Algernon Swift at Bristol Waterstones

Thank you to everyone who came to the event for Algernon Swift on Friday at Waterstones in Bristol Galleries.  It was a really lovely event made special by the excellent performers, poet Melanie Branton, song and dance man John Mead, and Angie Belcher’s teenage alter-ego, Odious Vex. Here are some photos of the fun we had (only spoiled for a moment by the unexpected appearance of Miserable Malcolm). I particularly enjoyed reading aloud from The Life and Times of Algernon Swift, and eliciting some groans for the puns. Thanks too to Nick Lovell and Clive Oseman for reading at the Open Mic’ and to Edouard at Waterstones for hosting it!

Melanie Branton

Melanie Branton performed some of her excellent poetry, including the romantic possibilities of dating parts of speech and a very disturbing episode of Midsomer Murders.

Unusually for a poetry event, we had some song and dance from the wonderful John Mead of the Unravelled Commedia Company.  If you'd like to find out more about this sort of thing (and what's going on here) please visit their FaceBook page.

Song and dance man, John Mead

Unfortunately there was also an unwelcome interruption from Miserable Malcolm, who didn't seem entirely positive about Bill's book.

Open Mic'ers Clive Oseman and Nick Lovell (who run Swindon's wonderfully named "Ooh Beehive!" night):

After which, Angie Belcher's teenage alter-ego Odious Vex set us all straight with poems like Drugs are Bad (including Legal Highs), War is Bad and I Love Lucy.

And here I am reading (and gesturing) from The Life and Times of Algernon Swift:

Big thanks to Jodie Marks for the pictures!

Next stop for Algernon Swift: I will be reading a 15 minute passage from the book for a broadcast for the Resound Festival in Stroud next Saturday (15^th April) in the Line Gallery at Stroud Valleys Artspace. This starts at 2.15 and will take about half-an-hour. If you’d like to be part of the small audience, please drop me a line.