Oxfam Poetry Reading, 16 November

On the evening of Friday 16th November the College will be hosting a poetry reading to raise funds for Oxfam which will feature some of the UK’s best known poets. The reading is one of a number planned to coincide with the launch of Life Lines 2, Poets for Oxfam, a CD anthology. Life Lines 1 was a great success and has sold in excess of 10,000 copies with all profits going to the charity. Life Lines 2 will be launched at The Cheltenham Festival of Literature on Friday 5th October.

We are very privileged to welcome to the College six poets who have recorded work for the CDs: Wendy Cope, Blake Morrison, Daljit Nagra, Fiona Sampson and Todd Swift, as well as Dr Jonathan Ward who teaches English here. It will take place in the Great Hall, starting at 7.30pm. Tickets are £6 for adults (£4 concessions) and a special rate of £3 for boys at the College. All proceeds – including money raised from sales of CDs on the night – will be donated to Oxfam.

This is an extraordinary opportunity to hear some very well known poets and we very much hope you will be able to join us on what promises to be a memorable night. Oxfam has been selected as the Dulwich College charity this term and two poets – Daljit Nagra and Fiona Sampson – will be visiting selected English classes during the day.

A Fool's Life

Akutagawa Ryunosuke's A Fool's life has been translated from the Japanese by Anthony Barnett, OA and Toraiwa Naoko. Akutagawa's writings include reworkings of motifs and tales of China's and Japan's past, modern fables, essays and a few autobiographical fictions which, like A Fool's Life, follow his intense engagement and difficulty with the world. He ended his brief life the month after completing A Fool's Life.

Anthony Barnett is not the first Old Alleynian to publish translations from Asia, EB Howell (1893-1897), translated Chin Ku Ch'i Kuan The Inconstancy of Madam Chuang and other Stories from the Chinese in the 1920's.

Anthony Barnett will be one of the subjects of an exhibition on Old Alleynian poets in the Wodehouse Library in February 2008.

The Immortal Jeeves

Jeeves' first appearance was in 1915 and PG Wodehouse's last Jeeves novel was published in 1974. In The Times on Saturday 29 September 2007, Martin Jarvis describes the challenge of re-creating the enduring and inimitable valet. Martin Jarvis will be appearing at The Times Cheltenham Literature Festival on Sunday October 7 at 6pm. His performance of two Wodehouse readings will be broadcast later this year on BBC Radio 4. For more information see the festival website or call 01242 227979.