In 2011, the Southbank Centre hosted the Festival of Britain to mark its fiftieth anniversary. Not wanting to be outdone this year, they are staging the Festival of the World. Last night, Westminster’s arty crowd crossed the bridge to toast this ambitiously titled project.
The evening was worth the walk, with flowing Pol and also a impromptu compulsory poetry reading. Simon Armitage informed ex-ministers (like Tessa Jowell) and Lib Dem wannabes (like Don Foster) that poets were the real lawmakers with the ‘constituency of the heart, the chief whip of the head and constitution of imagination.’ Foster shut his eyes and even swayed slightly to take in the words.
Visiting London to oversee an assembly of poets, as part of the grimly named ‘Cultural Olympiad’, the dry poet was less excited about the actual Olympics: ‘I’d like to see a return to old fashioned events… like jumping off buildings.’ Now that is one Olympic ticket I’d fork out for, depending on who was competing of course. If you are intrigued by Armitage’s Poetry Parnassus, ‘tickets are available from the box office of corrupt poetry officials’.
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