Waiting for Godden: Photo Story: A beautiful night at Journey to Nutopia, Salena Godden & Friends at The Cockpit Theatre

Hello! We had such a beautiful night at Journey to Nutopia, An Evening with Salena Godden & Friends, at The Cockpit Theatre this week. Thank you so much to all who came along to see us and support us. Thanks to Michelle Olly and The Cockpit & Journey To Nutopia team. Thanks to these mighty writers and poets with their profoundly beautiful and powerful work and generous spirit. These black and white photos just arrived, taken by Chris Beschi, so will share here on my blog in a photo story. Thank you so much my amazing friends Oakley Flanagan, Rosa Rankin-Gee, Kat Francois, Oli Spleen and Heidi James. Make sure you seek them all out, follow their posts and tweets and buy all their books! Highly recommended! It was such a gorgeous event. I really enjoyed sharing Mrs Death Misses Death in the Cockpit Theatre. Loved every minute and love you! My heart is all full up.

Thank you so much! Xx

Heidi James is the author of critically acclaimed novels Wounding, So the Doves (a Sunday Times' Crime Book of the Month) and The Sound Mirror. She won The Saboteur Award for her novella, The Mesmerist’s Daughter and was a finalist in The Cinnamon Poetry Collection Prize. Her short stories, poetry and essays have been published various anthologies including, We’ll Never Have Paris, Somesuch, Dazed and Confused and Galley Beggar Press. She hosts a podcast, First Graft, where she discusses the writing process with other writers.

Twitter @heidipearljames & Insta @heidipearljames

Oli Spleen is an author and musician who decided if he were to survive his hospitalisation from an AIDS related emergency, he would write his way to a better future. The resulting novel “Depravikazi” was published in 2003 by Running Water Publications. At the Brighton launch of the book his first band “The Flesh Happening” was formed. In 2009 he formed the band “Pink Narcissus” and in 2013 released a solo album “Fag Machine” which spawned the eponymous weekly club-night showcasing live original LGBT+ music in Brighton. In 2017 he formed his third band “Spleen” and in 2019 he released his second solo studio album “Gaslight Illuminations”. April 1st 2022 saw the launch of Spleen’s fifth studio album “Still Life”, an album about life in the shadow of and in spite of death. Its themes encompass nature, the environment, mortality, grief, life, death, mass extinction of species, displaced people and the general human experience of existence in the 2020’s.
Twitter @olispleen & Insta @olispleen

Kat François is an Educator, Poetry & Drama Performance Artist and Teacher, Playwright, Life Coach and Fitness Instructor. BBC TV and World Slam Champion. She has written and performed acclaimed shows includingRaising Lazarus, dealing with the experiences of Caribbean soldiers in WW1. Kat has appeared on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row, Saturday Live and Woman’s Hour, Radio 5 Live, Sky and BBC television. She also runs a poetry and theatre performance group with young people. Twitter @katfrancois & Insta @katfrancoispoet

Rosa Rankin-Gee is the author of two novels: The Last Kings of Sark, which won Shakespeare and Company’s Paris Literary Prize, and Dreamland, set in a near-future Margate, described as “liquid grace and glinting sparkle” (The Observer), “enthralling… blazing bright” (The Guardian), “superb” (The New European) and “a triumph” (GQ). Her work has appeared in Esquire, The Paris Review Daily, The New Yorker & Vogue. Twitter @rosarankingee & Insta @rosarankingee

Oakley Flanagan is a writer, poet and playwright. As a playwright: ‘This Queer House’, VAULT Festival, directed by Masha Kevinovna, produced by OPIA Collective. Their poetry appears in bath magg, Poetry London, Under the Radar and Wasafiri, as well as anthologised work for 3 of Cups Press, Hachette UK, Trapeze and Verve Poetry Press. They are a member of The London Library Emerging Writer Programme and an alum of Roundhouse Poetry Collective. Their pamphlet is forthcoming with Out-Spoken Press 2022–3 Publishing Programme from Out-Spoken Press available HERE