ARTICULATE LAUREATES

Lindsay Balderson

Lindsay Balderson loves words and the intimate relationships they form with one another. Humour plays a big part in her poetry, she is a natural performer and likes nothing better than to make her audience laugh. Lindsay is a typical Piscean and has a deep interest in the mystical and magical and these often weave spells in her writing. She was born and raised in Darlington and lives there still. She has a full-time job as a busy P.A./Supervisor and is also a complementary therapist. Lindsay joined Vane Women in December 2001. Follow the links to read Lindsay's pieces on this site: Fortune Teller, Kyoto The Devil's Sonnet Tea and Puns The Night Before the Morning After High Force to Low Force

Joanna Boulter

Joanna Boulter grew up in Wiltshire and sampled several countries in the Far East and Middle East before moving to Darlington with her family in 1989. She's been writing poetry forever, but in common with many other women wasn't published until she was 40. Since then her work has appeared in many magazines and she's had several competition successes. Her latest is to win First Prize in the Poetry London competition. Her first collection, Running With The Unicorns, was published by The Bay Press in 1994. In 1997 she won a Tyrone Guthrie award from Northern Arts, enabling her to complete a long sequence of poems, On Sketty Sands, based on her maternal family history (right back to the ancestral Welsh pirate!), published by Arrowhead Press in September 2001. Her third collection The Hallucinogenic Effects of Breathing is from the same press, published May 2003. She won a Northern Promise Award this year to continue research into her sequence of poems on the composer Shostakovitch. Joanna received mentoring, as part of the Award, from David Morley of Warwick University. Follow the links to read Joanna's pieces on this site: A Visitation The Might of a Pig Bulletin I Could Bless This Secluded Island The Woman In White If I Were a Giant

Diane Cockburn

To say Diane Cockburn has an unusual view of life is an understatement. Her style is black humour with a slight bias towards vegetables, moths and assorted toothed creatures. She was brought up in Belfast during the Troubles, so Death regularly appears in various guises: sometimes as a potato, sometimes as a mound of saturated fat. Her first collection, Under Surveillance was published in 1999 by Vane Women Press. You can also seek her out at the sign of the sanctuary knocker . . . She is to be found on Durham Writers. Diane joined Vane Women in February 2001. Follow the links to read Diane's pieces on this site: Advice On Being Offered Hawthorn Blossom Hair Today Do You Fancy a Paddle? Growing Green Following Tradition

Anne Hine

Anne Hine is a poet who thinks deeply, unafraid of questions of spirituality in a world often violent and uncaring. A love of language, sensual word-play and humour make her poetry speak as it enlightens. She has lived in the North for the last twenty years and has used her many life experiences as material for her writing. Her first collection Dark Matters was published by Vane Women Press in 2001. See Lowdown. Follow the links to read Anne's pieces on this site: Out of Whom Seven Devils Were Cast Female am I Sea Offerings Blank Page Syndrome Concluding Pink Pebbles

Pru Kitching

Pru Kitching: born in Sunderland, schooled in North Yorkshire and County Durham; wrote a lot; trained in theatre in Manchester; wrote a lot; married a painter and was widowed; didn't write; ran away to Copenhagen; travelled a lot; came back to Weardale in the North Pennines; writes a lot again. Her first collection All Aboard the Moving Staircase was published by Vane Women Press in 2004. She joined Vane Women in 2006. Follow the links to read Pru's pieces on this site: I Am

S.J. Litherland

S.J. Litherland's work encompasses love, politics, loss, and philosophy. She has five published collections of poetry, The Long Interval (Bloodaxe 1986) Flowers of Fever (Iron Press 1992) The Apple Exchange (Flambard 1999), a four-part book, The Work of the Wind published by Flambard in July 2006, and a sequence of poems about former England cricketer Nasser Hussain The Homage from Iron Press, October 2006. Her work has appeared in various anthologies, New Women Poets (Bloodaxe), Forward Book of Poetry 2001 and North by North-East (Iron) She has received two Northern Writers' Awards for her writing. Originally from Warwickshire, she has lived in Durham City since 1965, bringing up a son and daughter. She has four grandsons. Follow the links to read her pieces on this site: Aneirin and the Sea Fears at Fourteen Sonnet 61 Enginehouse near Burnthouses XXXI Durham Bus Station XXII The Eclipse for Linda The Quartz in Your Valley for Barry MacSweeney

Dorothy Long

Dorothy, Dot to her friends, is wife, lover, mother, grandmother, ex-teacher, borough councillor and for one year only, Mayor of the Borough of Darlington. Her work, mostly poetry with the odd short story reflects this varied world. Family, friends, loves and irritations, politics and prejudices are her subjects and to write a novel is her ambition. Domestic in scale, though varied in style, her poetry demonstrates an interest in pattern and form, repetition of sound and rhyme. Follow the links to read Dorothy's pieces on this site: No Random Loving One Lamp Louie Beach Betty Blue Dresses Big Top

Marilyn Longstaff

Did lots of writing for work and politics; made up stories and silly rhymes for children; flirted with academic style in pursuit of higher qualifications; creativity moved from knitting to writing in 1994 when she joined a women's writing class at Darlington Arts Centre. Since then she has read a fair amount, been on a few courses, done an MA in Creative Writing at Newcastle University, had stuff published in magazines, received a Northern Promise Award from New Writing North. She has two published collections of poetry: Puritan Games Vane Women Press 2001; Sitting Among the Hoppers Arrowhead Press, 2004. At present, she is trying to write the odd thing and learn how to be an editor for Vane Women Press. Follow the links to read Marilyn's pieces on this site: Abandoned Homework Darlington Tea and Puns Engine House (Burnthouses) Promoted to Glory Dale View Gayle Maud

Pat Maycroft

On the fells of the upper Gaunless Valley in the wind, rain and snow is the place where Pat feels at home. A visual artist who writes about the history of place, the events of daily life, of death, and of the after life. In 1998 Pat gained a first class Honours Degree in Photography at Cleveland College of Art and Design. As a member of the Royal Photographic Society she is currently recording some of the Nation's listed buildings to provide images for a web site created by English Heritage. Through this work and the discovery of ancient parish boundary stones, Pat has been inspired to write some of her best poems, appearing here. A major selection of her photography appears with poetry from Pat and Vane Women in Northern Grit (Vane Women Press) launched at Durham Lit. Fest and Darlington Arts Centre in July 2002. Why not take a look at some of her photographs? www.imagesofengland.org.uk Follow the links to read Pat's pieces on this site: Inglenook II Halloween Thought for the Day Eggleston greets Marwood Traffic Choked City Yellow Tulip Stone

Chris Powell

Chris Powell lives in Weardale and teaches performing arts in Sunderland. On her journeys between the two she composes fragments of deathless prose in her head, and then forgets most of them. A number of the stories she has managed to recall have been published in various magazines and anthologies and broadcast on Radio 4 in the afternoon reading slot. Her first collection of short stories Burning the Blue Winged Boys was published by Vane Women Press in 2005. Chris joined Vane Women in 2006. Follow the links to read Chris's pieces on this site: Extract from Adele's Amazing Electric Shepherd

Margaret Rule

Margaret Rule is a mixture of Yorkshire common sense and dry humour which her work reflects in every line. She has been writing for fifteen years since retiring from thirty years teaching, mainly in Darlington. She is a wife, mother and grandmother. Her work has been published in various newspapers and magazines including The Yorkshire Journal, Northern Grit and Rewriting the Map. Her first collection The Right Amount of Vinegar was launched by Vane Women Press in October 2005 at the Gala Theatre, Durham Follow the links to read Margaret's pieces on this site: Job Satisfaction Black Shoes Autumn in the Borders Blues Thrown Out of Orbit Colonel Noah Shepherdess

Judy Walker

Judy Walker lives in Hexham and is a freelance public relations consultant. She writes short stories and when she grows up would like to be a novelist. Judy finds inspiration often comes (inconveniently) when driving - from Radio Four programmes if she is alone or from the eavesdroppings of her three teenage children when they are passengers. She writes about oddball and outsider characters and, worryingly for her elder sibling, finds the difficult relationship between sisters is a recurrent theme in her work. She has won a few short story competitions and was runner up in a competition, organised by Radio Four arts programme Front Row, to write the opening of a novel featuring an accountant as the main character. She joined Vane Women in 2006. Follow the links to read Judy's pieces on this site: Small Town Love Party Time White Elephants and Other Mumbo Jumbo Up Is Like Down Portrait of Andre

Annie Wright

Annie's hot first pamphlet collection Including Sex was published by The Bay Press in 1995. An original and scrupulous writer, her work is rich in sexual lyricism. The poems are sensual, and often frankly sexual, full of taut phrases and energetic explosions of imagery. Her long awaited first full collection Redemption Songs from Arrowhead Press, published April 2003, was described by Fred D'Aguiar as "unabashedly erotic". She is literacy consultant to Darlington LEA's primary schools and loves working with teachers and children on effective ways to develop and improve their creative writing. An experienced workshop leader, Annie has led writing sessions with writers aged four to seventy plus! Her current obsessions are with the interplay between art, sculpture, landscape and male/female relationships. Follow the links to read Annie's pieces on this site: The Night is Holding its Breath Lovebites Dog days Clerihews Star Man Chaos Theory Resting Place