Poet Rachael Allen and writer Patrick Langley read their work to a packed audience at the CAST arts centre, Helston on February 28, just before the Covid19 lockdown.
Named a Faber New Poet in 2014 and currently poetry editor at Granta, Allen hails from Cornwall. She published her debut solo collection Kingdomland last year and read poems ‘Many Bird Roast’, ‘Simple Men’ and ‘Porcine Armour Thyroid’ from the collection, at CAST.
Langley’s debut novel Arkady was released in 2018 by leading independent publisher, Fitzcarraldo. A dystopian story of two brothers adrift in an existential cityscape, written in an intense, visual style, Arkady garnered rave reviews. Langley is now writing his next novel and read excerpts of this new work at the CAST evening.
The mix of poetry and prose read by Allen and Langley is the kind of cross-disciplinary work CAST supports, with a programme spanning cutting-edge contemporary art, literature and film. Allen says she also draws on other artistic practice in her work; some of her new poems were inspired by collaborations with visual artists including Guy Gormley, Marie Jacotey and Vera Iliatova
Images by Robert Barker
CAST Culture 