The Writers of Wales Database

RICHARDSON, SUSAN

Email: susan@susanrichardsonwriter.co.uk
Website: http://www.susanrichardsonwriter.co.uk/

Poet, performer, playwright and educator. Susan was born in Monmouthshire and studied/lived/worked in London, the USA, Canada and Australia before returning to her native Wales. Her collection of poetry, Creatures of the Intertidal Zone (Cinnamon Press) was inspired by her journey, for which she received a Churchill Memorial Travel Fellowship, through Iceland, Greenland and Newfoundland in the footsteps of an intrepid eleventh century female Viking, and one of the themes is the impact of environmental issues on the Arctic and sub-Arctic. She has also been published in numerous journals and anthologies including Horizon Review, Long Poem Magazine, Acumen and Poetry Wales.

Susan is one of the poets-in-residence on BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Live and was commissioned to write and perform poetry for BBC2’s coverage of the 2009 Chelsea Flower Show. She regularly performs her work at festivals and environmental events throughout the country: recent bookings include the Dark Mountain Festival, Runnymede International Festival of Literature, Leamington Peace Festival, Chester Literature Festival, Ludlow Green Festival and Petersfield Write Angle. Together with writer Siobhan Logan, Susan is also a founding member of the Polar Poets: they are currently performing Arctic-ulate, their multi-media show which interweaves poetry, storytelling, monologue and music, at both Theatre and Science Festivals.

Susan is also currently collaborating with a visual artist on a project which explores environmental and mythological themes relating to the Far North. A collecion of their poetry and prints, Up There Where the Air is Rarefied, will be published by Cinnamon Press in 2011, while a joint exhibition is now touring galleries in Wales and beyond.

As an educator, Susan has more than fourteen years’ experience of running creative writing workshops. She has tutored for Cardiff University, Bristol University, Nottingham Trent University (online tuition), the Open University, West Wales Eco-Centre, the Women’s Arts Association, Disability Arts Cymru, the Welsh Refugee Council, Cinetig Animation Company and the Open College of the Arts. She has run workshops at primary and secondary schools, residential homes and hospices, coaxing poetry from children as young as 3 and adults as old as 96. She also offers private tuition and mentoring, while her ongoing programme of Wild Writing Workshops, which combine writing and walking in an inspiring wilderness location, have taken her to the Fort William Mountain Festival and the Avebury Pilgrims’ Weekend of the Gatekeeper Trust.

In addition, Susan has held several writing residencies – at Swansea University, for the National Association of Local Government Arts Officers and for the Anorexia and Bulimia Association of Australia. She has won a Classic FM Woman of Tomorrow award for her writing and educational work and has also received both a Leverhulme Trust Fellowship and a Rotary Foundation Amabassadorial Scholarship. Susan is a Member of The Welsh Academy and a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Reviews:
With respect to Creatures of the Intertidal Zone (Cinnamon Press, 2007)

"…This is free verse at its finest…I can still feel its impact on my heart.."
Poet Ann Drysdale

"…Susan Richardson beautifully marries the landscape of the polar regions with their - and her own - emotional topography. I particularly admire her spirited recreation of Gudrid, that enchanting eleventh century Viking heroine.."
Travel writer Sara Wheeler


Selected Publications:
Two Of Me Now (The Bloomsbury Heritage Series) (Cecil Woolf Publishing, 2000)
Creatures of the Intertidal Zone (Cinnamon Press, 2007)
Where the Air is Rarefied (Cinnamon Press, 2011)

Contributed to:
Even the Rain is Different (contributor) (Honno, 2005)
Dance the Guns to Silence (contributor) (Flipped Eye Publishing, 2005)
The Lie of the Land (contributor) (Cinnamon Press, 2006)
Welsh and Proud Of It! (contributor) (Pont, 2007)
Poems of Love and Longing (contributor) (Pont, 2008)
In the Telling (co-editor) (Cinnamon Press, 2009)
A Wilder Vein (contributor) (Two Ravens Press, 2009)



Two Of Me Now (The Bloomsbury Heritage Series) (Cecil Woolf Publishing, 2000)

Poetic drama about the lives and work of Virginia Woolf and Sylvia Plath, exploring the issues of biological and literary motherhood.









Creatures of the Intertidal Zone (Cinnamon Press, 2007)

Poetry collection inspired by Susan’s journey through Iceland, Greenland and Newfoundland in the footsteps of an intrepid tenth century female Viking.

To purchase this title from gwales.com, please click on its front cover

Eligible Writers on Tour subjects offered:

1. Read, perform and discuss own work
2. General creative writing workshops
3. Wild Writing Workshops, combining writing and walking in an inspiring outdoor location
4. Eco-poetry workshops, encouraging participants to engage with their natural environment, and our changing world, through poetry
5. Other specialised creative writing workshops, including autobiography, travel writing, playwriting and crime fiction
6. Writing therapy workshops aimed at, for example, people with disabilities, eating disorders or serious illnesses such as cancer

AGE RANGE: All groups considered