Shropshire Star

Celebrating Oswestry's literary legends

An Oswestry man is putting Shropshire back on the literary map by staging a week-long festival celebrating his town's most famous former resident, the First World War poet Wilfred Owen.

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John WaineFrom Mary Webb to Edith Pargeter, Shropshire isn't short of inspiring literary connections.

But one Oswestry man is putting the county back on the literary map by staging a week-long festival celebrating his town's most famous former resident, the First World War poet Wilfred Owen, as well as works from emerging and established local writers.

John Waine, who tweets from @BestOfOswestry, is organising the Oswestry Festival of the Word, which will feature written work, spoken word and song from the rich creative pool in and around the county.

"I got the idea last September when I noticed we had three great bookshops in the town," explains John.

"Oswestry didn't have a bookshop for many years so to have these three, as well as the background of Wilfred Owen which hadn't really been fully explored, I thought it would be a great time to showcase the area's creative talent from the past and present."

The festival takes place between March 13th and 20th at various venues across the town, including the library, The Ironworks, Booka bookshop and The Walls.

John has organised a colourful schedule of lectures from people like Angela Huth, author of Land Girls, Catherine Cooper, a local author and illustrator of children's books, and Dominic Hibberd, who wrote the last biography on Wilfred Owen.

Oswestry poets and writers will have a chance to perform their work at The Ironworks, while photographer Ben Osborne, former Wildlife Photographer of the Year, will give an illustrated talk about his work on the BBC's spectacular Planet Earth series.

On March 18th, Wilfred Owen's birthday, Shrewsbury author and ex-Chairman of the Wilfred Owen Association, Helen McPhail, will be giving an evening talk on the poet, exploring his greatest works and local roots.

John, who keeps twitterers up to date on the event through his dedicated Twitter page @OswestryLitFest, believes the town has a lot to be proud of."The Wilfred Owen connection is really inspiring.

He was born in Oswestry and there are lots of echoes of his past around the town.

"Even into the present day, there's such a lot of creative talent throughout Oswestry, Shropshire and the Marches, and we really want to show people what we have to offer."

As well as organising the festival, John runs The Best of Oswestry, a popular internet resource and events guide for residents and tourists.

He believes it's important to keep growing the area and giving people reasons to come into the town.

"I'm always thinking of how many ways we can get some life and energy into Oswestry, and make the best use of what's already there," he says.

"There's so much going on in the town and so many hidden gems that people don't know about, so it's a great way to showcase the very best of what we have to offer."

Find out more at www.thebestofoswestry.co.uk

By Lara Page

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