Guildford diary: The Bell tolls

It is Guildford’s turn to pick up the literary baton and kick off its 10-day Book Festival. Here is the first of our dispatches from Surrey.

At the summit of the sprawling city of Guildford, with its cobbled streets and quaint hideaways, looms the Cathedral famed for featuring in The Omen.  Last night its bells tolled to the sound of Martin Bell reciting from his new book of light-tongued but ominous verse (he prefers to call it ‘verse’ than ‘poetry’), For Whom the Bell Tolls.  

‘The Man in the White Suit’ is sitting in his dressing room prior to his Guildford talk dressed, predictably, in his ‘white suit’, which is actually cream.  Does he have John Donne or Ernest Hemingway in mind with this title? Donne, via Hemingway. It’s a title on loan. Martin Bell insists that his new book, which is his first ever poetry, sorry, ‘verse’ book, is a bit of fun.