All the wonder of words in Trentham

WHAT began with a book launch twenty years ago has grown into what is arguably Trentham’s biggest community event.

Words in Winter Festival will mark its milestone birthday with another month-long series of events which gets started tomorrow.

The festival is a celebration of the power and delight of language through words – written, spoken, played or sung; through poetry, storytelling, composing and competing.

Workshops, dinners, Scrabble and trivia are among many events and activities on the program until 31 August.

Competitions include 50-word stories, six-word stories, bush and contemporary poetry, short stories and crosswords.

Event highlights include a dinner and book launch with chef and restaurateur Annie Smithers and a writers’ workshop with the author of The Dressmaker, Rosalie Ham.

Smithers will be launching her fourth book, Kitchen Sentimental.

A new addition is an event called Let The Instruments Speak which will explore how the sounds of music can be translated into words.

It will be led by Flinders Quartet cellist Zoe Knighton with input from historical instrument specialist Simon Rickard and the duo Newbury Fog.

The festival culminates on 31 August with Squirm, a humourous storytelling event hosted by RedBeard Historic Bakery manager Todd Dales in a night of sharing life’s most embarrassing, uncomfortable and cringeworthy moments.

“It is rare to have two outstanding musicians playing together in our little town, and to have a leading author presenting a writing workshop,” organising committee member Sylvia Johnson said.

“Plus, we are thrilled that renowned chef, author and farmer Annie Smithers is launching her fourth book with us.”

Ms Johnson said the festival had grown steadily over the years and developed from the 2004 book launch and informal bush poetry sessions in the town.

“There’s no grand design, it just evolves,” Ms Johnson said. “It’s an event that sits very well with this little town.”

Organised by a core group of six, the festival enjoys strong support from Trentham businesses and community organisations.

It has also just won a $500 grant from the Red Room Poetry Foundation – one of only eight grants around the country – as recognition of its range of poetry and storytelling events.

Ms Johnson said apart from being very popular with locals, the festival also hopefully contributed to preserving the English language.

“We’ve lost the art of expressing ourselves,” she said. “It reinforces the written word and the spoken word.”

Full details of events are available at wordsinwintertrentham.org and the Facebook page.