A different type of Festival
An interview with
Lady St Germans

The Port Eliot Literature festival is situated on the landscaped grounds of the 18th century Port Eliot House at St Germans in Cornwall. Taking part over three days, the Lit fest attracts a diverse range of performers, and has something for all tastes. Whether you want to catch some music, listen to poetry, see talks by authors about their work, watch films, or take part in a pub quiz, the Port Eliot Lit fest will not disappoint.

This interview with Lady St Germans took place after the 2007 festival. This year (2009) the festival runs from the 24th to the 26th of July, with performers such as Hardeep Singh Kholi, Michael Eavis, Sarah Waters, and Louise de Bernieres already confirmed.

How did the literary festival come about?
The idea for the festival came about 7 years ago when I first met my husband. He had run a festival here in 1980’s called the Elephant Fair, which was hugely successful and had a big impact on this part of Cornwall, and his life. He said running a festival is a bit like herpes, it’s hard to get it out of your bloodstream, and he was toying with the idea of running another festival here. He felt it was time again, but he didn’t really want a straight music or arts festival, he wanted to do something different, and so he came up with the idea of a literary festival.

As a writer myself I immediately thought the combination of him and the idea of a literary festival could develop into something fantastic, but I was only interested in getting involved if it appealed to my generation. Growing up in Worcestershire I lived between the Hay on Wye and Cheltenham Literary festivals, but never went. I was never drawn to them. I wanted to attract a younger audience. So the aim was to try and do something different with words, and not just have straight book readings. We wanted to have the soul of a music festival, but the brains of a literary festival; a festival where you could be stimulated and inspired during the day, and then dance and lose your head at night.

So my husband Perry asked his friend, actor and musician, Rick Worthy who had been involved with the Elephant fair to come on board. And I asked a great friend of mine to join us; Simon Prosser, who is the publishing director at Hamish Hamilton. Living in London he had the clout of the big publishing world behind him. So together we set about to organise the festival.

The first festival in 2003 was really small, and we wanted it to be small as we wanted to try and do it right. There were probably less paying customers than there were artists. It was just like a really great party. But people did come much to our eternal gratitude. People came from London saying Port where? Performers such as; Alain de Botton, Richard Benson, Hari Kunzru, Anita Pallenberg, and Ralph Stedman all took part and loved it. People then went back to London, or wherever, and told their friends about the literary festival, and the following year it more than doubled and it’s grown and grown every year.

What sort of numbers do you get coming to the festival now and where do people come from?
We had around 4000 people come this year, and there is a huge geographical mix. We do get a lot of people coming from the Southwest, as we’re local but we also get lots of people coming from all over really. We also have more people coming from abroad now and have a lot of people coming in from the states.

We don’t really want it to get that much bigger. I feel as it is at the moment, it’s still got this quality where you can still get lost in the gardens. At this size performances can be woven in amongst all of the gardens. If it gets any bigger, we may have to have performances in one area which wouldn’t be as good. I think the sign of good festival is when you come across things going on, you didn’t know about.


How do you go about finding artists, and how do you decide what you want to put on?
At first it was very much a case of us approaching artists, but now we find it’s more of a two way traffic. We get lots of our performers through word of mouth. Writers who have come here will often tell other writers, and then they get in touch with us enquiring about performing.

There is an eclectic group of us working and overseeing the festival. When deciding what performances to have, we look at what has worked and look at how to develop that, as well as exploring new ideas. We have a whole network of people and ideas. James Flint for example does a brilliant job running the film tent. We all work together, and have lots of discussions about who and what. I tend to go with my instincts and think if I’m going to enjoy this and be interested, other people will too. That’s how I’ve always operated really.


Was there anyone in particular you were really looking forward to seeing this year?
Everyone! I loved Joel Levack at the boathouse, his I minute disco was fantastic. I would like him to be more involved in the festival. Alexander Master’s Tattoo boudoir was a highlight for me. It was the absolute apercu of our ideas of doing something different with words. Writing on people and drawing on people was absolutely brilliant.

The Biba tent, was great with everyone doing illustration. I was really pleased to see Andy Martin, who is a great writer, who writes about surfing. Mick Brown on Brian Wilson. Angela Harnett was really amazing; she was a completely natural performer. I could carry on for ages.

We feel we can offer performers a sense of freedom. They can come here and do something they wouldn’t get the chance to do normally. They don’t have to read from their latest book, or do what your publishers tell them to do. They can show a film, sing a song, or even do magic tricks; they can do what they like.

You have a different Logo every year. I particularly liked the Ralph Stedman one. Can you tell me how they came about?
The first year we got a wedding photographer to take photo’s of some wooden books, which were made by Heathcote Williams when he lived here. My husband and I piled them all up on the lawn. The second year we employed an illustrator who did a logo of flying books, which was fantastic.

Then we decided we wanted to have an artist actually taking part in the festival to do the poster, and as Ralph Stedman had been at the festival the first year, he did the logo for us the next year. We wanted to carry on by using artists appearing at the festival to design the logo’s and last year it was designed by Martin Parr, and this year Gavin Turk did the logo.

I called Ralph up, and it’s always quite difficult to ask an artist to do something like this, because they have to transpose their art onto your art, you have to get balance right and feel your way, both of you, how you’re going to do this. Ralph really liked the festival and said sure straight away and he had a couple of images that he thought would work. He’s not very technological, he has everything in drawers and stuff, and on the phone talking to him you can kind of almost see his studio, and you can hear the drawers banging and doors flying open and shut.

A couple of hours later he sent me an image which was in a huge format, but he didn’t know how to make it smaller. So this absolutely massive file arrived, and it took about an hour to open. As it started going down you could see the top of the image. He said it was an urban, agricultural thing that would suit the spirit of festival. As the image unfurled, at first it appeared normal, and it got madder and madder, and we thought it was fantastic; we loved it. It worked really well for us that picture.

People said had they had heard about the festival but it was only when they saw the Stedman image that they came, because they got it, they understood what we were trying to do, and how we were very different to other literary festivals.

As you’re getting more recognised do you think publishers come looking for talent and to see what’s happening in the literary world?
I hope so, I’m not really aware of it so much, I do know a lot of people from the publishing world come. I know it must be happening. This year for instance, we were asked by Bloomsbury, to launch one of their writer’s here; Richard Reynolds the guerrilla gardener, before his book came out.

One real success story was the Cloud Appreciation Society’s Gavin Pretor-Pinney, who had an exhibition here this year. He’s a great sign of what the festivals all about. He had thought about writing about clouds for years, and went to loads of publishers that all turned him down. We were old friends so I said come and do something at the festival anyway. So he came and did his 1st Cloud Appreciation Society lecture, and everyone wanted to talk to him afterwards. Also there were several publishers in the audience, who thought wow, and he got a book deal. His book was one of the best sellers of last year; it was a big hit. I’m really proud he had his first gig here. It was a real success story that came out of festival.

What do you think are the benefits of festival for the literary world? Are you able to contribute towards any charity for example?
Here at the festival we have the Literary Consultancy, who advises people on manuscripts. In so far as us donating to charity, we are not at that stage yet, we are still very much funding it ourselves, we’re not at the point where we are making any profit at all, and we’re still running at a loss. The Arts Council grant makes the festival happen basically.

We’ve got a plan that if we do start making a profit we’d like to have a scheme called ‘A room of my own’, which will fund a writer to work for a year, and give them a place to work here. That’s what I’d like to do if we do ever get to the point where we make any money.

Can you tell me more about the Literary Consultancy?
They’re an Organisation called TLC, known as The Literary Consultancy and you can find them on our website. They were in the round room on Saturday and Sunday, and you can take your manuscripts to them and they will read it. They have professional readers, and they’re all people from the publishing world who set up this charity for writers, who maybe have not got the connections to get really good agents, or have sent books around and keep getting them rejected and don’t know why? So they read peoples manuscripts over the weekend and give them follow up advice the next day, and it works really well.

Where do you go from here? How would you like to develop the festival?
In terms of development, I would like to get more people from the South West involved, more Cornish writers and voices. I would also like to expand the young people’s areas, such as the mucking about with words tent which was very popular this year and the children’s area. I would also like to develop the HAHA stage and have more performance such as dance and theatre happening there.


For more information on the 2009 Port Eliot Literary Festival, and to book tickets online go to:
www.porteliotfestival.com

Fast lives and fast foods
Isn’t it about time we slowed down?

It is clear our lives have changed quite dramatically over the past half a century. Many of these changes such as, the increasing number of young mothers who now go out to work have had a major impact on our eating habits. On top of this, the pace of life has seemed to get faster especially as information technology becomes more and more developed. With parents rushing around, children staying in watching television and playing computers instead of getting outside, and the birth of the microwave meaning food can be ready in minutes, fewer families are now taking the time to cook and sit down to eat together. The Food Standards agency report that in 1980 an average meal took an hour to prepare compared to only taking 20 minutes in 1999. Ironically as people have had less time to spend on preparing family meals, and with the rise of television celebrity chefs, cooking has now become more popular as a leisure activity.

Research found that between 1998 and 2002, in the UK the demand for ready made meals rose by 44% compared to 29% across Europe. It is suggested that 30% of adults in the UK eat a ready meal more than once a week. The popularity of foods from different cultures has also influenced the convenience food culture, and Indian and Chinese ready meals make up almost half of meals in the chilled cabinets. Over the past decade ready meals have also undergone a change of image, and instead of having a reputation as a lazy convenience food, they are now being marketed as a healthy premium choice.

It is could be argued that we have now adopted a casual and possibly careless approach to what we eat on a daily basis. With food technology replacing home economics in school, it has also been suggested that children are not learning how to cook, and without the right parental guidance, are children likely to end up opting for unhealthy choices? As young people grow up, not knowing any better it is a real possibility we will get trapped in a ready meal/junk food culture.

We are now all too aware of the consequences to our health of eating too many processed foods, however in the first decade of the 21st century; the popularity of convenience foods is likely to continue. Despite being marketed as healthy, ready meals still often have unnecessarily high amounts of saturated fats, salt and sugar, which have been linked to health problems such as strokes, heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, and dental disease. Diseases that arise from obesity and digestive malfunction are set to rise as fast food replaces traditional ways of eating. Two hundred years ago, there was an evolutionary change when people in Europe on average got taller. Now we are facing another possible evolutionary change, but instead of growing upwards people are growing outwards.

The Slow Food movement was founded in 1989 by journalist Carlo Petrini, and was prompted by the opening of a McDonalds in Rome. The idea was to counteract fast food and fast life, address people’s dwindling interest in food, educate people about where food comes from, and the traditions and the cultures surrounding food. Ultimately their aim is to help people rediscover the joys of eating and the pleasure of good tasting food. The Slow Food movement is founded on the concept of ‘eco- gastronomy’, and how the food choices we make can have an affect globally. The manifesto states:

“We are enslaved by speed and have all succumbed to the same insidious virus: fast life, which disrupts our habits, pervades the privacy of our homes and forces us to eat fast foods. A firm defence of quiet, material pleasure is the only way to oppose the universal folly of fast life.”
Carlo simply believes people should be able to eat better quality, tastier and fair food, which has been produced in a way that does not harm the environment, animals, people, or the producers themselves. They set about achieving this in a variety of ways such as; working with and protecting small food producers from being taken over and influenced by industrial standardisation. Among their achievements they have been helping livestock producers to adopt additive free organic methods to produce a higher quality, lower fat, and hopefully tastier beef.
The movement is also very much about promoting slower living, and has lead to the development of ‘Slow Cities’. The requirements to become a ‘Slow City’ include:

· Encouraging good food, with farmers markets and traditional cuisine, and organic farming.
· Urging businesses to adjust their working hours to allow people to enjoy a slow midday meal with their families.
· Prohibiting the use of neon signs, advertising billboards and car alarms.
· Ecological transport links including; pedestrian areas, cycle paths and limits on the number of cars.
· The promotion of recycling.
· The increase of more green space within cities.

Slow food sees children as the Slow Foodies of the future, and much of their work includes being involved in education. Carlo believes it is no good threatening children with the dangers of unhealthy food, and instead takes the approach of trying to make discovering about tastes and nutrition fun. Work within schools includes gardens where children can get hands on experience of eating the food they grow themselves. Today the movement has 100,000 members in 132 countries.

Maybe we should take a leaf out of their book, and stop rushing around, put aside time to cook proper meals, and spend some quality time every day with our families. By stepping out of the fast food culture we will not only be helping the infrastructure that produces organic, natural and wholesome foods expand, we are also more likely to enjoy our food, feel healthier, have more energy and ultimately live longer.

“Let food be thy medicine and thy medicine be thy food”
Hippocrates