Wordsworth was inspired by the Lake District, Burns by the Scottish Highlands; but an event at Cambridge University’s Institute of Astronomy tonight will see poets boldly go where few of their kind have gone before.
Wordsworth was inspired by the Lake District, Burns by the Scottish Highlands; but an event at Cambridge University’s Institute of Astronomy tonight will see poets boldly go where few of their kind have gone before.
The free event - Dark Matter: Poems of Space - will see poets James Fenton and Maurice Riordan in conversation with eminent astronomers (and poetry lovers) Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell and Paul Murdin
It will also include readings from a new anthology, Dark Matter: Poems of space, published by Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.
Chaired by Siân Ede, Director of the Foundation’s arts programme, it will be held in the Institute of Astronomy’s Sackler Lecture Theatre from 7-8pm.
Dark Matter’s editors, Maurice Riordan and Jocelyn Bell Burnell, commissioned new poems from leading poets, including James Fenton, inspired by their discussions with space scientists. Paul Murdin collaborated with another of the commissioned poets, Nick Laird. Dark Matter is the third in Gulbenkian’s trilogy of poetry and science anthologies.
Jocelyn Bell Burnell has long harboured a passion for poetry.
She said: “When I started ‘collecting’ poetry with an astronomical theme some twenty years ago, I kept very quiet about my hobby. It is only in the last few years that I have dared to ‘come out’, so it has been heartening that so many of my colleagues have been so willing to take part in this unusual exercise, as well as delightful to see the results of the collaborations.’
Siân Ede said: “Who could not be intrigued by the profound implications of space science, its big bangs and phase transitions, its black holes and collapsed stars? These seem to be pertinent to our very existence and we must struggle with our grasp of them just as we might expect scientists to respect the profound historical knowledge and rigour required in writing good poetry.”
For the poets involved in the project, initial bewilderment was soon replaced by a sense of awe and of recognition.
One of them, Neil Rollinson, said: “You sweep the skies looking for something that makes sense of the universe and eventually you find it, or you find parts of it, or you find more questions, which seems to be what happens when you write poems. We’re in the same business. We’re just trying to find out what we are and what makes us tick. What the hell the universe is all about.”
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