Join me for a 'wild writing' workshop, playing with words to produce a creative piece of work at Suffolk Wildlife Trust’s breathtaking Carlton Marshes Nature Reserve

Come and spend a day juggling words and letting them settle onto the page, inspired by the breathtaking combination of water, land and sky that is Carlton Marshes Nature Reserve.

We will take as our theme the experience of being connected to nature through the five senses.

The Literary Landscapes Workshop is a day to experience, learn, write and share your love of words. Make a sensory connection with nature and capture its essence by producing a short blog style essay. This is a day for anyone experienced or novice who wants to transfer their love of nature to the page.

I am fascinated by plants and people and their interactions in landscapes over time and place. Trained as a historian and a scientist I am is always looking for ways to weave my writing between the two.

Tea and coffee will be provided throughout the day. Ideally, please bring your own re-usable mug, or a flask if you prefer.

You will also need:
A packed lunch - although light meals are available to pre-order from the cafe in the morning and will be served at lunchtime. 
Whatever you normally use to write on and with: paper, pen, electronic formats + charging equipment;
Notepad and pen for the reserve time;
A mobile phone or similar equipment for recording short pieces;
A camera if you wish;

A perch stool if you prefer to sit but don’t wish to use a reserve bench. 

Please dress suitably for the weather and for walking around on the reserve, where it may be very muddy

To book and see the terms and conditions please the Suffolk Wildlife Trust website

Exhibition Opening – 29 June 2019

Fragile Earth: seeds, weeds, plastic crust deals with the most urgent topic of the day: climate change.  It looks at the agency of plant and animal life, romantic notions of nature, human extraction of materials, global networks of trade, production of waste and questions of responsibility.  The exhibition includes existing works from the 1970s to today by 19 artists from across the globe with video, installation, drawing and sculpture. New commissions engage with the characteristics of the Tees Valley.

We have a day of making, exhibition tours, music, Community Lunch plus special guests.  ‘Remarkable Plants’ authors Helen and William Bynum will give an illustrated talk on the plants that shape our world and launch a publication written especially for the exhibition. Our Art Trolley focuses on imaginative activities that support the environment and the future of the planet.

11:00 – 12:00      Curator-led tour of Fragile Earth: seeds, weeds, plastic crust

11:00 – 13:00      Live Illustration of ‘Endlings’ with artist Amy Dover

12:15 – 12:45      The Middlesbrough Winter Garden, a talk by Dr Tosh Warwick,

Research Associate and Heritage Consultant

13:00 – 14:00     Lunch provided by MIMA Kitchen

13:00 – 16:00    Art Trolley and The Barrow activities

14:00 – 15:30    Illustrated talk by Helen and William Bynum

Tuberculosis is a contagious, infectious disease. It has been a harsh challenge over much of human history. Now, medics and scientists are grappling with the rising threat of drug-resistant tuberculosis - devastating when combined with HIV.  

That deadly combination has caused significant public health crises in recent decades – a topic which Dr Derek Sloan will explore at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (the “College”), in a one-off public event on tuberculosis: past and present (2 April).  

Dr Sloan will discuss his first-hand experiences of drug-resistant tuberculosis and HIV in South Africa, where he was based as a senior medical officer and tuberculosis lead (for Hlabisa sub-district in kwaZulu Natal) in 2005-6. He will also outline the vital programmes designed to develop treatments for drug-resistant tuberculosis and to speed up treatment times.

In contrast, Dr Helen Bynum will examine the long, dark history of tuberculosis – including how the medical community have managed and mismanaged this brutal killer. She will say that tuberculosis patients were treated initially through rest and fresh air in secluded sanatoria – then later with a cocktail of antibiotics as new medical treatments were discovered.

Ahead of the event, Dr Bynum said:

“Tuberculosis is characterised as a social disease, one that has dogged humankind for millennia. The very mention of tuberculosis brings to mind romantic images of great literary figures pouring out their souls in creative works,  their bodies seemingly consumed by this awful disease. If tuberculous is a disease that at various times has had a strange glamour associated with it, its recent history is incredibly complex too.

“It is of great concern that tuberculosis has emerged again in the developed world, both among the poorest in urban society and in association with another deadly infection – HIV/AIDS. The disease has returned with a vengeance, in drug-resistant form. Sadly its story is far from over.”

While the cases of tuberculosis are at their lowest point in Britain for 35 years, it was estimated that England still has one of the highest rates of tuberculosis in Western Europe with just under 5,200 affected in 2017. In 2017, 34 people died of tuberculosis in Scotland.

Join Drs Bynum and Sloan as they explore tuberculosis – past and present – at this one off event on Tuesday 2 April, from 6PM. Please book through Eventbrite.

Boerhaave Nascholing Infectious Diseases 2018

I am delighted to be giving an after dinner lecture at the National Infectious Disease Congress in the Netherlands "Boerhaave Nascholing Infectious Diseases 2018".  

On Thursday evening I will explore the rise of the public dispensary movement in early 20th century Britain. These tax-payer funded dispensaries were established after the National Health Insurance Act of 1911. 

I'm focusing on the dispensary, known as the Prevention of Tuberculosis Department at the Royal Hospital for Diseases of the Chest, City Road, London. This dispensary served the people of Shoreditch, Finsbury and Islington South.

I want to talk about getting this initiative up and running, while keeping its many stakeholders (moderately) happy.  

Could the dispensary deliver their goals and improve tuberculosis care in these deprived London boroughs?

TB remains both stigmatising and a disease of social exclusion, problems which the dispensary had to acknowledge and attempt to tackle along with the coughs and night sweats, undernourishment and overcrowding. 

Two days after my talk, 24 March 2018 is #WorldTBDay2018. This year's slogan is Leaders for a TB-free world Would the Dispensary staff have made the grade?

Finished drawings are lauded in histories of botanical art, preparatory sketches often get forgotten. We have brought these vivid, spontaneous records gloriously back into the light, in Botanical Sketchbooks as we delved into archives and attics looking for sketchbooks, field notes, notes, personal journals, works on vellum, herbarium sheets and letters and even a drawing on the back of an envelope. Which famous botanist made that one? What stories can these sketches reveal about their creators and the natural world?

We are delighted to be talking about the making of botanical sketches and Botanical Sketchbooks @ilklitfest as part of their Ways of Seeing thread.