Poetry and Prose programme

Tread lightly:
Richmond Park
leave no mark in Richmond Park
A tribute to its unique beauty and wildlife
www.frp.org.uk
David Harsent
The Friends of Richmond Park is honoured to have Sir David
Attenborough as a Patron. A long time resident of Richmond,
his foreword in the Friends’ Guide to Richmond Park states:
“Richmond Park is a very special place for me... its wildlife
is exceptional particularly for somewhere so close to a major
urban centre”.
Sir David is also the Patron of the Friends’ Ponds & Streams
programme which has raised money for the restoration
and creation of ponds in Richmond Park, including the
new Jubilee Pond, opened for the Queen’s Jubilee, and
Attenborough Pond, opened by Sir David in 2014.
After roles as Controller of BBC2 and later BBC’s Director
of Programmes, Sir David travelled the globe for over 50
years making wildlife programmes bringing the wonders of
the natural world to the TV screen. He wrote and presented
all 13 parts of Life on Earth (1979), later producing The
Living Planet and The Trials of Life. His other groundbreaking series include The Blue Planet, Planet Earth, the
biggest nature documentary ever made for television, and
Frozen Planet. Life Story was his most recent project with
the BBC who have indicated that Sir David is involved in
another major series.
David Harsent premieres his new poem commissioned by
the Friends of Richmond Park to promote the protection
and conservation in Richmond Park.
David won the 2014 TS Eliot award (“the Oscar of British
poetry”, The Guardian) for his book Fire Songs and has
published 9 other collections of poetry which, between
them, have won 7 awards. Chair of judges Helen Dunmore
described Fire Songs as combining “ language and emotion
with technical brilliance and dramatic power”. Previous
winners of the TS Eliot Award include Seamus Heaney,
Derek Walcott and Ted Hughes.
David has written extensively for the opera stage, working
with a number of composers, but most often with Sir
Harrison Birtwistle. He made his Royal Opera House debut
in 1991 as librettist for Birtwistle’s critically-acclaimed
Gawain returning in 2008 with his libretto for Birtwistle’s
The Minotaur. A Birtwistle double bill – The Corridor and
The Cure – opened at the Aldeburgh Festival this month
and will shortly come to the Linbury Theatre at the ROH.
A new production of Huw Watkins In the Locked Room
opens in Hamburg next month.
David is Professor of Creative Writing at the University of
Roehampton and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Richmond Park is more than a park; it is a National Nature Reserve, a European Special
Area of Conservation and London’s largest Site of Special Scientific Interest. It is home to
130,000 trees including 1,100 veteran oaks, 1,300 beetle species, 60 species of nesting
birds, myriad butterflies and insects and, of course, 630 red and fallow deer. And it is
loved and enjoyed by 5.5 million visitors every year.
Since it was enclosed by Charles I in 1637, it has been been lauded in poetry and prose
celebrating the wonder of its wildlife. Today’s selection of texts feature the Park’s flora and
fauna that make it so special but which are threatened with disease, climate change and
the pressure of the love of the many.
We’re delighted to welcome Friends of Richmond Park patron Sir David Attenborough and TS
Eliot award-winning poet David Harsent who today premieres a new Richmond Park poem.
Graphic Design: Vesna Brekalo
Sir David Attenborough
Photograph courtesy of Andrew Wilson
300 years of poetry and prose
Special guest
Sir David Attenborough
Premiere of a new poem by David Harsent, winner of the 2014 TS Eliot Award
Readers Anthony Calf, Julian Glover,
Stella Gonet, Julia Watson
Today’s celebration is also for the new memorial in Poets
Corner dedicated to 18th century poet James Thomson who
lived in Richmond. Other writers featured include: Alfred Lord
Tennyson, Percy Bysshe Shelley, William Henry Hudson, Edward
Thomas, Rosemary Dobson, John Clare, Lawrence Sail and
winners from the Friends’ 2012 competition Poems in the Park.
Sponsored by
Today's readers
Programme
We're delighted to welcome four very talented local actors who have all
kindly agreed to give their time freely today to read our selection of texts.
Please give them a warm welcome.
Today's poetry, prose, writers and readers
Anthony Calf
Julian Glover
Stella Gonet
Julia Watson
Anthony is a true local boy;
born in Hammersmith, he
studied at LAMDA in West
Kensington and lives in
Barnes. He is a prolific stage,
and screen actor. Theatre roles
include: David Hare’s The
Power of Yes, Harold Pinter’s
Betrayal, Alan Bennett’s
The Madness of George III
and, most recently, starring
in Tom Stoppard’s new play,
The Hard Problem, all at the
National Theatre, with many
West End appearances.
TV credits include as novelist
Lawrence Durrell in My
Family and Other Animals,
Pip in Great Expectations
and Colonel Fitzwilliam
in the BBC’s Pride and
Prejudice. Other TV work
includes: Call The Midwife,
Lewis, Doc Martin, Holby
City and a 10 year run in
New Tricks.
In 2010 Calf played the
Foreign Secretary Anthony
Eden in the BBC’s revival
of Upstairs, Downstairs,
reprising his stage role as Eden
in Howard Brenton’s Never
So Good (2008). Film
appearances include Anna
Karenina, The Madness of
King George, and Oxford
Blues.
RADA trained Julian Glover
has had an illustrious stage
and screen career. In 1993,
he won the Laurence Olivier
Award for Best Supporting
Actor in the title role of the
RSC’s Henry IV, parts 1
and 2 and has played many
of Shakespeare’s leading
roles including King Lear at
Shakespeare’s Globe.
Other theatre includes Lionel
Bart’s Oliver, Ronald
Harwood’s The Dresser,
Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for
Godot and Tom Stoppard’s
Jumpers.
Recently he has been
performing in the acclaimed
production of The Scottsboro
Boys, at the Young Vic
and in the West End.
Since the 1980s, Julian has
given interpretations of the
epic Anglo-Saxon poem,
Beowulf, a project he has
passed to his actor son, Jamie.
Julian’s film work includes
the Bond film For Your Eyes
Only, Indiana Jones and the
Last Crusade, Cry Freedom
and The Young Victoria
and his extensive TV work
includes the role of Grand
Maester Pycelle in HBO’s
Game of Thrones. In 2013 he
was awarded the CBE.
Stella hails from Greenock
and trained at The Royal
Conservatoire of Scotland
in Glasgow. She has a
substantial stage and screen
career including numerous
RSC productions; Measure
for Measure, A Midsummer
Night’s Dream, Divine
Gossip, Three Sisters, The
Revengers Tragedy and
Heresies. Her National
Theatre credits include
Skylight, Racing Demon,
The Shaughraun, The Voysey
Inheritance and Hamlet
as well as numerous West
End plays including last
year, where Stella enjoyed a
successful run in Handbagged
playing Margaret Thatcher.
Stella’s film and television
credits include Nicholas
Nickelby, starring
alongside Tom Courtenay,
Christopher Plummer and
Juliet Stevenson, Siblings,
Silk, Outnumbered, Lewis
and Foyle’s War as well as
long-running roles in House
of Eliot and Holby City.
Married to actor Nicholas
Farrell, the couple have costarred in several productions.
Julia, another Barnes
resident, studied drama and
English at Exeter University
and has been involved in
education as well as being a
professional stage, TV and
radio actor.
Among her substantial
theatre work, she has
appeared at the National
Theatre in George Bernard
Shaw’s Major Barbara
and Georg Büchner’s
Danton’s Death as well as
in productions in numerous
leading regional theatres
including Bristol Old Vic,
Bath’s Theatre Royal, York’s
Theatre Royal and the
Nottingham Playhouse.
Local theatre-goers will
particularly recognise her
as a regular at Richmond’s
Orange Tree including roles
in Ibsen’s Love’s Comedy,
Githa Sowerby’s The
Stepmother and Stern’s The
Man Who Pays the Piper.
Julia is also a stalwart of
many popular TV series such
as Doctors and Casualty
in which she was a leading
member of the cast for nearly
20 years.
Julia is married to writer,
poet and librettist, David
Harsent.
Author
Text
Introduction by Ron Crompton, Chairman, Friends of Richmond Park
Reader
James Thomson
Julia Watson
Extracts from Summer from The Seasons
William Henry Hudson Extracts from A Hind In Richmond Park
Julian Glover
Rosemary Dobson
A Walk In Richmond Park
Stella Gonet
Edward Thomas
Extracts from Winter in Richmond Park, from
the book 'The Woodland Life'
Stella Gonet
Percy Bysshe Shelley
To A Skylark
Anthony Calf
Wildlife and conservation in Richmond Park: Sir David Attenborough & Ron Crompton
Tennyson
The Oak
Julian Glover
Lawrence Sail
Stag Beetle
Julia Watson
John Clare
Insects
Anthony Calf
Tennyson
The Brook
Stella Gonet
Alan Franks
Common Ground
Julian Glover
Patricia Moore
September
Julia Watson
Peter Woan
Richmond Park Stories
Anthony Calf
Chris Rice
Kingfisher, Beverley Brook
Stella Gonet
David Harsent
A new poem commissioned by the Friends of
Richmond Park
David Harsent
James Thomson
Extracts from the writer’s most famous work
All four readers
Poets Corner and the James Thomson memorial
James Thomson, a son of the Manse, lived in Richmond from
1727 and was famed in his lifetime as a writer and poet, his most
famous work being The Seasons (some of which we hear today).
He is memorialised both in the Scott Monument in Edinburgh and
in Richmond Park's Poets Corner where his memorial and the area
around it has just been remodelled and upgraded.