HI~Arts is honoured to announce that its first International Fellowship has been awarded to Kenneth White.

The annual Fellowship will enable a leading international academic and writer to engage with the theme of 'Creativity and the North', producing new work to encourage and inform understanding of the unique aspects of the creative life and culture of the Highlands and Islands.

The award to Kenneth White recognises his outstanding, unique and sustained contribution to the study of Scottish culture in general and of the Highlands and Islands in particular.

As part of the Fellowship programme, Kenneth White is undertaking a three-date tour of the Highlands and Islands under the heading of 'The Geopoetics Project', details as follows:

Ullapool: Macphail Theatre 5pm, Saturday 29th October 2005, free:
' North Atlantic Investigations'

Inverness: Beaufort Hotel 7pm, Sunday, October 30th 2005, free:
'Return to the Territory — a Highland Reconnaissance'

Kirkwall: Orkney College 7pm, Monday, October 31st 2005, free:
'A Sense of High North'


Kenneth White is the author of a very considerable body of work comprising poetry, prose narrative and essays. His first book, The Cold Wind of Dawn, came out from Jonathan Cape, London, in 1966. Among his recent books are: Open World-Collected Poems, 2003, The Wanderer and his Charts, essays, and Across the Territories, narrative, 2004, published by Polygon, Edinburgh.

He held the Chair of Twentieth Century Poetics at the Sorbonne Paris from 1983 to 1996, and is the founder-president of the International Institute of Geopoetics, as well as holding honorary doctorates from Glasgow and Edinburgh and the Open University.

Kenneth White said:

"In these lectures, I’ll be talking about place, culture and world. The country is badly in need, not of yet another Renaissance, but of a thoroughgoing reconnaissance. A lot of the institutions haven’t a clue what culture means, they spend their time piling up secondary matter and fostering foutery schemes.

"I’ll be doing a re-reading of Scottish literature, Scottish history and Scottish culture. And I’ll be doing it from different places, always in touch with the particular place. Culture starts from where you are. And if your base, your centre, is right, you can move out from it in concentric circles. You don’t get embedded in regional couthiness. With a wider field of reference, you expand.”

Robert Livingston, Director, HI~Arts said:

"As we work towards 2007, the year when Scotland celebrates Highland culture, we need to hear what a figure like Kenneth White has to say about the true nature of Highland culture, and about the need to recognise regional distinctiveness. We’re delighted that Professor White has accepted our invitation to become the first HI~Arts International Fellow.”

The HI~Arts International Fellowship is established with, and acknowledges financial assistance from, Scottish Arts Council and HIE.