Don Paterson at UEA

The first session of the Spring Festival at UEA kicked off with Don Paterson - and that is where we were tonight, which is why it is late, and why this is not going to be a long piece. Enough to say the place looked pretty well packed out and that means about 600+ people. Don reads chiefly from Rain and some new sonnets.

Dinner afterwards with Don, Lavinia, JC, KS, C and myself - much conversation about the brain and determinism. Much about poetry generally.

I could mention the visit of Prince Charles to UEA earlier in the afternoon -the camel-coloured overcoat, the bald patch from two floors up. For some reason I didn't know he was due so the police presence was a puzzle. Then the students line up, a few with flags, and eventually there he is, milling about. It's interesting how the milling seems perfectly acceptable. It's a close and intimate milling. I don't see a lot of security men but maybe they are dressed as students. Maybe they are busy passing exams. Maybe they are the UEA rabbits of which there are many at various seasons. Security rabbits.

In the meantime I see Chris Reid has won the overall Costa. Congratulation to Chris. That should keep him in coffee for a while.