WSFC Student in National Poetry Contest Final Rachael Maltby, a second year student at Worcester Sixth Form College, reached the final round of a national poetry performance contest on Saturday 15th March at the National Portrait Gallery in London. The Poetry by Heart Final was hosted by the legendary poet and radio presenter Roger McGough and will be broadcast on Radio 4’s Poetry Please programme later in the spring. Reaching the final was the end of a long journey for Rachael. After getting through the Sixth Form College round before Christmas, Rachael went on to win the Herefordshire and Worcestershire county round at Droitwich Library in January. 46 students from the county contests around the country were invited to London to compete for one of only 8 places in the final round. Against very tough competition in the regional round in London, Rachael was selected to represent the Midlands area in the prestigious national final. In the final round, Rachael recited 3 poems (selected from the 200 available on the on-line anthology) before a panel of celebrity judges: one poem from before and one from after 1914, and then, as part of the centenary commemoration, a World War 1 poem. Poetry by Heart is a pioneering national competition set up by former Poet Laureate Andrew Motion (and The Poetry Archive in association with The Full English) designed to encourage students at school and college in England to learn and recite poems by heart. Two students were able to progress from the Worcester Sixth Form College round to the County round – as well as Rachael, Laura Tiffney (a science student at WSFC) also performed in this stage of the contest and was highly praised. Rachael says of her experience of the whole competition: “I feel a stronger sense now of how the beauty of poetry and words on a page can be transformed through the voice. Poetry by Heart has widened my knowledge and understanding of what poetry can do – this will help not just my education but also my appreciation of how we use words in everyday life in such intricate ways! It has also increased my confidence and social skills as I had to perform on stage in front of a large audience and got into conversation with famous writers and presenters. I would really encourage any 14 to 18 year old to get involved with this and learn poems by heart, as once they’re there they’ll never leave you!” Paul Morris, Head of English and Media at Worcester Sixth Form College, says: “Every round of the competition was inspiring. All the students had taken the trouble to memorise wonderful literature that will remain with them forever – and then to perform these in front of an audience takes a lot of courage. To think of hundreds – maybe thousands – of students across the country doing this is amazing. Rachael performed superbly in the final stages of the contest and brought out the meaning and the music of her chosen poems with extraordinary sensitivity for such a young person. Roger McGough was brilliant at chatting to the competitors and easing the tension with jokes and comic poems in between the rounds. Andrew Motion came up and chatted to Rachael after she won the Midlands heat and was so encouraging and full of praise for her performance. We will definitely do this again with our students next year!” The former Poet Laureate Andrew Motion who set up the Poetry Archive and is the driving force behind the competition comments: “We want it to be fun, as it encourages pupils to discover new pleasures and fulfilments, but we want it to be serious as well: an excitement and a dare. To demonstrate, in fact, the marvellous form of two-way travelling that poetry allows us: into ourselves, and out into the world, at one and the same time.”
Posted on: Thu, 20 Mar 2014 15:41:12 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015