If you have tickets for either of Sharon’s events please contact the Shetland Box Office – 01595 745 555 – for a full refund.

Alternatively you can have your ticket(s) replaced with tickets of the same value for another Wordplay event, subject to availability.

Janis Mackay has kindly stepped into the breach and will run a session about the influence of traditional story telling on her writing, in which she will share the stories that inspired her novel, “Magnus Fin and the Ocean Quest”, and speak about how writers can use traditional stories to inspire and develop their own writing. Lovers of stories and writers of all ages are welcome: tickets for this session are available from the Shetland Box Office.

There are a number of free events and films, but we would advise booking for these in advance; bookings for free and paid events can be made at the Shetland Box Office 01595 745555 or by visiting the Shetland Box Office at Islesburgh Community Centre Reception.

Jen Hadfield will feature at 3.30pm alongside Rodge Glass and Eleanor Thom in a session chaired by Jenny Brown entitled “Exclusive Short Stories by Leading Writers”. She will read a piece of non-fiction on the theme ‘Elsewhere’ commissioned by the festival. Six days later on Sunday 5^th September at 10am, she will will appear at Wordplay 2010 in Shetland, where she will run a poetry writing workshop entitled, “Make it Strange: Dreams and Transformations.”

Later, at 8.30pm, Donald S Murray will appear in conversation with Will Self, in a session entitled “Fresh perspectives on St Kilda on the 80^th Anniversary of the Evacuation.” Murray whose book the “Guga Hunters” was reviewed by Will Self, for the Daily Telegraph, said “I feel immensely lucky to be appearing with Will Self at Edinburgh Book Festival, and I am looking forward to the event with great excitement.”

Murray is also delightedly anticipating the imminent publication of his newest book, “And On This Rock: Italian Chapel, Orkney” (Birlinn) which is due off the presses in September and will be launched in Edinburgh at at 7.30pm on 1^st October in Valvona and Crolla on Elm Row.

www.shetlandarts.org/events/wordplay

www.edbookfest.co.uk

Also appearing will be film critic, Mark Kermode, who with Linda Ruth Williams will curate Screenplay, the film festival which will be based in the Garrison Theatre and will run from Tuesday, August 31^st through to Sunday 5^th September and will feature actor Jason Isaacs and a wide variety of films, including work by local film makers. Further information about both festivals will be published in due course.

Wordplay – More information and full programme

Screenplay – More information and full programme

The hit show will be performed in Islesburgh Community Centre on both days of the festival.

The Edinburgh based Puppet State Theatre Company are on their first visit to Shetland, just another stop on what they are now calling their “Never Ending Tour” with a hit show that has struck a chord with audiences everywhere they take it, including three years of sell out runs at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

The Man Who Planted Trees, is a heart warming adaptation of the book by Jean Giono, a cult classic with a powerful environmental theme. It is suitable for anyone over the age of 7 and has a broad appeal to children and adults alike.

Literature Development Officer, Donald Anderson said, “This is an opportunity not to be missed, for people of all ages in Shetland to see a great show.”

Tickets can be purchased by calling Shetland Box Office, 01595 745 555.

Prize winning writer and sculptor, John Cumming, the initial instigator of the project said, “Fisherman’s Lives is a working title for what is effectively a work in progress.  By May 2010 it will be an anthology of creative writing, developed from the stories of those who lived through the era of the drift and seine net fishing.”

The reading will feature some of Shetland’s finest contemporary writers. Appearing with John will be Laureen Johnson, James Sinclair, Mark Ryan Smith, Lise Sinclair and Charlie Simpson, all of who are contributing to the anthology.

Laureen Johnson, co-editor of The New Shetlander, Convenor of Shetland Forwirds and author of a novel, Shetland Black (Shetland Times 2002) and a collection of poetry, Treeds (Hansel Cooperative Press 2007) which was short listed for the Callum Macdonald Poetry Pamphlet Prize in 2008.

As well as being Secretary of the Shetland Folk Society, Charlie Simpson is involved with the Shetland Fiddlers Society, the Shetland Musical Heritage Trust and is a highly versatile writer, the author of a wide range of essays and articles for the New Shetlander, Shetland Life and the Shetland Times. His book In Da Galley: Sixty Essays in Seafood Philosophy (Shetland Times 2001) is a collection of his columns first published in The Shetland Fishing News.

James Sinclair has had his work published this year in New Writing Scotland and is a regular contributor to The New Shetlander. Mark Ryan Smith serves on the editorial committee of The New Shetlander. He has recently published a collection of poetry, Midnight and Tarantella (North Idea 2008) and has contributed poems, essays and short stories to a number of publications and anthologies.

Lise Sinclair is a musician and an artist as well as a writer and has recently released a CD, Ivver Entrancin Wis and published a collection of poetry, here (North Idea 2006). Lise’s appearance at Wordplay comes hard on the heels of several triumphant performances at the Poetry On The Road Festival in and around Bremen, in June 2009.

Shetland Arts Literature Development Officer, Donald Anderson said,  ” This is a very important event because it brings together three important threads of what the festival is about. As well as a celebration of  a very important part of the Shetland community and its culture, it is also a chance to celebrate and promote both the Shetland dialect and the high quality of writing currently being produced here.”

While reflecting on how the project has developed so far, John Cumming said, “In the past Shetland literature has tended to turn to crofting and the land for inspiration, but by talking to fishermen and their families; to the gutters, coopers and boat builders, we have found a rich source of narrative and language.”

Tickets for this event are available from Shetland Box Office, Islesburgh Community Centre, 01595 745 555.

One writer who will need very little introduction is Louis de Bernieres, perhaps best known for his best selling novel, Captain Corelli’s Mandolin (1994) winner of the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Novel. A Partisan’s Daughter (2008) was short listed for the Costa Novel Award and his new book, Notwithstanding: English Village Stories is due to be published this autumn. As well as writing, he plays the flute, mandolin, clarinet and guitar, and performs regularly with the Antonius Players.

Another festival guest, coming to Shetland for the first time, is the acclaimed writer, animator, broadcaster and artist, Steven Appleby who lives in a garden shed in London besieged by children and sycophantic cats. Over the past 23 years his work has appeared in newspapers (including The Guardian, The Times and The Sunday Telegraph), over 20 books (including Men: The Truth; Normal Sex; Antmen Carry away My Thoughts As Soon As I Think Them and Jim – The 9 Lives of a Dysfunctional Cat), television (the animated series Captain Star), BBC Radio 4 (Steven Appleby’s Normal Life), theatre (Crocs In Frocks) and on the walls of art galleries and private homes.

Adding to the eclectic feel of Wordplay 2009 is Mark McCrum, a writer of thirty years experience which includes work as a travel writer – Happy Sad Land (1994), and a ghost writer Jack and Zena (1997). Mark has also written about television – he wrote a book about Castaway. In 2001 he published Somebody, Someday in which he chronicled a tour with pop star Robbie Williams.

Another writer who will require little introduction to Shetland readers, especially young Shetland readers, is Mairi Hedderwick, the author and illustrator of the massively popular, Katie Morag stories. Mairi will be making a very welcome return to Shetland, in the company of Katie Morag, for her first appearance at Wordplay. As well as her books for children, Mairi Hedderwick has also written for adults, and her book, A Highland Journey: Sketching Tour of the Highlands, Retracing the steps of John T Reid, which follows the footsteps of the Victorian artist who travelled extensively in the Highlands and Islands, including Shetland (which he wrote about in Art and Rambles in Shetland).

Two other children’s writers who will make the trip north for Wordplay are, Keith Brumpton and John Fardell. Apart from a growing list of illustrated books which include such titles as Chariots on Fire and Curse of the Vampire Squirrels, Keith Brumpton has also devised and written TV programmes, including BBC’s spy show M.I High. Keith will run drawing workshops for young people. John Fardell, In addition to writing and illustrating children’s books – Manfred the Baddie, The Flight of the Silver Turtle – is also a cartoonist, and his work has appeared in various publications including The Independent, The Herald, The List, and Viz.

There is a strong crime theme, with three of the UK’s best selling and most talented crime writers due to appear. Shetland crime enthusiasts will need no introduction to Stuart MacBride, author of Cold Granite, Broken Skin, Dying Light and Flesh House all set in Aberdeen and featuring DS Logan Macrae, whose new book, Blind Eye is now published in hardback by Harper Collins.

Stuart will appear alongside his compatriot, Allan Guthrie, author of five novels, the most recent of which, “Slammer” was described in the Scotsman as “ the most relentlessly page-turning novel this reviewer has come across in a long, long time…” As well as a leading novelist, Allan is an editor and a literary agent with Jenny Brown Associates.

Also no stranger to Shetland is Ann Cleeves, author of the highly successful “Raven Black”, “White Nights” and the newly published “Red Bones”, three quarters of her Shetland Quartet of novels featuring Fair Isle born detective Jimmy Perez. Ann will take part in a very special event featuring her friend CSI Helen Pepper a lecturer at Teesdale University, which will involve Helen taking the audience through one of the crime scenes from Ann’s novels and examining it from the perspective of a professional Crime Scene Investigator. Ann and Helen will also run a series of workshops in Shetland schools in the week before the festival.

Continuing the crime writing theme and expanding on it, Ann Cleeves will join leading television writer, Mark Greig in conversation. A writer with a long pedigree and an enviable track record, Greig’s work includes, Ashes to Ashes, Life on Mars, The Bill and Taggart. In this session, both writers will discuss the similarities and the differences they experience in their different forms of writing.

Combining fact and fiction will be three Shetland residents, Tom Morton, Donald S Murray and Donald McDonald who will explore the importance of landscape to their writing. Listeners to Radio Scotland’s afternoon programme will of course be familiar to Tom Morton who has published a string of fine novels – the latest of which, Serpentine, (Mainstream Publishing (4 Jun 2009) is currently available in paperback. Appearing with Tom will be Donald McDonald who has published two books via the internet – Antichaos and Palindrome (lulu.com) – both of which combine dark humour with a keen eye for human foibles. Pitching in from a non-fiction perspective, is Donald S Murray, whose latest book, The Guga Hunters , was published in 2088 by Birlinn Books. The book is a fascinating history of the men of Ness, in the Butt of Lewis, of which Murray is himself a native, who set off every summer to the remote skerry of Sulisgeir, to catch the gannet chicks which they preserve for eating. The book has met with great critical acclaim, not least from Will Self who reviewed it glowingly, in the Daily Telegraph.

As well as the crime fiction, children’s fiction and literary fiction, the festival will also feature a bevy of truly exceptional poets with readings featuring, 2008 TS Eliot prize winner, Jen Hadfield – Almanacs ( Bloodaxe 2005) and Nigh No Place (Bloodaxe 2007). Jen will be joined by Tivoli Prize winner, Kevin MacNeil – Love and Zen in the Outer Hebrides (Canongate 1998), himself until very recently a resident in Shetland. Also appearing is, Gerry Cambridge, editor of Scottish-American, literary magazine, Dark Horse, and several volumes of poetry including Aves (Essence Press, 2007; reprinted 2008), a collection of prose poems about wild birds; and Madame Fi Fi’s Farewell and Other Poems (Luath, 2003); and ‘Nothing but Heather!’: Scottish Nature in Poems, Photographs and Prose (Luath, 1999; 2nd edition, 2008). As well as his appearances at the festival, Gerry will be working as creative writer in residence in Shetland Primary Schools. Shetland resident is Gordon Dargie, whose talent came to the attention of the Scottish literary world with the publication of tunnel of love earlier this year, by prestigious pamphlet imprint Kettillonia Press poems from which were also published in the Scottish Review of Books and The Herald.

A star attraction at the festival will be an appearance by Puppet State Theatre, who will perform their hit show, The Man Who Planted Trees. The show has been a sell out for three successive years at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and has another run in Edinburgh this year. A captivating adaptation of Jean Giono’s environmental cult classic. A French shepherd sets out with his dog to plant a forest and transform a barren wasteland… this show is suitable for anybody over the age of seven and is a must see. “IT IS VERY, very rare to find something that appeals as effortlessly to children and adults as this magical show …” Scotsman, 5 Stars

Literature development Officer Donald Anderson said, “this year’s festival seems to be particularly busy and we are delighted to have such a wide range of literature related activity on offer and once again to welcome so many fine writers and artists to Wordplay.”

Tickets for all festival events are available from the Shetland Box Office – 01595 745 555 from Friday 7th August. Discount rates are available for tickets purchased before August 28th. For details see the festival programme, which can collected from Shetland Arts offices at Toll Clock Centre, Lerwick and venues around Shetland and downloaded from shetlandart.org/events/wordplay

Vimeo (High definition version)

Jen Hadfield from Neil Astley on Vimeo.

YouTube (Lower definition version)