can tell us about these themes. She is Senior Lecturer of Black History at the University of Lincoln. Kristy also works with heritage and cultural institutions wishing to create content reflective of the histories, experiences and desires of marginalised individuals and groups.
Book tickets
07:00 pm
Tue, 15 Jul 2025
Stage
£15 full price / £13 concessions
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no. 236848.