London-based poet, playwright and short story writer Chrissie Gittins will be visiting nine primary schools and one secondary school along the western seaboard of the Highlands from Durness to Skye between 31st August and 14th September 2005.

Originally from Lancashire, Chrissie will be spending a day at each school, giving poetry readings and workshops. In the primary schools she will be working with every child – which ranges from 9 children at Torridon to 85 children at Kyle, and at Portree High School she'll be working with a selection of classes. Chrissie  shall also be giving two adult poetry readings – one at Lochcarron Library and another – which will be the final event of the tour – at the An Tuireann Arts Centre on Skye.

The project is funded by the Highland Council, the schools themselves and the Scottish Poetry Library (SPL). The SPL has a huge collection of children’s poetry books which they will post out to any school. The project will promote this resource and it is hoped the schools will make ongoing borrowings. 

Chrissie's children’s poetry collection Now You See Me, Now You …(Rabbit Hole Publications) was shortlisted for the 2003 CLPE (Centre for Literacy in Primary Education) Poetry Award and contains two poems which won Belmont Poetry Prizes. Her adult collection Armature (Arc Publications) was called ‘one of the more striking debuts of 2003,’ by Jane Yeh in Poetry Review. She has appeared at the Northern Children’s Book Festival, at the Royal Festival Hall and at Poets House, New York. She is part of the Poetry Society’s poetryclass training team for teachers and has worked with children and young people for the Arvon Foundation, Tate Britain, the Refugee Council, Southwark Council and Croydon Libraries. Her website,   www.chrissiegittins.co.uk ,  gives further information about her publications, performances, radio and education work.

In 1999 Chrissie visited eleven primary and secondary schools in and around Inverness, courtesy of The Highland Council after appearing at the Edinburgh Festival; in 2003 she visited four primary schools in and around Inverness in tandem with appearing at the Highland Festival.

The poem below, which she wrote while she was staying in Assynt last autumn, was published by Macmillan this summer in Works 4 (500 pages, £5.99), edited by Gaby Morgan and Pie Corbett. Macmillan have donated a copy of Works 4 to each school she will visit as part of this project.

9th September - Reading for adults at Lochcarron Library, Howard Doris Centre, Lochcarron, Wester Ross, 7.30pm. Tel: 01520-722679. Free.

14th September - Reading for adults at An Tuireann Arts Centre, Struan Road, Portree, Isle of Sky, 7.30pm. Tel:01478-613306. £6 / 3.


Figure


When I arrived Suilven
wore a scarf of cloud

across her shoulder.
Next day, pouting at Canisp,

a chestnut beret at half cock.
Her skirts were low

with mist on Thursday.
Today, her shape,

with sun, is kissed.